Proto-Samic
Proto-Samic is the reconstructed last common ancestor of the Samic languages. It was spoken in the 1st millennium CE in the area of modern-day northern Finland. (If extinct southern languages are included, this dating will likely become both older and more southern. Stem-group para-Samic languages have from toponymic evidence once been spoken as far south as the Baltic coast)
Sound changes from Proto-Uralic
Possibly original:
- e → ɪ / _Ci (see *ê)
- e → e / _{j w x} (ie. does not become *ɪ → *ɤ)
- Vx → Və → Vː / _C
Proto-Uralic to Pre-Samic (≈ "Finno-Volgaic")
Shared with Finnic & Mordvinic
- ë → a
- ðʲ → ð (also lʲ → l, if it exists separately; note that other palatals remain)
Shared with Mordvinic
- ü → i (feeds the next changes)
- i → iː / _{j x}
- u → uː / _{w x}
- i u → ɪ ʊ (*iː *uː remain) (also shared with Nenets!)
Pre-Samic to Proto-Samic
- V → Vː / [-HIGH] (also shared with Nenets!)
a-umlaut
- eː äː oː → ea aː oa / _C{aː, oː} (note that this *aː is distinct from *ɑː!)
2nd syllable vowel changes go around here…
- x, ŋ → w / _t (*xt only occurring in newer derivativs/loans)
Spirant fortition
- ś x → ć k / _V
- PS *ć (written also *č) is probably best described as a palatal stop, so we may be dealing with a process [sʲ ~ ɕ] → [ç] → [c]. Note that original *s *š remain sibilants!
- PS *ś (likewise also written *š) remains elsewhere
- śj → śś
Fronting of postalveolars
- tʃ ʃ <č š> → ts s <c s>
Popular areal changes
- w → ∅ / _{y u o} (shared with Finnic, Mordvinic, Mari)
- j → ∅ / _{i e} (not sure about the distribution of this)
- w → v (even syllable-finally)
Raising & epenthesis (first two shared with North Finnic but obviously non-genetic)
- äː ɑː → eː oː / [+STR]
- ∅ → v / #_oː
- ∅ → j / #_eː
- aː → eː / [-STR]
Gradation could be described around here.
Centralization (a late change - consider eg the northern Lappland toponym *ɤnárɤš → Finnish Inari)
- ɪ ʊ → ɤ o
There may have also been a high lax unrounded back vowel (see ô_a). A merger into that might provide the motivation for the unusual back reflex of PU *i.
This results in the following inventory:
- long vowels */iː eː ea aː oa oː uː/ <í é ea á oa ó ú>
- short vowels */ɤ o/ <ë o>
/ea oa/ are traditionally analyzed as [ɛː ɔː] rather than [ea oa], however I'm at a loss to explain how would *ɑː end up as *oː in that case.
The shortening of iː uː → i u and the diphthongization eː oː → ie uo may postdate Proto-Samic; the former have bimoraic reflexes /ij uv/ in South Samic. At any rate, as eg. *a *e in Scandinavian loans ends up as *á *é, the "long" vowels must've been the unmarked series.
