Re: Word-initial sound changes

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Constructed Languages List [mailto:CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU]On
> Behalf Of dirk elzinga
> Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2000 3:36 PM
> To: CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU
> Subject: Re: Word-initial sound changes
>
>
> On Thu, 27 Jan 2000, John Cowan wrote:
>
> > raccoon@ELKNET.NET wrote:
> >
> > > I know that in languages I'm familiar with that use some form
> of lenition
> > > (voicing or fricativization, or both), lenition doesn't occur
> > > word-initially. My question is, how unreasonable would it be
> for lenition to
> > > occur word (and phrase)-initially too?
> > Totally reasonable, and what the Celtic languages (and their conlang
> > relatives) do.
> Perhaps it is just splitting hairs, but I have always preferred
> to use the term 'lenition' to refer to consonant alternations
> which are  triggered by phonetics/phonology, and reserve the
> term 'mutation' for consonant alternations which mark
> morphological categories. It's a useful distinction to make.
I guess I didn't mean lenition, actually. I think I was originally just
thinking of lenition as an example of sound change. To me, lenition means a
kind of 'softening' of consonants that makes them easier to pronounce. But I
thought the Celtic mutations did come from phonological factors. Certainly
not factors present now (synchronic) but possibly factors which were once
present (diachronic). No?


Eric Christopherson
raccoon@elknet.net