Re: Origin of Estonian /7/

On Mon, Mar 15, 2004 at 05:03:30PM -0500, Trebor Jung wrote:
> Merhaba!
>
> Where does Estonian /7/ (o-tilde) come from? I mean, it's in a sea of
> languages without it, and it's rare I think. Vietnamese (and Thai(?)) have
> it, but they're not related to Estonian at all... So it's kind of puzzling.
>
> --Trebor
Apparently it comes from either /e/ or /o/. Plausible enough, I'd say.
I believe Votic (what's left of it, anyhow) and Ingrian are also guilty
of having /7/. As do several Sámi languages (sadly can't be bothered to look
them up). There, at least now Estonian feels a little bit more at home
in the sea with some friends to play with!

Now all we need is a true expert. (:

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