OT: Long Consonant Clusters (Berber)
From: | David Peterson <thatbluecat@...> |
Date: | Saturday, January 3, 2004, 18:43 |
I had an entertaining homework assignment this past quarter concerning the
causative prefix in Imdlawn Tashlhiyt Berber. I don't think I can beat
ernstskts (8 in a row!), but I can give you words of five consonants in a row with no
vowels (though anything that's not a stop in this language can act like a
nucleus):
SbrbS "to cause to be gaudy"
ZZnZm "to cause to escape an accident" (and, of course, /nZm/ is just "to
escape an accident")
ssrkz "to cause to dance"
SSkSm "to cause to enter"
Honorable Mentions:
ZmmZdawl "to cause to slip" (has a vowel and a glide)
SfZZiZ "to cause one to distract oneself by walking"
This last word doesn't have that long a cluster, but man! Four fricatives
in a row?! What's more, check out that definition. The non causative, of
course, is "to distract oneself by walking". That's a great word! I don't
know if I'd associate /fZZiZ/ with that act automatically right off the top of
my head (or /nZm/ for escaping an accident, for that matter), but, hey, it's
cool!
-David