Re: Why Consonants?

"T. A. McLeay" wrote:
>
>On 17/02/07, Alex Fink <a4pq1injbok_0@...> wrote:
>
> > Hah, never mind a speaker of Berber (/tftktstt/ 'you sprained it'), or
> > Salishan (/xKp_>X_wKtK)pKKs/ 'he had had in his possession a bunchberry
> > plant').
> >
> > I can't think of any natlang that goes to these lengths with all-vowel
>words
> > longer than about four or five.  So is the situation reversed at the
>extremes?
>
>Well, there's words like "k&#299;lauea" in Hawaiian with his longer if you
>count the /l/ as vowel-like and much longer if you count the &#299; as two
>vowels; "Hawaiian" in English has a good long string of vowel-like
>segments too.
This is probably where I'll have to whip out the Finnish contender
_riiuuyöaieauer_ /ri:.u:.y2.Ai.e.Au.er/ (IML ['ri:u:y9,6j:e\,6w:e\r])
"dawning of the dating night plans".


> > >> This came up on the list some time ago, and someone observed that the
> > >> opposite is true for Spanish: Vowels are (apparently) pronounced
>quite
> > >> consistently between dialects, which are distinguished largely on the
> > >> basis of consonants (pronounciation of frex ll, j, z, -s).
> > >[...]
> > >
> > >Interesting, I didn't know this before. I wonder what causes some
> > >languages to change vowels faster than consonants, or vice versa.
> >
> > I'd imagine that has something to do with the fact that Spanish has a
>nice
> > stable cross-linguistically favored five vowel system, whereas the
>English
> > system has crammed in entirely too many vowels for its own good.
>
>Actually, makes me wonder, aside from the addition of a handful of
>diphthongs and the loss of a back unrounded vowel *&#616;, the Finnish
>vowel system looks like it's been relatively stable since
>Proto-Uralic/Proto-Finno-Ugric (at least, they both have/had more than
>their fair share, in essentially the same ways). Anyone know if this
>is just a deceptive superficial appearance, or is it so?
>
>--
>Tristan.
Concentrating on the cross-linguistically more volatile bimoraic vowels:
* Stressed /Q: &:/ > /o: e:/ in Proto-Fenno-Ugric
* Stressed /iu/ > /y/ in PFU
* Unstressed /Qu &u Iu/ > /o o u/ in Proto-Finno-Samic
* Unstressed /Qi &i Ii/ > /oi ei i:/ > /o i i/ in Proto-Fennic
* Stressed /Qi &u/ > /Ai &y/ at some nondescript time between PFU and mid PF
* Stressed /Ai/ > /ei/ in PF
* Stressed /V:i/ > /Vi/ in PF
* Stressed /e: ey 2: o:/ > /ie 2y y2 uo/ in erly Finnish
This for Standard Finnish. It's not nil, but not very much either,
considering that Proto-Uralic has been dated to 6000-4000 BC. Especially,
stressed /u: y: i: ui ei ou &i/ have remained intact at least since.

Dialectally, however, there's been more additional vowel shifts:
* /A: &:/ > /oA e&/ in the East
* /ie y2 uo/ > /ia y& uA/ in the West
* /Ai Au &i &y ei eu oi ou/ > /Ae Ao &i &2 e: eo oe o:/ in both
* further /oA e& Ao &2 eo/ > /uA i& A: &: e:/ in Savo
All of these during the last millenia. Central suthern dialects are largely
identical to the standard vowel-wise.

Of the consonants, many have changed into something else - everything
palatal except for /j/ and everything velar except for /k/, principally -
and then there's been the whole gradation bizniz going on. The lenition of
/D G/ was pretty complex too, with half a dozen simultaneous reflexes each.
But for fairness, eg. any and all instances of /r l/, and by far most of /s
m n/, have also remained intact since PU.

I don't think it's just the amount of vowel vs. consonant phonemes in play
here, Finnish and its ancestors have always had lots of the former; I
suspect it's more of a Sprachbund thing whether vowels or consonants end up
being more volatile.

John Vertical

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