Re: Ebb and flow

-----Original Message-----
From: andrew
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2008 10:42 AM



"On Mon, 04 Aug 2008, R A Brown wrote:

{…}

> It's true that /tS/ is found only in recent English loan words in
> Welsh - but it does occur with soft mutation /dZ/ in Cornish.
 

What causes affricates to occur in Cornish?  Is it the result of front
vowels or are there other environments?”

 

- British –nt, -lt had already become sibilants (probably through *[nts] >
[ns]) in the late Old Cornish (OC) period (ca. 1100-1200) and were writtem
<ns> and <ls>: dans ‘tooth’ (Brit. *dant; Welsh, Breton dant); als ‘shore’
(W allt, B aod).

 

- British /d/ in final position had become a sibilant (probably through
*[dz] > *[z]) by the Middle Cornish (MC) period (ca. 1200-1500), usually
written <s>: tas ‘father’ (cf. W, B tad); Late Cornish attestations include
tâz.

 

- Medially before a front vowel and /w/, /d/ is shifted in Middle Cornish
and appears as <s> or <g> or <i> (<j>): MC wose, woge ‘after’ (cf. W wedi, B
goude); MC peswar ‘four (m.)’ (cf. W pedwar, OB petguar > MB pevar); MC
crysy, crygy ‘believe’ (cf. B kredin). In Late Cornish this is frequently
written <g> or <dg>; Lhuyd in his phonetic script spells it <dzh>. 

 

- Internally /nt/ had been shifted by the MC period and was written <ns> or
<ng>: MC kerense, kerenge ‘love’ (cf. B karantez, karanté); MC ganso ‘with
him’ (cf. MB gantan, gantaff).

 

- /nt/, /lt/ and /d/ are unaffected medially before the back vowels /O/ and
/A/, e.g.: caradow ‘loveable’, ledan ‘wide’ and also if followed in the next
syllable by /l/, /n/ or /r/: padel ‘pan’, fenten’well’, peder ‘four (f.)’.

 

- in initial position /t/ and /d/ were sometimes shifted because of the
preceding /n/ from the article an ‘the’ in certain frequently occurring
words such as chy ‘house’ (cf. B ti) and in geth ‘in-the day’.

 

Dan