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1.4  w, j, Q, s, z

  • W
    Proto-Tallic *w is one of the sources for the new vowel y in Kymna. In the course of delabialization, the combinations *we, *wi early became y; *wo, *wu > o, u; and only *wa was retained for a while before becoming va (cf. Japanese we, wi, wo, wa > e, i, o, wa).

    The final combinations *-tw, *-dw were shifted into labial position pp (the latter probably via *bb) with addition of the vowel -a. Similarly a velar + w was shifted into dental position: *-kw, *-gw > tt. The preceding vowel may be rounded by the influence of *w.

    This change only happened in monosyllables. In polysyllables, final *-w becomes -o:

  • J
    Proto-Tallic *j was another source for the vowel y, one finds *jo, *ju, *je, *ji > y, y, e, i in combination with stops. As with *wa, *ja was retained for some time before becoming dza between vowels. Combinations of stop + *ja were fortitioned in the following way: *pja, *tja, *kja, *phja, *thja, *khja > *psja, *tsja, *ksja > sa and *bja, *dja, *gja > *bzja, *dzja, *gzja > dza.
  • Q
    The Proto-Tallic velar/uvular phoneme *Q has disappeared in Kymna altogether with lengthening of the preceding vowel. Of the long vowels, ā, ī, ū remained, while > ei, > ou. In Moluma, > ae.
  • S, Z
    Medial *-s- became voiced *z and then the affricate dz. Original *z, *sd, *ds, *sb, *bs all merged in dz as well. On the other hand *zr > ðr.

    1.4.1  m, n, l, r

  • M
    Proto-Tallic *m mostly remains unchanged. In the verbs gūlum ’to swim’ < *gwumlun and koulum ’to wash’ < *komlun it disappears by dissimilation with the final nasal. The combinations *sm, *ml, *mr, *nm develop an anaptyctic vowel u, changing to dzum, mul, mur, num. In Moluma, additionally *rm, *lm > rum, lum.
  • N
    Proto-Tallic syllabic *ṇ became a in Kymna (as in Greek). There was also a late loss of final *-e after n, leading to a second wave of syllabic -*ṇ, which became -un. Adjectival -na appended to -ne led to metathesis *-nena > -enna.

    Proto-Tallic final *-un, *-on became -um, in particular the conclusive verb ending -un in Talmit corresponds to -um in Kymna.

    In Moluma, *ṇ also became a, but initial *ṇ- caused a shift of p, t/d, k/g to the nasals m, n, ŋ. Of these, ŋ became m before o, u, y and n before e, i, perhaps via developing glides: *ŋo > *ŋwo > mo and *ŋi > *ŋji > ni.
    The resulting prefix a- coincided with a- from signum marking in adjectives. The latter became an intensive prefix in Kymna and Moluma and was later dropped in ordinary forms. This dropping affected the nouns by analogy, which then often dropped their initial a- as well, but the nasal shift in Moluma remained.

    Some words of this kind are dialect loans in Kymna, where loss of p would have lead to phonetically unsatisfactory forms, e.g. ame, amei- ’town, city’ < *ṇpel (√pel), mona ’round’ < *ṇko-mo (√ko).

  • L & R
    An *l in the coda after the front vowels e, i (l exilis) became vocalized to i, hence *el, *il > ei, ī and *wel, *wil > ëy; while *l after *a, *o, *u (l pinguis) became palatalized (the new l exilis) by a chain shift.

    Initially, *g, *p and *kh were lost before r, l. In the case of r, it led to a compensatory lengthening, with an initial trill [r] instead of an alveolar flap [ɾ]. Moluma, on the other hand, uses anaptyctic vowels to avoid initial clusters:


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