--- Danny Wier <dawier@...> escribió: >
Starostin proposes the same nine vowels with no
> length distinction:
>
> front: i e ä ü ö
> back: ï u o a

Glen is right. Starostin's reconstruction is sloppy,
very sloppy. If you want to study Altaic Linguistic, I
recommend you Nikolaus Poppe (in my view the most
important and intelligent Altaicologist together with
Benzing), Roy Andrew Miller and Johannes Benzing.
These three authors are who I study in Altaic
Linguistic in the University.

For example, Poppe proposes nine vowels with length
distinction:

a e i o u ë ï ö ü (a: e: i: o: u: ë: ï: ö: ü:)

but these nine vowels can be reduced to five vowels,
without "vowel harmony", first with length
distinction,

a e i o u (a: e: i: o: u:)

and then with no length distinction,

a e i o u
>
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