Hi!
Modern Israeli Hebrew has
/h/
/?/ from 3ayn and /?/
/x/ from classical /H/ and post-vocalic /k/
/gh/ from classical /r/ and post-vocalic /g/
Afaik, at least Amharic and Akkadian are two other Semitic languages who
have reduced their
set to /h/, /?/ and /x/. Already Ge'ez often confused 3ayn and hamza. I
can't confirm or
deny in the case of Maltese and I don't know any Afro-As language that has
lost also /x/,
/?/ and /h/ for whatever that's worth since I don't know any Afro-As lgs
except the Semitic.
Best wishes
Harald
-----Ursprungligt meddelande-----
Från: Richard Wordingham <
richard.wordingham@...>
[mailto:
richard.wordingham@...]
Skickat: Thursday, December 12, 2002 6:16 PM
Till:
cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Ämne: [tied] Laryngeal Loss (was Does Koenraad Elst Meet Hock´s
Challenge?)
--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...>"
<tgpedersen@...> wrote:
> All true.
> Let me try to recapitulate. I wondered why IE, unlike AfroAsiatic,
> has done away with their laryngeals. You, Piotr, then assure me,
with
> many examples from various IE branches, that the loss of laryngeals
> is a natural process. It seems to me that you have thereby declared
> the AfrAs languages to be unnatural, which I don't think was your
> intended purpose? Which takes me back to my original question: why
IE
> and not AfrAs?
I believe loss is underway in Maltese. I vaguely recall that <gh>V
and V<gh> are now pronounced as long vowels. Unfortunately, I can't
remember for certain whether the consonant digraph represents ain or
the voiced velar guttural.
In the time of Jesus Christ, the laryngeals of Gallilee (so
presumably, essentially of Aramaic) were collapsing. At the very
least, /h/, /?/ and ayin had merged.
Finally, though perhaps of less relevance because of probable
substrate effects, I believe Modern Hebrew, at least in Ashkenazi
mouths, has no more laryngeals than German, i.e. only /h/ and /?/.
Richard.
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