Re: PS Emphatics

----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard Wordingham" <richard@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 02, 2008 11:32 AM
Subject: [tied] Re: PS Emphatics


--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
wrote:

> From: Arnau Fournet.arnaud wrote:

Richard:
So, Arnaud, what do you mean by "t?_s"?

> Glottalized consonants were voiced by the time we get to Afrasian, the
> parent of Egyptian.

Do you, Patrick, mean Proto-Nostratic (PN) 'glottalised consonants'?
Do we need to ask how you identify them? I fear that you and Arnaud
are not communicating.

***

Yes, I believe Proto-Nostratic had glottalized stops and affricates.

Whatever is voiced by way of stop or affricate in PIE and Afrasian _was_
glottalized in Nostratic and probably earlier (Proto-Language).

Following the ideas of Anttila, I theorized a Proto-Language sound system
composed of glottalized stops/affricates and aspirated stops/affricates
based on the idea that the earliest language would provide the maximum
contrast for intelligibility. These consonants were voice-indifferent.

After testing, I could see that later voiced stops and affricates
corresponded to my earlier theorized glottalized stops and affricates.

I do not insist on glottalization, Perhaps some other contrast was primary.
So long as we can distinguish stop and affricates in two contrasting series,
we are, I think, on the right track. The relationship between glottalized
and voiced just seems the easiest.

***

> Glottalized emphatics are a modern dialectal variation; the
emphatics were
> first retroflex, and, as Richard, I think, pointed out, pharyngalized.

I did not identify any progression from pharyngealisation to
glottalisation. 'Glottalisation' seems to be the most widespread AA
realisation, if you count implosives and ejectives as glottalised.

***

Sorry if I gave a false impression. Poor sentence structure.

Implosives, no. Ejectives, definitely yes.

***

Can one have retroflex velars?

***

Perhaps. Rather a tricky maneuver with the dorsum.

***


To add to the confusion, Bomhard derives these consonants from PN
glottalised consonants.

Richard.

***

Yes, I started out with voiced-voiceless, and Bomhard's work, rightly or
wrongly, along with Anttila, persuaded me to change to glottal-aspirated.

But as my late professor Klaus Baer said: "it does not matter whether you
use nails or screws to hinge the door".


Patrick

***