Schedule 75. StuTS

In this paper, I will demonstrate the possibilities of phonetic reconstruction. Usually, historical linguistics deals with the reconstruction of the linguistic system of a proto-language and the linguistic changes that its descendants have faced. When reconstructing the sound system of a language, it is standard practice to stop at the phonemic level. Nowadays however, it is possible to even account for the phonetic level at times. One of the cases where current wisdom may need to be revised is the reconstruction of PIE’s sole sibilant *s. Traditionally reconstructed as a voiceless alveolar sibilant, it may be more accurately described as a flat apical postalveolar sibilant. Clues come from very different sources: typology of sibilant systems and sound changes, loan contact between early Romance, Germanic and Finnic languages, and graphic evidence of the Anatolian languages.

One of the main endevours of historical linguistics is the reconstruction of a common proto-language and its linguistic system. The first step usually lies in the reconstruction of its phoneme system. The reconstruction of the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) phoneme system has been underway for around 200 years now. At the same time there are still new discoveries being made. In recent time (Kümmel 2007), criticism of the current methodology has come up: While the phonemic reconstruction is usually very systematic and algebraic, this leads many linguists to be content with their reconstruction as soon as they figure out their cognates, sound correspondences, and sound laws. Historical linguists ought to also account for the plausibility of those sound changes which can only be done if we have knowledge about the phonetic characteristics of the proto sound and its descendants.

One sound which is reconstructed in the handbooks without justification of its phonetic properties is the sole sibilant of PIE, *s. While the wealth of phonetic articulations of sibilants is long known (see e.g. Ladefoged, & Maddieson 1996), PIE *s is usually said to be an alveolar or dental sibilant. As Vijūnas (2010) has pointed out, PIE *s and its early descendants may rather be reconstructed as a retracted sibilant. His arguments are, however, rather shortsighted and need some revision. In this talk, I will present some of the arguments for the reconstruction of a retracted (more concret: flat apical postalveolar) sibilant. This includes typological considerations, loan contact between early Romance, Germanic and Finnic languages, plausibility of sound changes in Latin, Greek, and Celtic, and lastly, graphic evidence of the Anatolian languages.

Literature:
Adams, D. Q. (1975). The Distribution of Retracted Sibilants in Medieval Europe. Language 51(2), 282–292.
Byrd, A. M. (2018). The Phonology of Proto-Indo-European. HSK 41/3, S. 2056–2079. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter.
Joos, M. (1952). The Medieval Sibilants. Language 28(2), 222–231.
Kokkelmans, J. (2021). The Phonetics and Phonology of Sibilants: A Synchronic and Diachronic OT Typology of Sibilant Inventories. Ph. D. thesis, Universität Verona, Verona.
Kümmel, M. J. (2007). Konsonantenwandel: Bausteine zu einer Typologie des Lautwandels und ihre Konsequenzen für die vergleichende Rekonstruktion. Wiesbaden: Reichert.
Ladefoged, P. & I. Maddieson (1996). The Sounds of the World’s Languages. Oxford: Blackwell.
Vijūnas, A. (2010). The Proto-Indo-European Sibilant */s/. Historische Sprachforschung 123(1), 40–55.

Info

Day: 2024-05-11
Start time: 16:40
Duration: 00:30
Room: Fish (33.1.010)
Track: Historical Linguistics
Language: en

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