Verse:Ed Dynje/Tonal tricons IE

Diachronical sketch

1. Turn PIE *o to low or rising tone via *a and *əˁ. The resulting stage will have 3 to 4 tones depending on dialect, with the new tonal distinction existing in tandem with the inherited pitch accent. At this stage, h₂ and h₃ have tonalized to low tone as well.
2. h₁ tonalizes to high tone, yielding 5 diachronic tones: stiff (from h₁), high level, mid rising, low level (unmarked), low rising. The stiff tone merges with the high level tone in most descendants. It is thought that the low level tone became mid level.

Proto-whateverthisis

• Vowels: ⟨*ɨ *ə *a⟩ /ɨ ə a(ː)/
  • ⟨*ɨ⟩ arises from epenthesis of syllabic resonants
• Tones: stiff (from h₁), high level, mid rising, mid level (unmarked), low rising
• Satemize *ḱ *ǵ *ǵʰ to *ts *ts’ *dz; labiovelars merge with plain velars. PIE tenuis stops become aspirated stops. This yields:
• Surface consonants: /[ʔ] b g d w dz t’ j kʰ l m n tsʰ p ts’ k’ r s tʰ/
• Abstract consonants: ||h₁ b g d w dz t’ j k l m n ts h₂~h₃ p ts’ k’ r s t||