Talsmic languages
The Talsmic languages are a relatively isolated subbranch of the Zachydic language family; with Raxic they form the Raxo-Talsmic subfamily. They are descended from Proto-Talsmic (PT or PTal).
Characteristics
The historical Talsmic languages have all shared the following characteristics to some extent:
- conversion of a former case system into a system of state distinctions
- rigidly head-initial word order
- verb-initial clauses
- heavy grammatical use of pronominal suffixes/enclitics on possessed nouns, verbs and prepositions, that index their dependents
- some languages use bare possessum forms.
- differential indexing of the direct object and the possessor, and occasionally the prepositional object
- grammatical apophony (tonal, vocalic or consonantal)
- word order changes for topicalization and focusing
- prominence of tense rather than aspect in verbal TAM, unlike in mainland Zachydic languages.
Characteristic phylogenetic innovations vis-à-vis Zachydic include:
- Rhotacization of /*z/ to /*r/ V_V, and secondary rhotacization (often before consonants, the choice of which depends on the language).
- Development of Proto-Zachydic ejective stops into aspirated stops, which have fricativized in daughter languages.
- Assibilation of affricates occuring after primary rhotacization (/*cʼ, *c/ > /*s/, /*ʒ/ > /*z/ etc.) greatly reduces the consonant inventory; this also contributes to the fricative-rich flavor of Talsmic.
- Also common is the transition of the uvular series into the radical series; uvulars are still found in some phonetically conservative languages and dialects, however.
Proto-Talsmic phonology
The following is the Proto-Talsmic sound system as reconstructed by Talsmicist Dàžiir pyr Chlìisa.
Consonant inventory
| Proto-Talsmic reconstructed consonants | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Uvular | Glottal | |||
| Nasal | *m | *n | ||||||
| Plosive | voiceless | *p | *t | *c | *k | *q | *ʔ | |
| voiced | *b | *d | *ɟ | *g | ||||
| aspirated | *pʰ | *tʰ | *cʰ | *kʰ | *qʰ | |||
| Fricative | voiceless | *s | *ç | *h | ||||
| voiced | *z | *ƶ | *ʁ | |||||
| Approximant | *w | *j | ||||||
| Trill | *r | |||||||
| Lateral app. | *l | |||||||
/qʰ/ may have been realized as an affricate, [qχ].
Vocalic inventory
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Close | *i *ī | *u *ū | |
| Mid | *e *ē | *o *ō | |
| Open | *a *ā |
Proto-Talsmic grammar
Nominal morphology
Nouns and adjectives had retained from Proto-Zachydic 6 cases (nominative, accusative, genitive/prepositional, allative, ablative, locative/instrumental), 3 numbers, 2 genders (masculine, feminine), and additionally possessive inflection for nouns. Like its daughter languages as well as Proto-Zachydic, Common Talsmic is thought to have been a differential object marking language; only definite or specific direct objects were marked with the accusative case.
[Genitive is partitive > indefinite?]
| *çúma=ʔ 'air' | *méisar 'segment' | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gender → | Masculine | Feminine | ||||||||||
| Case ↓ | Singular | Dual | Plural | Singular | Dual | Plural | ||||||
| Nominative | *çúma | *çúmōr | *çúmū | *méisar | *méisoir | *méisāne | ||||||
| Accusative | *çúmeç | *çúmōç | *çúmūt | *méisaç | *méisoiç | *méisina | ||||||
| Genitive/Prepositional | *çúmu | *çúmār | *çúmakʰe | *méiset | *méisair | *méis(in)ir | ||||||
| Ablative | *çúmenʔ | *méisanʔ | ||||||||||
| Allative | ? | ? | ||||||||||
| Instrumental | *çúmīl | *méisai | ||||||||||
The essive case (*-ēri) was marginal, and was only used adverbially (cf. Th. -ēr adverbial suffix).
Some nouns took the "thematic" suffix/clitic *-ʔ with an uncertain meaning, a holdover from the classifier system in Proto-Zachydic.
Pronominal morphology
Proto-Talsmic free pronouns can be reconstructed with less confidence because all case marking except as clitics and suffixes was eliminated.
Full personal pronouns
Possessive suffixes
Verbal morphology
Tense
The Proto-Talsmic verbal system has converted the pre-existing aspect-based perfective/imperfective dichotomy into a time-based one (past/non-past). The irregularity of the past system is probably a result of conflation of many different parent aspect systems.
Aspect
The following aspect suffixes can be reconstructed:
- prospective *-eh-
- inceptive *-lʁa-
- cessative *-mbe-
Mood
Proto-Talsmic has kept many moods intact (imperative, desiderative, hortative, optative). The negative imperative used the prohibitive particle along with the hortative form. The moods are frequently collapsed by its progeny (e.g. jussive in Themsaran).
Thematic suffixes
Proto-Talsmic saw the development of thematic vowels from derivational suffixes. Thematic vowels are found in many Talsmic languages, but modern languages often generalize the a-paradigm to the expense of the others.
- *-īn: basic verbs
- *-a-īn: denominative or transitive verbs
- *-e-īn: dynamic or reflexive verbs
TAM/subject affix paradigm
Todo: rederive past tense... they don't look like they could (all) be perfective suffixes.
| Subject affixes | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Present/Non-past | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -īn | -dir | -mī |
| 1.in | - | -ʁ-sē | -n-sē |
| 2 | -r | -r-sē | -l-sē |
| 3.m | -m | -iri- | -ʁēj |
| 3.f | -isi | -tēj | |
| Simple past | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -ʔne | -sid | -mā |
| 1.in | - | -ʁʔā, -tar | -nʔā, -taq |
| 2 | -rʔe | -rʔā | -lʔā |
| 3.m | -ā(-m) | -ā-iri | -ā-ʁēj |
| 3.f | -ā-isi | -ā-tēj | |
| Prospective | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -eh-īn | -eh-dir | -eh-mī |
| 1.in | - | -eh-ʁsē | -eh-nsē |
| 2 | -eh-r | -eh-rsē | -eh-lsē |
| 3.m | -eh-m | -eh-iri- | -eh-ʁēj |
| 3.f | -eh-isi | -eh-tēj | |
| Imperative | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.in | - | -ʁsi | -nsi |
| 2 | -h | -rsi | -lsi |
| Hortative | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -īn-ti | -dis-ti | -mī-ti |
| 1.in | - | -ʁs-ti | -ns-ti |
| 2 | -ti | -rs-ti | -ls-ti |
| 3.m | -m-ti | -iri-ti | -ʁēj-ti |
| 3.f | -isi-ti | -tēj-ti | |
| Desiderative | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -īn-ʔi | -dir-ʔi | -mī-ʔi |
| 1.in | - | -ʁsē-ʔi | -nsē-ʔi |
| 2 | -r-ʔi | -rsē-ʔi | -lsē-ʔi |
| 3.m | -m-ʔi | -iri-ʔ | -ʁēj-ʔi |
| 3.f | -isi-ʔi | -tēj-ʔi | |
| Optative | |||
| Singular | Dual | Plural | |
| 1.ex | -īn-aʔ | -dir-aʔ | -mī-aʔ |
| 1.in | - | -ʁs-aʔ | -ns-aʔ |
| 2 | -r-aʔ | -rs-aʔ | -ls-aʔ |
| 3.m | -m-aʔ | -ir-aʔ | -ʁ-aʔ |
| 3.f | -is-aʔ | -t-aʔ | |
Other verbal affixes
Other reconstructible affixes include:
- *-iwe: potential. (e.g. Thm. tacvéi 'know (a fact)' < tak-iwe-īn 'be able to say')
- *-wa- passive suffix.
- the *-ska- causative.
- *az-, "towards" directional prefix.
- the memory evidential prefix *ʔṇʔ-.
Syntax
Basic word order was most likely SVO, as evinced by the order verb-object suffix in all daughter languages.
Sound changes to Proto-Talsmic
- *wj
- > *j / #_
- > *w / otherwise
- /ř/ > */r/ _V, */l/ otherwise
- /*ɢ/ > /*ʁ/
- C[+ejective]
- > C[+aspirated] (the pathway may have been /*kʼ/ > /*kˀ/ > /*kʡ/ > /*kᴴ/ > /*kʰ/)
- > C[-aspirated] / _C
- > /*ʔ/ / _#
- C[-ejective]
- > C[-aspirated]
- > C[+aspirated] / _C
- /*z/ > /*r/ / V_V, V_#
- /*c *ʒ *cʰ/ > /*s *z *s/, /*cc *ʒʒ *ccʰ/ > /*ts *dz *ts/
- /*nr/ > /*mr/
Sound changes from Proto-Talsmic
| PTal | Thm | LThm | Tiz | Sn | Qel |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| *m | m | /m/ | /m/ | /m/ | /m/ |
| *p | p | /p/, /b/ | /p/ | ||
| *b | b | /b/ | /b/ | ||
| *pʰ | f | /h/ | /p/ | ||
| *n | n | /n/ | /n/ | ||
| *t | t | /t/, /d/ | /t/ | ||
| *d | d | /j/ | /d/ | ||
| *tʰ | th | /f/ | /ħ/ | /t/ | |
| *s | s | /s~ʃ/ | /s/ | /s/ | |
| *z | z, r | /z~ʒ/, /ɾ/ | /z/ | /z/ | |
| *ç | th, ch | /f/ | /ʃ/, /tʃʰ/ | /ʃ/ | /x/ |
| *ƶ | ð, ch | /v/ | /ʒ/, /dʒʱ/ | /ʒ/ | /j/ |
| *c | ŧ | /ts~tʃ/ | /tʃ/, /tʃʰ/ | /tʃ/ | /ts/ |
| *ɟ | ł | /j/ | /j/, /ɧ/ | /dʒ/ | /dz/ |
| *k | c, ch | /k/, /g/, /tʃ/, /ʒ/ | /k/, /kʰ/ | /k/ | |
| *g | g, ch | /g/, /ʒ/, /w/ | /g/, /gʱ/ | /g/ | |
| *kʰ | ch, c | /x/, /ʃ/ | /x/, /kxʰ/ | /k/ | |
| *q | q, ħ | /ɴ/, /h/ | /ʡ/, /ʡʰ/ | /ŋ~ɴ/ | /ʕ/ |
| *ʁ | ħ, v | /h/, /w/ | /w/, /ʍ/ | /ʁ/ | /ħ/ |
| *qʰ | ħ | /h/ | /ʕ/, /ħ/ | /ʕ/, /ħ/ | /ʕ/ |
| *l | l | /l/ | /l/ | ||
| *r | r | /ɾ/ | /ʁ/ | /r/ | |
| *w | v | /v/ | /f/ | /b/, /w/ | |
| *j | ı | /j/ | /j/ | ||
| *h | h | /h/ | Ø | ||
| *ʔ | Ø | Ø | Ø |
to Tizian
- /w/ > /v/
- /ʁ/
- > /w/ _C[-velar],
- > /ʕ/ otherwise
- /n/ > /ː/ _C[-glide]
- /l/ > /r/ _C[-glide]
- /z/ > /r/ / _C[+voiced, not /z/]
- /sŧ, šŧ/ > /št/
- Stress accent develops from initial stress.
- /aː/ > /o/
- /eː oː/ > /e˞ o˞/ <ee oo>
- /iː uː ʉː/ > /iɚ uɚ ʉɚ/ medially.
- /ai ei/ > /ei i/
- /ç ʝ/
- > /ʃ ʒ/
- /p t ŧ k b d g/ > /pʰ tʰ ŧʰ kʰ bʰ dʰ gʰ/
- _V[+high tone]
- _C[+fricative]#
Vocabulary
ʔ
- *ʔāzda: ‘great, big’ > Thm. ā́rd ‘ibid.’
- *ʔáʔmar=ʔ: ‘fist’ > Thm. ámmái ‘grip, handle’
- *ʔā́cʰa: ‘god, heaven’ > Thm. ā́thym ‘holy’
- *ʔikta: > Thm. ícht ‘jar, jug’
- *ʔina: ‘I’ (1sg pronoun) > Thm. ná 'ibid.'
- *ʔinh-: ‘lie, to settle down’ > Thm. inthī́ ‘let me lie’, insé ‘city, town’