Carrick/History
Common Brittonic
Carrick inherited the following consonant inventory from Common Brittonic:
| Bilabial | Dental/ Alveolar |
Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive | p | b | t | d | k | g | ||||
| Fricative | ɸ | (β, μ) | s | (ð) | x | (ɣ) | (h) | |||
| Nasal | m | n | (ŋ) | |||||||
| Approximant | w | l | j | |||||||
| Trill | r |
The process of lenition weakened intervocalic consonants, including those at the beginning and end of a word in continuous speech, creating a chain shift of voiceless stop > voiced stop > voiced fricative, plus m > μ (a voiced bilabial nasalised fricative), s > h and probably ɸ > Ø. Meanwhile, geminate stops and ss were shortened to fill the gap created by the lenited allophones (e.g. katus "battle" > kaduh but kattā > katā).
The Brittonic vowel inventory had already undergone changes, creating long monophthongs from old diphthongs. It consisted of five short and seven long vowels, plus triphthongs consisting of ijV:
| Short | Long | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Front | Back | Front | Back | |
| Close | i | u | iː | uː |
| Close-Mid | eː (< ei) |
oː (< oi) | ||
| Open-Mid | ɛ | ɔ | ɛː (< ai) |
ɔː (< ou, eu) |
| Open | a | aː (< aː, au) |
Proto-Carrick
Proto-Carrick, ranging from approximately the 3rd to the 8th centuries, underwent a series of significant changes:
- Changes to unstressed word-final sounds:
- short -a, -e, -o are lost, along with any preceding j, w (e.g. donjo- > don)
- final -n is lost and a preceding vowel nasalised (e.g. kanton > kantõ)
- Vowel changes:
- unstressed short e > i (e.g. imbed > imbid)
- short o > a, long aː > ɔː (e.g. don > dan, laːμaː > lɔːμɔː)
- Short I-Mutation: a > æ, e > i, o > ø, u > y before i, iː, j in next syllable (e.g. dani > dæni).
- Short word-final vowels are deleted in words of 3 syllables or more (e.g. riːɣænĩ > riːɣæn)
- Vowel Changes:
- final-syllable unstressed oː > uː, ɛː > eː (e.g. kadoː > kaduː, tundɛː > tundeː)
- unstressed eː > iː
- non-final ɛː > aː (e.g. kɛːd > kaːd)
- x < earlier xs and in the combination xt becomes h
- h < earlier x and s are lost, lengthening preceding vowel (e.g. oxtuː > ɔːtuː, swehr > sweːr)
- Lenition 2 of intervocalic and final consonants:
- also affects consonants adjacent to l, r (balg > balɣ, mark > marg)
- previously lenited stops lenite again: b > β, d > ð, g > ɣ,
- p, t, k from earlier pp, tt / xt, kk become b, d, g (ɔːtuː > ɔːduː)
- s (from ss) > h (sanes > saneh, )
- Final consonants are devoiced: (e.g. kaːð > kaːθ, balɣ > balx)
- Full I-Mutation before i, iː or j in the next syllable:
- Short vowels: a > æ, e > i, o > ø, u > y
- Long vowels: aː > æː, eː > iː, ɔː > øː, oː > œː, uː > yː
Early Carrick
- U-Mutation: a(ː) > ɔ(ː), e > ø, eː > œː, i(ː) > y(ː) before u(ː), w in next syllable (e.g. kaðu > kɔðu)
- word-initial combinations of (C)wV are mutated (e.g. sweːr > sœːr, gwan- > gon-).
- Stressed e(ː) becomes ja(ː) (e.g. geːhl > gjaːhl, menn > mjann)
- Syncope:
- unstressed short vowels in open syllables (including word-final) are lost (e.g. kɔðu > kɔθ)
- unstressed æ, ø become e (e.g. salæn > salen)
- unstressed long vowels are shortened (e.g. ɔːduː > ɔːdu)
- mp, nt, nk > pp, tt, kk
Late Carrick
- medial s > h before p, k, t (sisp > sihp)
- long vowels break: aː > au, æː > ai, eː > je, øː > oy, ɔː > ou, oː > wo, œː> jo, iː > ei, y > ey, u > eu (e.g. ɔːdu > oudu).
- ɣ merges with h (< s) (e.g. selɣ > selha
- h is lost, with lengthening of preceding vowel:
- before a consonant (e.g. sihp > siːp)
- between a consonant and a vowel (e.g. selha > seːla)