User:Frrurtu/Sandbox
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Phonology
Consonants
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Retroflex | Pharyngeal? | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | *m /m/ | *n /n/ | *rn /ɳ/ | |||
| Plosive | *p /p/ *b /b/ |
*t /t/ *d /d/ |
*k /k/ *g /g/ |
*rt /ʈ/ *rd /ɖ/ |
||
| Fricative | *f /ɸ/ *v /β/ |
*s /s/ *z /z/ |
||||
| Affricate | *ch /t͡ʃ/ | |||||
| Approximant | *w /w/ | *y /j/ | *rl /ɭ/ *rr /ɻ/ |
*l1 *l2 |
- The exact pronunciation of the consonants transcribed as l1 and l2 is unknown.
- Among the descendants of Proto-Rttirrian, these two sounds survived only in Proto-South-Rttirrian, where they merged into a single phoneme, */ʟ/. That phoneme corresponds to /l/ and many instances of the low tone in Gaju, and corresponds to /w/ and diphthongal /u/ in Rttirri. In all other descendants of Proto-Rttirrian, l1 and l2 disappeared as consonants and survive only in their effects on surrounding vowels.
- Some linguists posit that they were pharyngeal approximants [ħ] and [ʕ], pointing to the fact that they generally had a backing effect on surrounding vowels in branches other than South Rttirrian. Others note that these backing effects were not uniform, and suggest that only l2 was pharyngeal while l1 was something like the velarized lateral [ɫ], or a lateral fricative [ɬ~ɮ].
Vowels
| Front | Central | Back | |
|---|---|---|---|
| High | i /i/ | u /u/ | |
| Low | a /ä/ |