Carrick/History

Common Brittonic

Carrick inherited the following consonant inventory from Common Brittonic:

Inherited Consonant Inventory of 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:

Vowel Inventory of Common Brittonic 1C

	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 is lost, lengthening preceding vowel (e.g. oxtuː > ɔːtuː)
• 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, earlier h (< s) is lost (sanes > saneh, saμæhisp > saμæisp)
• 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) in next syllable (e.g. kaðu > kɔðu)
• Stressed e(ː) becomes ja(ː) (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)