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
Close-Mid
(< ei)

(< oi)
Open-Mid ɛ ɔ ɛː
(< ai)
ɔː
(< ou, eu)
Open a
(< aː, au)

Proto-Carrick

  • 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)
  • I-Mutation 1: a > æ, e > i, o > œ, 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)
  • A-Mutation: u lowers to o before a, æ, ɔː (e.g. tumbã > tombã)
  • Vowel Changes:
    • final-syllable oː > u, ɛː > e (e.g. kadoː > kadu, tundɛː > tunde)
    • unstressed eː > i
    • all other final-syllable long vowels shorten
    • non-final ɛː > aː (e.g. kɛːd > kaːd)
  • x < earlier xs and in the combination xt is lost, lengthening preceding vowel (e.g. oxtu > ɔːtu)
  • Lenition 2 of intervocalic and final consonants:
    • previously lenited stops lenite again: b > β, d > ð, g > ɣ,
    • p, t, k from earlier pp, tt / xt, kk become b, d, g (ɔːtu > ɔːdu)
    • s (from ss) > h, earlier h (< s) is lost (sanes > saneh, brisk > brihk
  • Final consonants are devoiced: (e.g. kaːð > kaːθ)
  • I-Mutation 2:
    • Short vowels: a > æ, e > i, o > ø, u > y
    • Long vowels: aː > æː, eː > iː, ɔː > øː, o > œː, uː > yː