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==Notation== | |||
Radicals will be termed C₁C₂C₃ (usw.) in pattern discussions. Roots will be given with the pattern √cc…, e.g. ''√ls'' 'speech, tongue' | |||
==Phonology== | ==Phonology== | ||
===Vowels=== | ===Vowels=== | ||
In stressed syllables the vowel system centers on an opposition between three vowels: /a i u/. These are the only permitted vowels in stressed syllables. In unstressed syllables there is a tendency to de-emphasise the distinctive qualities of the vowel with occasionally extreme coalescence into a schwa /ə/. | In stressed syllables the vowel system centers on an opposition between three vowels: /a i u/. They also come in a long variant. These are the only permitted vowels in stressed syllables. In unstressed syllables there is a tendency to de-emphasise the distinctive qualities of the vowel with occasionally extreme coalescence into a schwa /ə/. | ||
===Consonants=== | ===Consonants=== | ||
GA has a rich system of consonants with articulations ranging from labial to glottal and with a family-specific feature opposition: [-voice], [+voice], [+emphatic]. The nature of the [+emphatic] feature is not clear but it presumably involves some sort of glottalised articulation. | GA has a rich system of consonants with articulations ranging from labial to glottal and with a family-specific feature opposition: [-voice], [+voice], [+emphatic]. The nature of the [+emphatic] feature is not clear but it presumably involves some sort of glottalised articulation. | ||
A series of class-internal exchanges between phonemes in the [+labial] series and those in the [+voice] / [-voice] series suggests that the features did not carry heavy information load initially and were thus easily exchanged. | |||
==Morphology== | ==Morphology== | ||
===Pronomina=== | ===Pronomina=== | ||
====Independent pronouns==== | |||
====Dependent pronouns==== | |||
{|class=wikitable | |||
|- | |||
! colspan="2"| ||colspan="6"|{{sc|sg.}}||colspan="6"|{{sc|pl.}} | |||
|- | |||
|- | |||
| colspan="2"|{{sc|1p}} || colspan="2"|-(n?)i ||colspan="2"| -? ||colspan="2"| -? ||colspan="2"| -? ||colspan="2"| -? || colspan="2"| -? | |||
|- | |||
| colspan="2" rowspan="2"|{{sc|2p}} || {{sc|m}} || {{sc|f}} || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? | |||
|- | |||
| -? || -ki | |||
|- | |||
| colspan="2" rowspan="2" | {{sc|3p}} || {{sc|m}} || {{sc|f}} || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? || colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -?|| colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -?|| colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -?|| colspan="2" rowspan="2"| -? | |||
|- | |||
| -? || -? | |||
|} | |||
===Bases=== | ===Bases=== | ||
There is no particular distinction between nominal and verbal elements or lexical bases as we shall call them. Nomina can be used as predicates and vice versa although the correlation in meaning isn't always instantly clear. E.g. ''npš'' ‘to be alive’ or ‘life’ as a transparent example and ''√qt'' ‘to take’ or ‘hand’ as a less transparent example. | |||
====Nominalisation strategies==== | ====Nominalisation strategies==== | ||
One basic way of creating nouns (insofar as a noun class separate from predicates can be even postulated) seem to be formed with the base vowel ''*a'' as in the templatic vowel patterns '''R₁aR₂''', '''R₁aR₂aR₃''', usw. e.g. Egyp. rmṯ /raːmac/ ‘man’, sn /san/ ‘brother’. | |||
====Verbalisation strategies==== | ====Verbalisation strategies==== | ||
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====Dual==== | ====Dual==== | ||
The dual ({{sc|du}}) is marked with ''-(a)n''. | The dual ({{sc|du}}) is marked with either ''-(a)n'' or ''-(i)y''. | ||
:''gʷinaʕ'' vs. ''gʷinaʕan'' | :''gʷinaʕ'' vs. ''gʷinaʕan'' OR ''gʷinaʕiy'' | ||
:‘a hand’ vs. ‘a pair of hands’ | :‘a hand’ vs. ‘a pair of hands’ | ||
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Plural formation strategies are many in Golden Afroasiatic with it being difficult to predict which form will be the dominant one for a selected noun. Additionally, when context is clear, plural marking may be eschewed completely. Various sociogeographiclects may prefer one pluralisation marker/strategy over the other. | Plural formation strategies are many in Golden Afroasiatic with it being difficult to predict which form will be the dominant one for a selected noun. Additionally, when context is clear, plural marking may be eschewed completely. Various sociogeographiclects may prefer one pluralisation marker/strategy over the other. | ||
===== | =====W-affixation===== | ||
The addition of ''-w'' (''-ū'') is a frequent pluralisation strategy in many Afroasiatic languages for masculine nouns. | The addition of ''-w'' (''-ū'') is a frequent pluralisation strategy in many Afroasiatic languages for masculine nouns. | ||
:''ʔab-ū'' | :''ʔab-ū-'' | ||
:‘fathers’ | :‘fathers’ | ||
===== | |||
=====T-derivation===== | |||
The almost ubiquitous marker ''-t'' surfaces again, this time as a derivational suffix forming collective nouns. This elegantly mirrors the role development of Indo-European ''-h₂''. | The almost ubiquitous marker ''-t'' surfaces again, this time as a derivational suffix forming collective nouns. This elegantly mirrors the role development of Indo-European ''-h₂''. | ||
:'' | :''sin-t'' | ||
:‘a set of teeth’ | :‘a set of teeth’ | ||
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======Radical reduplication====== | ======Radical reduplication====== | ||
A less frequent, less widespread reduplicating formation of the plural which only occurs in the South Ethiopian Semitic, Chadic and Cushitic branches of Afro-Asiatic is the one where the last radical is reduplicated L→R. As it seems to be attested in both Semitic, Chadic and Cushitic, we will adopt this formation of the plural as well. The languages differ in how they pluralise a little, with the South Ethiopian languages adding a plural ''-t'' on top of this, while both Chadic and Cushitic have zero additional morphemes beyond the partial reduplication. Chadic and Cushitic strategies seem to have primacy in light of the originally derivational meaning of ''-t''. | A less frequent, less widespread reduplicating formation of the plural which only occurs in the South Ethiopian Semitic, Chadic and Cushitic branches of Afro-Asiatic is the one where the last radical is reduplicated L→R. As it seems to be attested in both Semitic, Chadic and Cushitic, we will adopt this formation of the plural as well. The languages differ in how they pluralise a little, with the South Ethiopian languages adding a plural ''-t'' on top of this, while both Chadic and Cushitic have zero additional morphemes beyond the partial reduplication. Chadic and Cushitic strategies seem to have primacy in light of the originally derivational meaning of ''-t''. | ||
:''ḳas-as(V)'' | |||
:‘bones’ | |||
Note however that Ratcliffe<ref>Drift and Noun Plural Reduplication — Ratcliffe, Robert R. in Afroasiatic in “African Studies | Note however that Ratcliffe<ref>Drift and Noun Plural Reduplication — Ratcliffe, Robert R. in Afroasiatic in “African Studies | ||
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Another possibly ancient and widespread formation of the plural is by infixing ''-a-'' which per Lipiński <ref>Semitic Languages: Outline of a Comparative Grammar — Lipiński, Edward, p.245, §31.24 “Internal plural”</ref> occurs in Semitic and supposedly has clear parallels in Berber, Cushitic, and Egyptian. Chadic is not mentioned at all and for seemingly good reason. Schuch writes on the Chadic language Bade's morphology<ref>Chadic Languages : Bade Morphology — Schuch, Russell G. in ''Morphologies of Asia and Africa'' (Eisenbrauns 2007, ed. Kaye, Alan S.), p. 602, §3.8.4-3.8.5</ref> and mentions that a-infix plurals as postulated by Greenberg and other linguists seem generally to come from a misunderstanding of a Chadic syllabic feature. However, he notes that there does seem to be something similar to an a-infix in a few roots and gives the Bade example ''ə̀tlkùmən'' ‘fool’ → ''ə̀tlkw'''à'''m-cən-ən'' (emphasis mine). | Another possibly ancient and widespread formation of the plural is by infixing ''-a-'' which per Lipiński <ref>Semitic Languages: Outline of a Comparative Grammar — Lipiński, Edward, p.245, §31.24 “Internal plural”</ref> occurs in Semitic and supposedly has clear parallels in Berber, Cushitic, and Egyptian. Chadic is not mentioned at all and for seemingly good reason. Schuch writes on the Chadic language Bade's morphology<ref>Chadic Languages : Bade Morphology — Schuch, Russell G. in ''Morphologies of Asia and Africa'' (Eisenbrauns 2007, ed. Kaye, Alan S.), p. 602, §3.8.4-3.8.5</ref> and mentions that a-infix plurals as postulated by Greenberg and other linguists seem generally to come from a misunderstanding of a Chadic syllabic feature. However, he notes that there does seem to be something similar to an a-infix in a few roots and gives the Bade example ''ə̀tlkùmən'' ‘fool’ → ''ə̀tlkw'''à'''m-cən-ən'' (emphasis mine). | ||
Golden Afroasiatic allows a plural formation with an ''-a-''. This | |||
Golden Afroasiatic allows a plural formation with an ''-a-''. This strategy is slightly less common in frequency than the others. | |||
:''ŝaar'' | |||
:‘roots’ | |||
====Gender==== | ====Gender==== | ||
Golden Afroasiatic has an opposition between the genders masculine ({{sc|m}}) and feminine ({{sc|f}}), where the feminine gender is overtly marked with ''-t''. | |||
====Derivational strategies==== | ====Derivational strategies==== | ||
===Verbal morphology=== | ===Verbal morphology=== | ||
====Aspect==== | ====Aspect==== | ||
=====Radical doubling===== | |||
*C₁C₂C₃ → (yi-)C₁aC₂C₂aC₃ | |||
*:swn → (yi)sawwan=i | |||
*:‘{{sc|npf\}}know={{sc|1sg}}’ | |||
E.g. Mubi (Chadic) ''gìidì'' ({{sc|pf}}) → ''gǐttà'' ({{sc|npf}}) ‘to descend’; Egyptian ''jrj=f'' ({{sc|pfv}}) → ''jrr=f'' ({{sc|pres}}) ‘to do’. | |||
=====Yod-prefix===== | |||
*C₁C₂ → yiC₁aC₂a | |||
*:tˤd → yitˤad=šu | |||
*:‘{{sc|npf\}}say={{sc|3msg}}’ | |||
====Person==== | ====Person==== | ||
====Derivational strategies==== | ====Derivational strategies==== | ||
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===Numerals=== | ===Numerals=== | ||
===Particles=== | ===Particles=== | ||
====Enclitics==== | |||
I suggest the so-called Libyco-Berber “genitive” ending in ''-i'' with potential parallels in An. Egyptian has its origin as a postposition reduced enough to cliticise and thus form part of the phonological word. | |||
==Syntax== | ==Syntax== | ||
===Morphosyntactic alignment=== | ===Morphosyntactic alignment=== | ||
Proto-Afro-Asiatic's daughters seem to consistently hint at an earlier ergative system, whether it be the 'unbound' vs. 'bound' of Berber, the odd accusative marking for predicates and certain genitive constructions in Classical Arabic, Akkadian, and other Semitic languages, structural similarities between agentive markers and instrumentals, usw. I have chosen to fully embrace the ergative theory and construct a following opposition in NPs. | <s>Proto-Afro-Asiatic's daughters seem to consistently hint at an earlier ergative system, whether it be the 'unbound' vs. 'bound' of Berber, the odd accusative marking for predicates and certain genitive constructions in Classical Arabic, Akkadian, and other Semitic languages, structural similarities between agentive markers and instrumentals, usw. I have chosen to fully embrace the ergative theory and construct a following opposition in NPs. | ||
</s> R. Hasselbach<ref>Hasselbach, Rebecca. Case in Semitic: Roles, Relations, and Reconstruction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Oxford Scholarship Online, 2013. doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199671809.001.0001.</ref> makes a lot of sense discussing Archaic Proto-Semitic (APS); a marked-NOM for Semitic seems most probable. In light of Semitic, Berber, Cushitic (e.g. Beja) markers,with Egyptian inconclusive (no writing of final short *u, *a), and Chadic having zero traces of case, it seems more and more probable that PAA had a diptotic case system (if SBC is retention> E&CH loss). Thus for GA, we will assume a diptotic marked-S case system. The default is here the absolutive (= {{sc|acc}} in Sem.) which is used everywhere except for marking S with V (then {{sc|nom}}). | |||
{| | {| | ||
|- | |- | ||
! | !Subject-like | ||
|''*u'' | |''*u'' | ||
|- | |- | ||
! | !Absolute | ||
|''*a'' | |''*a'' | ||
|- | |- | ||
|} | |} | ||
While several branches, of which, most notably Semitic show postposed forms of these, the Berber and other families in the phylum show preposed forms. No order seems particularly deserving of primacy as far as I can see so I'll allow free variation in Golden Afroasiatic. | While several branches, of which, most notably Semitic show postposed forms of these, the Berber and other families in the phylum show preposed forms. <s>No order seems particularly deserving of primacy as far as I can see so I'll allow free variation in Golden Afroasiatic</s>. Note however that it could be argued that the preposed forms derive from originally deictic elements in Berber and possibly similar paths in other languages. In inflectional compounds, the case element appears to show up as a suffix more often than not (Egyptian, Semitic, Cushitic). Additionally, Hasselbach points out that ''-a'' seems to be an integral part of the nouns and might've possibly been the default noun ending at some point. | ||
For Golden Afroasiatic, the default position of the case element is after its noun. | |||
===Noun phrase=== | ===Noun phrase=== | ||
====Copulative phrases==== | |||
Following the example of the oldest attested languages (Egyptian and Semitic), GA accepts the following structures: [NP₁ PRON PRED], [PRED PRON NP₁], [PRON PRED], [PRED.ADJ NP₁] | |||
:''ʔisim šV[+high] ŝar'' | |||
:(name {{sc|3msg}} root) | |||
:‘the name (is) the root’ | |||
=====Adjectival copulative sentences===== | |||
[PRED.ADJ NP₁] | |||
:''yimaʔiyan '''ʔiynaan'''-ki'' | |||
:‘your.{{sc|f}} '''eyes''' (are) blue’ | |||
====Genitival constructions==== | ====Genitival constructions==== | ||
Possible strategies: | Possible strategies: | ||
*Semitic-style construct with the head initial. Nothing can intervene | *Semitic-style construct with the head initial. Additionally, the possessum receives the ''-a'' marker whilst the possessor ''-u''. Nothing can intervene between them and its treated prosodically as one word. | ||
*Apposition can also be used | *:'''''ʔadam'''-a ʔabVr-u'' | ||
*:‘'''land''' (of) the bull’ | |||
*Apposition can also be used. | |||
*Adposition agreeing with possessor in gender and number - "genitival adjective". | *Adposition agreeing with possessor in gender and number - "genitival adjective". | ||
*Pronominally | *Pronominally by suffixing a dependent pronominal element to the noun. | ||
*:'''''maʔ'''-šV[+high] | |||
*:‘his '''water'''’ | |||
===Verb phrase=== | |||
The basic order of constituents in a verb phrase is VSO with an optional SVO order as a result of a raising strategy when the subject is being emphasised. | |||
==Vocabulary== | ==Vocabulary== | ||
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| **ɬa-|| cow? || ? || West, Central ''ɬà'' || Agaw ''ləwi'', East ''lali, loon'', West ''ɬee'' || ? || ? || Akk. ''luʔum, luu''; Arab. ''laʔan''; Shehri (MSA) ''léʔ/lhóti'' | | **ɬa-|| cow? || ? || West, Central ''ɬà'' || Agaw ''ləwi'', East ''lali, loon'', West ''ɬee'' || ? || ? || Akk. ''luʔum, luu''; Arab. ''laʔan''; Shehri (MSA) ''léʔ/lhóti'' | ||
|- | |- | ||
|} | |||
===Lutz=== | |||
{| class="wikitable sortable" | |||
! colspan="2"| Proto-Afroasiatic !! colspan="5"| Reflexes | |||
|- | |||
! Form !! Meaning !! Berber !! Chadic !! Cushitic !! Egyptian !! Semitic | |||
|- | |||
| √b-k || to strike | |||
|- | |||
| √b-n || to build | |||
|- | |||
| √g-d || to be big | |||
|- | |||
| √m-t || to die | |||
|- | |||
| √s-n || to know | |||
|- | |||
| √d-m || blood | |||
|- | |||
| √f-r || flower, fruit | |||
|- | |||
| √l-s || tongue | |||
|- | |||
| √s-m || name | |||
|- | |||
| √s-n || nose | |||
|} | |} | ||
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===Numerals=== | ===Numerals=== | ||
*1 | *1 | ||
:Sem. ‘(i)št could match Berber iǧ~išt 'one' | :Sem. ‘(i)št could match <s>Berber iǧ~išt 'one'</s> interesting but not too promising; iǧ not projectable to Proto-Berber (methodology fault or lack of data?), similar to Egyp. ‘fty (but /f/ does not match /s/ ?)<ref> | ||
Wilson-Wright, Aren. "The Word For 'One' in Proto-Semitic." Journal of Semitic Studies LIX/1 Spring, (2014): p. 7 </ref> | |||
:MSA. Mehri, Soqoṭri have a resembling ''ṭāṭ~ṭād~ṭd'' “one” which might be linked to Cushitic ''*dad'' “someone” | :MSA. Mehri, Soqoṭri have a resembling ''ṭāṭ~ṭād~ṭd'' “one” which might be linked to Cushitic ''*dad'' “someone” | ||
:Egyptian ''w‘(y-w)[-t]'' matches Berber ''yiwən, yiwət'' “one”. | :Egyptian ''w‘(y-w)[-t]'' matches Berber ''yiwən, yiwət'' “one”. | ||
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==Books to acquire== | ==Books to acquire== | ||
*Northeast African Semitic: Lexical Comparisons and Analysis — Hudson, Grover | *Northeast African Semitic: Lexical Comparisons and Analysis — Hudson, Grover | ||
*Semitic and Afroasiatic: Challenges and Opportunities — Herausgegeben von Edzard, Lutz | *<s>Semitic and Afroasiatic: Challenges and Opportunities — Herausgegeben von Edzard, Lutz</s> ¤ | ||