Nyelvtudományi Közlemények 96. kötet (1998-1999)

Tanulmányok - Dezső László: Typological Comparison of Root Structuring in Uralic and Early Indo-European. [Az uráli és korai indoeurópai tőstruktúrák tipológiai összevetése] 3

32 LÁSZLÓ DEZSŐ more certain because of its low frequency in UEW. I hypothesize that palatalization changed the stop / and possibly к into affricates which was probably a complex process. The diachronic process will be different according to the reconstruction of the late PU: if one assumes two affricates as in UEW, one retroflex (cacuminal) affricate (as Sammalahti) or a palatalized stop f and an affricate с (Décsy). The phonetic realization of the consonant resulting from palatalization could vary in dialects and chronologically. The possible cacuminal feature of с in PU is typologically secondary. The vowel after palatalized consonants is expected to be a front vowel, but also back vowels are found. This fact requires the analysis of etymons for an explanation. In Proto-Tungus and Proto-Mongol (Menges 1968: 36, Doerfer 1964: 44, Sinor 1988: 736) с and dz derive from / and d; in Mongol t and d never occur before ir and i (Doerfer 1964: 44). In order to make my argument clear I shall briefly present the results of examination of the data with my interpretation. The analysis will be focused on CiVj. 1. The lack of palatalization before front vowels. The stop к can rarely be found before front vowels: ke (1), ki/kü (4) of 52 cases; / only occurs in the pronominal etymon tä (~ ti ~ ti), in tire (tűre) and täwa (the total is 16). In most cases both i and ü are reconstructed. The s is more frequent followed by front vowels: sä (4), se (4), si (2) of 19 occurrences; the same is valid for n: ni (4 of 10): / is rare (1 of 6). The variation i/ii shows the result of back movement, e could have a back variant. All these cases require further analysis. 2. The front and back vowels after consonants, resulting from palatalization. The affricate с is followed by back vowels: ca (2), со (1), си (1). The ô is infrequent and precedes front vowels: ô e (1) and ô i (\). The с is relatively frequent and is followed by both back and front vowels: со (1), си (1), cä (1), ce (3), со (1). The /' is followed only by back vowels: l'a (1), ío (1), lu (1); the n by both back and front vowels: na (1), no (4), nu (1) and ne (4), ni (1). A typologically plausible explanation could be the following: front vowels were preserved when they had no rounding effect of C2;

if C2 was followed by V2 = u, o, velarization and rounding was trasmitted to C2 and then to Vj. There is a similar process in Slavic languages: e following palatal consonants becomes о before any nonpalatal consonant or consonant cluster under accent (e.g. cornyj). 3. If the palatalized consonant is in medial position, the situation is more complex and the following vowels often can not be reconstructed. If we have C2V2, then s of the V2 vowels are not reconsructed; in the 14 cases left, we find back vowels in 8 etymons: ca (3), ca (3), na (2), in 6 cases we have front vowels. In consonant clusters, the palatalized consonant can be the second element of the cluster, but in 6 of 9 etymons V2 can not be reconstructed. The palatalized consonant can also be the first element of a cluster in 9 etymons, C2 being с, c: here, one can assume that the lost vowel was a front one which