Nyelvtudományi Közlemények 85. kötet (1983)
Tanulmányok - Utasi-McRobbie, Zita: Adjacent Stress in Relation to Overlength 45
48 ZITA TTTASI-McROBBIE 3. Consonant gradation in Lappish extends to ail consonants and consonant Clusters.4 The gradation can be quantitative and/or qualitative, though mainly the former. These word-internal changes occured as direct conséquences of the fact that the following syllable was closed or open. It has long been clear that the reasons for the gradation phenomenon are basically prosodie.5 In Lappish, just like in Estonian, the original phonetic environment of the gradation has undergone drastic change. However, the gradation processes survive and play an essential rôle in the grammar of both of thèse languages. 3.1. The occurrence of Q3 can be observed today in the Pite, Lule, Norwegian, Inari and Skolt-Lappish dialects.6 Lappologists have long recognized that this overlong grade is not organically related to the alternations of the strong (resulting in Q2 length) and weak (representing Ql length) grades. While the alternations of thèse two latter grades, as pointed out above, are historically related to the closeness vs. openness of the following syllable, the occurrence of the overlong grade is connected with the phenomenon of contraction. Whether the appearance of the overlong grade can be traced back to the Old Lappish period is questionable.7 What is important synchronically, though, is that the occurrence of the overlong grade plays a noticable part in the alternation of consonant length ; together with the differently originating consonant gradation process, it plays an important rôle in the morphophonology of the above mentioned Lappish dialects. We will now take up the question as to whether the occurrences of Q3 synchronically are due to the opération of not grammatically but prosodically motivated rules. 4. Before going into détails concerning the crucial significance of the prosodie factors in connection with the occurrences of Q3, let us first point to one of the difficulties to be faced during the course of a segmental analysis in relation to the applicability of a phonological rule, while also giving some indication of its applicability in relation to wordinternal quantitative factors. 4.1. In Skolt-Lappish there is a gênerai rule which affects wordfinal short vowels. The opération of this rule results in either the réduction or the dropping of the vowel in question. As the conclusions to be drawn from this phonological process are not affected by whichever way the rule opérâtes, for the sake of simplicity let us formulate here the apocope rule only (which, of the two, seems likely to be the more fréquent, cf. Korhonen et al. 1973). (i) [+sXort] —0 / # 4 There is no gradation in South-Lappish dialects. 8 »Die auf die hauptbetonte Silbe folgende Silbe hat, wenn geschlossen, stärkeren Druck gehabt, als wenn sie offen war, und diese der geschlossenen Silbe zuteil gewordene Steigerung der Intensität hat als Kontrasterscheinung im Anfangsteil des Phonems eine Schwächung der Intensität bewirkt, die sich darin äusserte, dass das zwischen den Silben stehende konsonantische Element schwächer und unvollkommener artikuliert wurde als vor offener Silbe« (E. Itkonen 1946, 1). 6M. Korhonen 1969, 236. 7 See Korhonen (1969, 237) for literature on the history of overlength in Lappish.
