Híí Diachronics - Esseintial Protolanging

[DesEsseintes]

Híí Diachronics

Welcome to the Esseintial Thread on the Diachronics of the Híí Language Family!

An Esseintial Foray into Protolanging and Diachronics

In this thread I'm going to be presenting and playing with my evolving ideas for the protolanguage and diachronics of my growing Híí language family. As such, this is a kind of scratchpad, and nothing in here is set in stone. My all time favourite word when it comes to conlanging is, after all, "tentative".

Híí?

The Híí language family is the most prominent language family among the tribal societies that inhabit the Plains of Áánene - the focus area of my conworld. They are all descendants of a common ancestor referred to as Proto-Híí. The Híí languages are inspired by and in many ways modelled after the Algonquian languages of North America.

The flagship language in this family is the language I originally named Hííenununóóoþa. A thread on it can be found here, but a lot of the stuff in the thread is outdated. The language is currently named Hííewéíh’hınoht, but as this may be subject to revision, I will be referring to it as Híí, Híí proper or Modern Híí in this thread.

Other scheduled languages of the Híí language family include Project Limestone, Dirimbyééru and Húú.

Húú?

Yes, Húú. Except it's not really the name of the language but a working title until it gets its own name. Thing is, Húú is actually a dialect of Híí proper, and the idea for this dialect was the main catalyst for my starting this thread. As Húú - unlike Híí- contains the grapheme <u>, I thought it would be ideal (and somewhat amusing) to name it Húú for now.

To begin with I'm going to be exploring how Híí proper and Húú diverged along the way from Proto-Híí to Modern Híí.

What about Háá, Héé and Hóó?

The Híí language family is steadily expanding, and in the long run, I aim to make the protolanguage progressively more complex to account for new features I want to add to such dialects. This is yet another reason not to consider anything in this thread set in stone. It's the journey, people, it's the journey.

I may resist the urge to actually name the new dialects Háá, Héé and Hóó though, tempting as it may be.

Have you gone mad, Des?

Probably.

[DesEsseintes]

Phonologies of Modern Híí Languages

This post is going to serve as a reference for the thread, where I outline the phonologies of the modern Híí languages. I'm going to start with Híí, Húú and Limestone, but hopefully I will be able to add others in the future.

Of course, as the phonologies evolve and I discover more about the diachronics of the family, I hope to update these outlines.

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Híí Phonology

Spoiler:

Phoneme Inventory

Híí has 17 phonemic consonant segments.

/m n/ m n
/b t k g ʔ/ b t k g ’
/t͡s t͡ɬ t͡ʃ/ ts tł ch
/ɸ θ s ɬ (ʃ) h/ f þ s ł sh h
/z (ɾ) l (w)/ z r l w

Notes:
- Phones in brackets are allophones that have their own grapheme representation.
- [ʃ] occurs as an allophone of coda /s/ before /t͡ɬ t͡ʃ/.
- The approximants /z l/ have two realisations: [z l] and [ɾ w]; [ɾ w] occur in intervocalic position, [z l] appear in coda before a stop.

Híí only has three phonemic vowel segments. There are also two diphthongs.

/e i o/ e ı o
/ei oi/ eı oı

Notes:
- Monophthongs can occur long or short.

Phonotactics

Syllabic structure is roughly (C1)V(C2(ː))

C1 is any consonant
V can be any of the long or short monophthongs and diphthongs listed in the vowels section above.
C2 is any of /s z ɬ l h ʔ/. /s ɬ h/ can also occur geminate in this position except word-finally.

In coda position, /s sː z/ are realised [ʃ ʃː ʒ] sh ssh zh before /t͡ɬ t͡ʃ/.

In coda position after a high vowel, /h hː/ assimilate (partly) to the PoA of a following stop or affricate as follows
/h hː/ → [ɸ ɸː] f ff before /b/
/h hː/ → [θ θː] þ þþ before /t t͡s/
/h hː/ → [x xː] h hh before /t͡ɬ t͡ʃ k g/ (note that this allophone is not explicitly indicated in the orthography)

Word-finally, the following codas are permissible: n t k s ł h w.

Surface realisations are actually quite a bit more complex than what has been outlined above, but as this has little to do with the diachronics, I've chosen to skip further discussion of morphophonological processes here.

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Húú Phonology

Spoiler:

Phoneme Inventory

Húú has 17 phonemic consonant segments.

/n/ n
/t t͡s t͡ɬ t͡ʃ k kʷ ʔ ʔʷ/ t ts tł ch k kw ’ ’w
/s ɬ x h hʷ/ s ł x h hw
/l j w/ l y w

Notes:
- /s x/ could be said to be in complementary distribution as /s/ generally occurs following front vowels while /x/ occurs following back vowels and resonants, with the exception that /x/ does not occur before /i/ regardless of the preceding vowel.

There are three or four phonemic vowel segments. There are also four diphthongs.

/e i o (u)/ e ı o u
/ei oi ou ui/ eı oı ou uı

Notes:
- Monophthongs can occur long or short.
- The vowel /u/ may be marginally phonemic, but mostly occurs as an allophone of /i/ after /kʷ ʔʷ hʷ w/.

Phonotactics

Syllabic structure is roughly (C1)V(C2(ː))

C1 is any consonant
V can be any of the long or short monophthongs and diphthongs listed in the vowels section above.
C2 is any of /s ɬ l x ʔ/. /s ɬ l x/ can also occur geminate in this position except word-finally.

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Limestone Phonology

Spoiler:

This phonology is very incomplete and likely to change.

Phoneme Inventory

Limestone contains at least the following 11 phonemic consonant segments.

/m n/ m n
/p t t͡s k kʷ/ p t ts k kw
/s/ s
/l j w/ l y w

Notes:
- There may also be the phonemes /x~h ʔ/, depending on how the diachronics evolves. If I decide to include them, they will only occur in coda position.
- /m n s l/ can be syllabic.

There are three phonemic vowel segments.

/a i o/ a ı o

Notes:
- Vowels can occur short or long.

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I'm hoping to start posting about Proto-Híí soon!

[DesEsseintes]

Proto-Híí Phonology

What follows is my reconstruction of Proto-Híí phonology through comparative analysis of Híí proper and Húú, along with my limited understanding of Limestone. Again I stress that this is a work in progress.

Phoneme Inventory

So far I have reconstructed the following consonant phonemes for Proto-Híí.

*m *n
*p *c *t *ƛ *č *k *q
*s *θ *ł *š *x
*l
*y *w

*c *ƛ *č *š *ł *y are assumed to correspond to IPA /t͡s t͡ɬ t͡ʃ ʃ ɬ j/

I would like to make some observations here regarding the reconstruction:
- *q has /ʔ/ as its main reflex in Híí and Húú but has been reconstructed as a uvular stop as its reflex in Limestone is /k/.
- *x was most likely uvular as well
- *č *š probably weren't phonemic but simply allophones of *t *s before *i *y.
- *θ is an alveolar fricative of unknown quality. It largely merges with *ł in Híí.

The vowel system seems to have been relatively straightforward, containing four vowel phonemes.

*a *e *i *o

- *o probably did not occur following *Cw.
- It is as of yet unclear whether *Ci *Cyi were distinct.

Vowel length and phonation will be discussed below in the section on vowel grades.

Syllable Structure and Phonotactics

Proto-Híí syllable structure can largely be summarised as C1(y,w)V(C2), where
C1 is any consonant
C2 is any of *N *s *θ *ł *l, and in marginal cases one of *ns *ls

The following C(w,y) combinations are attested

my ny nw
py ty/č tw ky kw qw
cw ƛw
θw sy/š sw łw xw
ly lw

Attested word-initial onsets consist of:

• nothing (zero-onsets are only permitted in this position)
• any single consonant
• any stop+glide cluster
• any of my ny sy sw

Attested medial clusters across syllable boundaries are laid out in the following table:

Code: Select all

      m   n   p   t   k   q   s   θ   ł   l
N     -   -   mp  nt  nk  nq  ns  nθ  -   -
ns    -   -   -   nst nsk nsq -   -   -   -  
s     sm  sn  sp  st  sk  sq  -   -   -   -
θ     -   -   θp  -   θk  θq  -   -   -   -
ł     -   -   łp  łt  łk  łq  -   -   -   -
l     lm  ln  lp  lt  lk  lq  ls  lθ  -   -
ls    -   -   lsp lst lsk lsq -   -   -   -  

All the above clusters can further combine with a glide as long as the last consonant in the cluster can form a legal C(w,y) cluster. Therefore mpy is a valid cluster while ntw is not, as py is permissible but tw is not. Similarly, lsqw is permissible but nsqy is not.

Vowel Grades

Vowels in stressed syllables could take one of four grades:
1. Short *á
2. Long *ā
3. Glottalised *aʔ or *áʔ1
4. Aspirated *ah or *áh1
1I use the acute accents when discussing stress patterns for added clarity

Several complex stress patterns seem to have occurred. As an example:

In many words, if the second syllable is accented with any grade other than the long grade, the vowel in the first syllable is lengthened.

nanáhkwa → nānáhkwa

I'll post more on this as I uncover more patterns.

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That's it so far. I would be interested to hear what sections are unclear, and what I should expand upon, before I start the actual diachronics. Comments and suggestions welcome as always.

Edit: Edited in clusters of the type nsC and lsC.

[DesEsseintes]

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[DesEsseintes]

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[zyma]

Welcome to the Esseintial Thread on the Diachronics of the Híí Language Family!

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I wish I had more to say other than that this is quite interesting and I'm very excited to see where it goes in the future. I can't think of any questions at the moment, as everything is clear, straightforward, and, as you've said, tentative.