Anttila - An Introduction To Historical and Comparative Linguistics (1972)

AN INTRODUCTION TO
HISTORICAL AND ·coMPARATIVE

LINGUISTICS
AN INTRODUCTION TO
HISTORICAL AND COMPARATIVE
LINGUISTICS
RAIMO ANTTILA
University of California, Los Angeles
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY New York

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COPYRIGHT© 1972, RAIMO ANTTILA
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PREFACE
In any course of historical and comparative linguistics there will be students

of different language backgrounds, different levels of linguistic training, and
different theoretical orientation. No textbook has fully overcome the difficulties
raised by this heterogeneity, and probably none will; but this book attempts to
mitigate the principal problems in the following ways.
Since it is impossible to treat the language or language family of special
interest to every student, the focus of this book is on English in particular and
Indo-European languages generally. This convention accords with the most
commonly successful practice. To these languages are added Finnish and its
closely related languages for an indispensable contrast. The remaining examples
are drawn from other parts of the world but have been selected for their utility
rather than to preserve any geographical balance.
The tenets of different schools of linguistics, and the controversies among
them, are treated eclectically and objectively; the examination of language itself
plays the leading role in our efforts to ascertain the comparative value of com-
peting theories. The history of linguistic thought looms in the background, if
for the most part implicitly, and no particular school is ignored. Of course, the
instructor can move to his own theoretical tilt from the equipoise of this book
and introduce whatever additional arguments he chooses.
The different levels of academic attainment in the typical class have been
taken into account by composing the book as though it were a handbook in
hopes of saving the more advanced students from frustration while still providing
the essential background. For a really basic introduction, therefore, some chap-
ters or parts of chapters can be omitted, but this suggestion should not be con-
strued as an indication that they are superfluous. All the principles presented
are significant (including cultural and biological parallels), but whether it will
be thought desirable for students to attempt to learn them all within the limits
of a given course will depend on the instructor's judgment. Some instructors,
for example, may find it useful to begin with comparative linguistics (Part III),
because this allows for constant practice with the various methods all through
the course.
At least two innovations may be mentioned here. On the one hand, the various
concepts have been broken down into their separate components to facilitate
learning; on the other, a much greater effort has been made in this text than in
other introductory texts to relate the different concepts to each other. In my
experience, students have found this combination to be very helpful.
The bibliography is by necessity an abbreviated one, and will not serve the
needs of every reader. Most of its titles are in English, German, and French,
v
vi PREFACE
the languages students are most likely to know. Works of great historical im-
portance are often listed in translation, or in a recent reprint; thus the dates in
the bibliography lie mainly in the 1960s despite the concern with the history of
linguistics. I have listed works that have actually influenced this text by their
relation to my personal background, other elementary material, and some more
advanced works for further study.
When the "working date" used in a cross reference to any publication has
been superseded by the actual publication date during the production of this
book, the actual date may be found appended to the bibliography entry in
parentheses; brackets indicate an alternative publication of a work.
The omission of an author index is alleviated by the fact that mention of
authors is avoided as much as possible in the text itself. Most names are gathered
into the reference sections at the end of the chapters.
The influence on my thinking of over a century and a half of scholarship in
the area of historical linguistics is obvious and freely admitted. But of particular
importance has been the instruction and inspiration drawn from many teachers
in many countries, above all Bernard Bloch, Warren Cowgill, Isidore Dyen,
Floyd Lounsbury (all at Yale), and Robert Austerlitz. Colleagues who have
given me guidance and encouragement in connection with this book are Henning
Andersen, William Bright, Mati Hint, Erkki Itkonen (whose book Kieli ja sen
tutkimus profoundly influenced the following pages), Guy Jucquois, Kostas
Kazazis, J. Peter Maher, Hanns-Peter Schmidt, and Michael Shapiro. Andrew
Sihler, of the University of Wisconsin, provided invaluable advice and assistance,
especially in the matter of style. I am indebted to a great number of students
who over the years have seen my ideas develop and who have influenced them-in
particular the class at UCLA in the spring of 1970, the first one to have this
manuscript in their hands, and especially Lyle Campbell and Bruce Pearson, who
have responded beyond the call of duty. The valuable qualities of my undertaking
have been enhanced by these sources of influence; whatever is of doubtful value
is solely my own responsibility.
R.A.
CONTENTS
List of Illustrations ix
Unnumbered Illustrations xi
List of Exercises xi
PART I
BACKGROUND: GENETIC LINGUISTICS IN RELATION
TO GENERAL LINGUISTICS AND RELATED
FIELDS
1. Language and Linguistics 3
2. Writing and Language 31
3. Linguistic Variation 47
PART II
HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: HOW DOES LANGUAGE
CHANGE?
4. Sound Change 57
5. Grammar Change: Analogy 88
6. Rule Change 109
7. Semantic Change 133
8. External Change: Borrowing 154
9. Why Does Language Change? Social and Linguistic Factors 179
PART III
COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS (GENERAL NOTIONS
AND STRUCTURE): HOW CAN CHANGE BE
REVERSED?
10. Preliminaries to the Historical Methods 207
11. The Comparative Method (the Central Concept) 229
vii
viii CONTENTS
12. Internal Reconstruction 264

13. Conclusion to the Methods 274
PART IV
LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION: A SYNTHESIS OF
VARIOUS LINGUISTIC AND CULTURAL NOTIONS
14. Dialect Geography 289
15. Alternative Relationship Models 300
16. Classification of Languages 310
17. Philology and Etymology 323
18. Reconstructing Phonology 335
19. Reconstructing Grammar 351
20. Reconstructing Semology/Semantics 364
PART V
CONCLUSION: LINGU I STICS AS PART OF
ANTHROPOLOGY
21. Change and Reconstruction in Culture and Linguistics 377
22. Genetic Linguistics and Biological Genetics 389
APPENDIXES
I. Syllabus to Some Introductions to Historical Linguistics 399
II. Reading List for an Advanced Course 400
BIBLIOGRAPHY 401
INDEX 429
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1-1. Language as a bridge between meaning and sound 4

1-2. Language as a bridge between meaning and sound in more detail 5
1-3. Basic vowel chart 7
1-4. Basic consonant chart 8
1-5. A table of semantic combinations 10
1-6. Four company trade marks 16
1-7. The frames of reference for linguistics 21
2-1. The relation between language and writing 32
2-2. Possible derivation trees for manuscripts 44
3-1. Class stratification diagram forth in New York City 49
3-2. Different semantic segmentation in two dialects 52
4-1. Changes in number and distribution of phonemes 57
4-2. Rotuman vowel triangle 63
4-3. The great English vowel shift 65
4-4. Steps in Grimm's and Verner's laws 67
4-5. Excrescent [b] 68
6-1. Relative chronology of English and Rotuman vowel changes 110
6-2. Relative chronologies of Grimm's and Verner's laws 111
7-1. Parallelism between phonology and semology 135
7-2. Loss of semantic marking 136
7-3. The interrelation among four mechanisms of semantic change 142
7-4. Elaboration in the meaning-form links 144
8-1. Various types of borrowing 156
8-2. Consonant correspondences between Germanic and Germanic
loans in Baltic Finnic 159
8-3. Changes in semantic marking through borrowing 161
8-4. The sources of loans for the Finno-Ugric languages 164
8-5. The filtering of the Baltic Finnic sound system through the Baltic
and Germanic ones 174
9-1. The different mechanisms of change and their analogical core 180
9-2. Geographical distribution of meanings 183
10-1. The parallelism between the phoneme and the morphophoneme 217
10-2. Selection of Finnish front vowel and dental sets 220
ix
X LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
10-3. Selection of East Lapp consonant alternations 223

11-1. Swedish, English, and German consonants for the comparative
method 232
11-2. The labial sets between Swedish, English, and German 234
11-3. The dental sets between Swedish, English, and German 236
11-4. The velar sets between Swedish, English, and German 238
11-5. Checking the reconstruction with earlier stages 241
11-6. Indo-European sets of correspondences for the comparative method 246
11-7. The inventory of reconstructed Proto-Indo-European vowels and
resonants 249
11-8. Finnish and Lapp consonant correspondences for the comparative
method 250
11-9. The interrelation of phonemes and morphophonemes 251
13-1. Relative time depths of internal reconstruction and the comparative
method 276
13-2. Relative difference in the results of internal reconstruction and the
comparative method 277
13-3. The interrelationship of various methods of establishing sound units 279
14-1. Four dialects characterized by a pool of twelve rules 293
14·-2. Geographical stratification (France) 295
14-J. The distribution of the outcomes of Proto-Lapp *md 296
15-1. A family tree of the Uratic languages 301
15-2. A dialect map of the Indo-European languages 305
15-3. Combinations of trees and isoglosses 308
16-1. Sapir's three-parameter classificatory scheme of languages 313
16-2. Greenberg's typological indices 314
16-3. Characterization of vowel systems through geometric arrangements 315
16-4. Criteria for establishing genetic relationship 319
16-5. Nostratic dental correspondences 321
18-1. Applications of Boolean algebra in the reconstruction of phonetics
and semantics 343
18-2. Derivation trees for Finnish consonant gradation 345
18-3. Flow chart of the basic steps in the reconstruction procedure 347
UNNUMBERED ILLUSTRATIONS
Classification of signs 18
Structural classification of sound change 69
Articulatory classification of sound change 71
Proportional analogy 89
The meaning-form linkups 100
Grimm's and Verner's Jaws in Germanic Ill
Subtractive reordering and restructuring and loss 130
Onomasiological change in French 134
Semantic shift in Latin 147
Numerical parameters for diphthongs in Martha's Vineyeard 192
Abduction, deduction, and language learning 197
Inventory of reconstructed Proto-Indo-European consonants 271
Diphthongs in the Atlantic states 293
Subgrouping and phonetic reconstruction 344
Table for retention of shared vocabulary 397
LIST OF EXERCISES
Borrowing 178
Morphophonemic analysis/internal reconstruction 228
The comparative method 256
xi
For Selja, Selene, and Matti
PART I
BACKGROUND:
GENETIC LINGUISTICS
IN RELATION TO
GENERAL LINGUISTICS AND
RELATED FIELDS
CHAPTER 1
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS
A brief review of linguistics is presented, followed by a

delineation of the domain of genetic linguistics (that is,
historical linguistics and comparative linguistics). The
background ideas for the book are given.
[1.1 The Descriptive Prerequisite] For any discussion of language change

(or reconstruction) a basic description of language itself is obligatory. In order
to study change in an object, one must first know the object itself; and the
underlying principles of historical and comparative (or genetic) linguistics can
be understood only in terms of the basic characteristics of human language. In
fact, before venturing into historical linguistics, most students have taken courses
in descriptive linguistics. A second group, however, tries to study both aspects
concurrently; and a third group never St,!:!...dies descriptive linguistics in an explicit
manner, but deduces its knowledge of language structure from historical treat-
ments. The last group has tended to disappear from the modern academic scene.
The first approach is the most beneficial one for the majority of students: the
more one knows about language, the easier the study of language change will be.
It is always advisable for the student to review and refresh his basic linguistics
before and during his study of historical linguistics. We shall often have to refer
both to history and to synchronic description in the following chapters, though
a complete treatment of what the student has done (or should have done) else-
where is of course impossible. Still, a short skeletal review of the basic features
of language is useful; in fact, it is a necessary bridge to genetic linguistics, and
will therefore be given here.
[1.2 Language and Its Levels] Human language is a particular kind of

sign system which bridges two areas of the nonlinguistic universe. One of them
can be called the "nonlinguistic real or imagined world" (hereafter the "real
world"), the things we talk about; and the other end of the bridge is connected
to physical speech sounds, for example, noises that can be produced by human
speech organs. This concept is graphically represented in Figure 1-1, where the
serrated line signifies the link, rather unclear (in terms of present knowledge),
between language and the nonlinguistic universe. The arrows show the directions
of movement in the mechanism: the speaker starts with a selection of the real
world and ends up with speech sounds, whereas the hearer perceives these sounds
first and then goes the other way through the mechanism. In other words, lan-
guage is a mechanism that connects meaning with sound. This is one of the factors
3
4 BACKGROUND: GENETIC LINGUISTICS AND GENERAL LINGUISTICS
Nonlinguistic real
or imagined world
Physical speech sounds
FIGURE 1-1. Language as a bridge between meaning and sound.
that make comparative linguistics possible. Figure 1-1 should be kept in mind
throughout this book, because it diagrams the basic structure of language. But
this graph shows only that language is a funnel with two wide ends connecting
sounds with meaning and vice versa. In addition, it should be remembered that
the speech sounds are actually as much a part of the same nonlinguistic universe
as the things we talk about; after all, one can talk about speech sounds them-
selves even without being a linguist or a phonetician. Furthermore, linguists
have found it useful and necessary to divide the monolithic funnel 'language'
into various subsections. Taking these two facts into consideration we may now
revise our graph as shown in Figure 1-2. Language is divided into three main
subsystems: (1) semology, which is connected with all of the real world (through
universal semantics); (2) a central section here called grammar, comprising
morphology and syntax; and (3) phonology, which completes the bridge back
into part of the real world, the speech sounds. Semology is linguistically organ-
ized semantics, semantics being the link between semology and the real world.
The relation between phonology and phonetics is the same. Phonology is the
linguistic counterpart of phonetics (Chapter 10). The arrows still indicate the
two directions of travel within the mechanism. Further divisions can be made:
it is, for example, quite common to distinguish at least two levels within the
phonological part (i.e., morphophonemic and phonemic), both of which are
intimately connected to the phonetic level. Usually one refers to all the levels
above the speech sounds as abstract. The notion of abstractness, however, breaks
down in the link between semology and semantics, because semantics is as con-
crete as the phonetic end of the system. Linguists are still not equipped to talk
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS 5
FIGURE 1-2. Figure 1-1 drawn in more detail. Experience is funneled into
semology, and the speech sounds, which are part of this experience, into
phonology. [Modified with permission from Wallace L. Chafe, "Phonetics,
semantics, and language," Language, 38, 335-344 (1962).]
about semantics, and the term 'abstract' has been used as a justification for
ignorance. Positing separate subsystems does not imply clear-cut boundaries;
they are still integrally connected with adjoining sections, as shown in Figure 1-2
by the interlocking arrows. Of all these levels, we know the phonological one
best; this means that we know its changes best, too. The higher we go on the
scale, the less definite our knowledge is, and the results of our historical work
clearly reflect this defect in our knowledge.
[1.3 Language and Its Units] Semology, grammar, and phonology all
have units. Thus phonology is usually divided into the different degrees of
abstraction corresponding to phones, phonemes, and morphophonemes. (The unit
one chooses as the foundation of the historical treatment determines the nature
of the changes themselves.) Traditionally the phoneme has been defined as a
class of sounds in a given language that operate as one and to which the speakers
react as one sound. The members of this class are allophones, which occur in
mutually exclusive phonetic environments, and they share, in addition, at least
one concrete phonetic feature (e.g., velar or labial, above and beyond shared
negative features like [-vocalic]). Two different sounds contrast only if they
occupy analogous positions in two different morphemes or words (Chapter 10).
We shall see that for sound change (allo-)phones are of primary importance,
and these are the sound units closest to phonetics.
Morphophonemes lead us to the buildup of grammatical units, which we

may quite well call morphemes. Even though the morphemes vine and fine require
two different initial phonemes, this opposition does not necessarily hold on the
morphophonemic level (e.g., wife/wive-s). Such allomorphs, which are connected
by regular alternations, belong to the same morpheme. These regular alternations
define morphophonemes, and 'regular' means that there are at least two in-
stances of each. Thus, for example, the alternation fey ,..., ref represents one
morphophoneme in the following material: sane/sanity, vain/vanity, and Spain/
Spaniard (see§ 2.4). Allomorphs are not only held together by morphophonemes
on the phonological side, but they are also linked to the same semantic unit; for
example, the shapes wife and wive- are semantically the same. A very widespread
view has been that morphemes are established solely on a semantic basis. Thus,
curiously, the formal units are actually semantic; for example, go and wen-(t)
are grouped together into one morpheme' go', as are (ox)-en and (cat)-s, because
both mean 'plural'. There is, however, no regular morphophonemic tie between
the forms, and they should consequently not belong to the same morphemes,
'go' and 'plural'. In other words, different morphemes can represent the same
semantic unit, and different semantic units can be represented by the same
morpheme; for example, the entities 'third person singular', 'possessive', and
'plural' are all represented by the morpheme-s fs "' z ,..., izf. Morphemes thus
do not 'have' meanings, they represent them. The morpheme and sememe (unit
of semology in language-specific semantics rather than in universal semantics)
are independent units that are necessarily linked together in the linguistic sign.
For example, we have one morpheme, bluff, and two meanings, 'trick' and
'precipice', and thus there are two linguistic signs: bluff 'trick' and bluff
'precipice'. Similarly, we have one morpheme-s and the three linguistic signs.
Or, we can say, the one meaning 'plural' and the two forms-sand -en establish
two linguistic signs, -s 'plural' and -en 'plural'. Because genetic linguistics
depends on such a link between form and meaning, it will be based heavily on
the linguistic-sign aspect of morphemes and sememes. No matter how the
linguist establishes his units, he will have such units; and for our purposes,
he will also have corresponding linguistic signs, because that is what language
is-a connection between sound and meaning (Figures 1-1 and 1-2). This view
is a minority opinion, because in actual practice most linguists refer to -s and
-en as variants of the same morpheme. But the position adopted here will give
the best foundation for treating linguistic change (see, in particular, Chapter 7).
We shall have to return to the linguistic sign later, because it is of utmost
importance; but before that we should look at the makeup of the units them-
selves.
[1.4 The Components of Units] The units are "composed" of smaller

components. In phonology these are called distinctive features; sound units
(phones) are combinations of such features (e.g., b is an arrangement of closure
(stoppedness), labiality, and voice: replacing the first feature by friction, we get
ft. Various schemes for handling distinctive features have been devised, either
acoustic or articulatory. In this book, articulatory features will be used because
they provide the most convenient common ground for philologists and linguists.
Thus the vowels are defined by three parameters: tongue advancement and tongue
height (both with continuous scales), and lip position (either rounded or un-
rounded). Height is normally subdivided into three levels; high, mid, and low
(with at least two subdivisions each); and tongue advancement, into three cate-
gories: front, central, and back. Figure 1-3 tabulates the vowel scheme, with
only the most frequent combinations of features represented. The unfilled boxes
could be filled with symbols already used, distinguished by various diacritic
marks. When we have to talk about such vowels, we may state the defining
features (e.g., a central lower-high rounded vowel) and then use any convenient
symbol for the situation at hand. Vowels also involve the activity of the vocal
cords, but voiceless vowels have not been indicated here (they are better known
ash-sounds;§ 10.2). Similarly, murmured vowels have been omitted.
Tongue advancement
Lip
I
position \. Front Central Back
u R u R u R
H i i.i=y i i=ru u
High
L I tJ I u
....
.c
.~
~
H e 0=0 0
.c Mid ~
~
L e 5=re
=
eJ)
=
A ~
~ H re=a
Low
L a a D
FIGURE 1-3. Basic vowel chart defined by three articulatory parameters.
[1.5] An articulatory classification of consonants can also be done on the

basis of three elements: manner of articulation (including six possibilities, if
flaps and trills are taken as vibrants), place of articulation (seven possibilities,
apico-dental and apico-alveolar being separate, but combined in the table), and
voicing (two possibilities). The most frequent combinations of features are given
in Figure 1-4; again, the unfilled boxes may be labeled when the need arises. We
have here a scheme that enables us to define most consonantal speech sounds.
Semivowels have not been specified; normally one needs only two, wand y. The
latter was included as a fronto-palatal voiced spirant, but often it can be equally
well defined as a nonsyllabic high front unrounded vowel. This is exactly what
'semivowel' means. Similarly, w is a nonsyllabic high back rounded vowel, and
it is a lesser degree of lip-rounding that separates it from j3. For nasals and
Position (point) of articulation
Point in
Activity Apical Frontal Dorsal Faucal tongue
Manner of of vocal Labio- Dental Point in
articulation chords Bilabial Dental Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal 'mouth'
stop voiceless p t k q=?
(closure) voiced b d g
voiceless P<P pf ts = c tS=c (kx)
affricate
voiced dz dz = J
.-;:: voiceless <P f 9=1> (( X (h)
r;; voiced v 6 y y (li)
spirant= B
II)
00 fricative >
0
voiceless s s
...0
00
voiced z z
nasal voiced m n fi=jl lJ
"0
·s lateral voiced 1 !i.. =I' L, l=JI
g trill
......
s:: voiced r R
flap .D
...
ro
voiced o=r
·;;:
glide voiced w y w
FIGURE 1-4. Basic consonant chart defined by three articulatory parameters. A row for glides is added to emphasize the
frequent patterning of [y] and [w]. Note that both occur twice in the diagram. Note that [q] will be used for the glottal
stop and not for a back velar.
liquids the voiceless counterparts have not been written in, although they are
by no means infrequent sounds in the languages of the world.
The two tables now roughly characterize the possibilities of all sounds made
by human articulating organs. They map in more detail the part of the real
world labeled 'sounds' in Figure 1-2. Any one language "chooses" only a small
part of all the possible speech sounds defined or definable in the tables. And
even if two languages use a p-sound, it does not mean that the p's would be
phonetically identical. The tables define cardinal points only, because the phonet-
ic truth is that the sounds are indefinitely varied, even in the pronunciation of
a single speaker, not to speak of different languages.
[1.6] Semantic components are parallel to phonetic components. Whether

there is one semantic unit (sememe) 'uncle', represented by the morpheme uncle,
is doubtful; but in uncle there is at least a sum of the three components 'first
ascending generation', 'first degree of collaterality', and 'male'. (These, at least,
are sememes.) Thus the semantic makeup of uncle (or the composite 'uncle')
is structurally quite similar to the phonetic makeup of b. In general, then,
a certain configuration of semantic units or components is represented by
a certain configuration of formal units (morphemes), which, themselves, are
certain configurations of sound units, the latter, finally, being arrangements of
distinctive features (phonetic components).
It was relatively easy to map the speech sounds, because all languages produce
Lhem in a relatively confined and clearly determined area. The same is not true
of the total experience of the "real world" of Figure 1-2. Different cultures
divide reality into different semological units, partly as a consequence of cultur-
ally relevant experience. There are semantic areas in which i.t is very difficult to
decompose the semantic structure into its components, sememes. However,
certain subsections of vocabulary have been very amenable to componential
analysis, and we see basically the same structure as on the phonetic side. Con-
sider the combinations of the meanings 'male', 'female', and 'young' with the
generic meanings of animal species in Figure 1-5. We have here a striking
similarity to the phonetic tables. All rows contain the same meaning, but the
last three columns contain forms representing two meanings. The independence
of form and meaning comes out very clearly indeed. The table shows that a
perfect arrangement of forms breaks down here and there, in that the same form
can represent two combinations (goose, dog, cat, and man). This is not surprising;
we have seen the same situation before with completely unrelatable meanings
(bluff, -s). The table shows farm animals predominantly, since gender differences
are important in terms of cattle breeding. It is often difficult to discover a generic
name, for example, for English bull-cow-calf One could perhaps speak of a
bovine animal; cattle will not do, however, as it may include other farm animals
(sheep) and exclude calves and heifers. Livestock, on the other hand, covers all
together. Outside the category of domesticated animals there is more of a one-
to-one relation between form and meaning, for example, tiger-he-tiger (male
tiger)-tigress (she-tiger, female tiger)-tiger cub (or young tiger, baby tiger),
Generic meaning Generic meaning plus meanings

and corresponding
form 'male' 'female' 'young'
horse stallion mare foal
sheep ram ewe lamb
pig boar sow piglet
goose gander goose gosling
dog (he-)dog bitch puppy
cat tom-cat (she-)cat kitten
man man woman child
FIGURE 1-5. A table of semantic combinations showing parallelism to

Figures 1-3 and 1-4.
where cub again covers the young of certain mammals only. Languages differ
greatly in the semantic combinations represented by one formal unit. This fact
leads to various ethnocentric value judgments. One often reads in early treat-
ments that in a certain "primitive" language there are different words for' black
cow', 'brown cow', and so on, but no generic word for 'cow' (Zulu). Similar
situations are quoted for 'potato' in Aymara, 'snow' in Eskimo, and 'camel'
in Arabic. 'Primitive' here really means 'different' (often it just refers to the
nontechnological culture of the speakers using a certain language), since the
link-up between the semantic and formal configurations is different. No language
is primitive; they are all of the shape portrayed in Figure 1-2 (see§ 22.5). English
would also be "primitive," looked at from the point of view of the very languages
that are branded that way. It does not have a single generic term for 'bovine
animal' and what is "worse" by far, it has almost a hundred animal group
names (not necessarily American or Modern English), restricted to one or a
few species only. In addition to the rather general (but still not generic) flock,
herd, pack, and so on, there are also cast (of hawks), husk (of hares),jesnyng
(of ferrets), gaggle (of geese, on ground or water), skein (of geese, in the air),
shrewdness (of apes), skulk (of foxes), sleuth (of bears), wisp (of snipe), and
so on.
In general, a term whose extension is larger than that of another is abstract.
In contrast, the latter term is concrete. Thus the notions 'abstract' and' concrete'
are relative notions.
(1.7] The areas in which the arbitrary division of reality by a particular

language first became extremely clear to scholars were the color and kinship
terms. The physical facts are identical for all cultures, that is, the wavelengths
of the spectrum and the biological relations of the ego in a population. But how
these facts are segmented into relevant units within a particular culture is culture-
specific, and this is then normally reflected in the language used by the culture.
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS II
Examples of these best-structured areas are provided in many introductory text-

books of linguistics. What is important to remember is the independence of
form and meaning in any particular language and the different linguistic divi-
sions and selections of the real world both within phonology and semology
(Figure 1-2). English p and French p are different phonological selections from
universal phonetics, and English green and Hopi 'green' are different semological
segmentations of the universal color spectrum-not to speak of intralinguistic
and interindividual variation: the chances are that your green is different from
my green to some degree.
[1.8 Form, Meaning, and Classification] The particular nature of the link
between form and meaning has been an important criterion for typological
language classification. A language in which words contain one morpheme each
and have a one-to-one correspondence between formal and semantic units is
called isolating. If the words of a language are built up of a number of clearly
segmentable morphemes, which again have a one-to-one correspondence be-
tween form and meaning, the language is agglutinating. When the relation be-
tween form and meaning is one-to-many, which is the general case, the language
is synthetic. If words of a language represent an unusually high number of
semantic units, the language is called polysynthetic. These again are cardinal
points only, since there are no pure types (Chapter 16). They just show that
different languages make the meaning-form link-up differently-but they all
make it. This clearly shows, also, that meaning is basically independent of form
(one-to-many relation). It is curious that this kind of typological classification
was popular at a time when morphemes were defined semantically, that is, when
linguists operated with the assumption of a one-to-one relation between form
and meaning. Certain idioms, for example, to kick the bucket, 'to die', obviously
invalidated the assumption of one-to-one relation, but they were somehow
squeezed into the model anyway.
[1.9 Units and Rules] Linguists differ in the number of language levels
or subsystems they posit, as well as in the number of units they assign to each
level. The framework we have been characterizing here is only the common
core of various conceptions of the particular shape of linguistic structure. We
have referred to distinctive features, phones, phonemes, morphophonemes,
morphs, morphemes, and sememes or semantic components. One must remem-
ber that the morpheme is not the only grammatical unit; there are others of
different rank, where we also have various conglomerations of different size and
rank (i.e., word, phrase, clause, and sentence). Each level has various rules (now
often called transformations) for the combination of the units. These determine
the types of constructions that occur or could occur. There are also rules that
link the different levels with the adjoining ones. All these, taken together with
the units, give us the sum total of language as represented in Figure 1-1.
But a linguist is a mechanic of language who tries to take the machinery
apart: Figure 1-2 was a first crude step, which we followed by the establishment
I2 BACKGROUND: GENETIC LINGUISTICS AND GENERAL LINGUISTICS
of units (both discussed earlier and mentioned here in connection with rules).
Units without rules and rules without units cannot exist in language. Both are
necessary, and consequently they cannot be hierarchically ordered; they are
both equally important in the actual functioning of language. Both the units and
the rules are subject to change, as we shall see, no matter what the linguist's
predilections are in his assumptions about the structure of the language mecha-
nism. But the way in which the change itself is described is, of course, dependent
on the kinds of rules and units the linguist posited in the first place. Absolute
change may be acknowledged differently by different linguists, therefore, because
they may have disagreed on the starting point and on the exact details posited
for the structure of language.
To emphasize how a change and its results can to a great degree depend on
the structure we adopt as our framework, let us refer to two hypothetical ex-
amples. Let us assume that two linguists describe one and the same language,
each according to his own principles. One arrives at a grammar that is a square,
the other posits a circle; but both get a definite form (which is always the target
of the linguist). The two grammars may be equally workable. Now comes a
chang~ that divides the grammar exactly in half. The square grammar gives
either two triangles or two trapezoids of various shapes, whereas the round
grammar always gives two half-circles. The impact of the change depended on
the configuration on which the change operated.
For the second example, suppose that one linguist posits more units of a
certain kind than another does. Say that we have two tables, one with four legs
and the other with three. Both are recognizable as tables, exactly as two different
grammars might be recognizable as grammars of the same language (as they
should be, of course). Then a historical change removes one leg from both.
The change is exactly the same in both tables, but the result is quite different
indeed; again, the results depend on the structure of the starting point. (These
metaphors can be translated into the grammars of different schools; see§ 6.6.)
This brief characterization of language as a bridge between "reality" and
speech sounds has proceeded from the more general toward the more detailed.
But this is only a presentation of the findings of descriptive linguistics and in no
way reflects the order in which the facts have been or should be discovered.
[1.10 Classification of Signs and Language] Let us now look at a generally

accepted definition of language:
A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by which the members of

a speech community (social group) cooperate and interact (communicate).
In other words, language is a system for communication. Language is systematic

(rule-governed, nonrandom; it shows predictability) and systemic, which means
that the total system is divided into subsystems (Figure 1-2). The definition
includes the attribute vocal to emphasize sound over writing, which is a (his-
torically) secondary representation of the primary speech. The remaining term,
arbitrary symbol, brings us back to the linguistic sign and its importance for
genetic linguistics. Only a full understanding of the notion 'linguistic sign'
makes both change and reconstruction comprehensible and theoretically
explainable.
A given entity is a sign of a given referent (thing meant) if it elicits at least
some of the responses elicited by the referent, or as normally put, a sign stands
for a thing. There are three typt:s of signs:
I. An icon expresses mainly formal, factual similarity between the meaning

and the meaning carrier; that is, there is physical resemblance between the
shape of the sign and the referent. Thus a photo is an icon of what it repre-
sents. Also many sounds by which one tries to imitate the sounds of nature
are highly iconic, because the simple qualities of the meaning are contained
in the form (e.g., English peep, thump, gulp, and so on).
2. An index expresses mainly material relation (factual, existential contiguity)
between meaning and form. It is based on psychological association and/or
physical juxtaposition of different events and things. For example, the
cause-and-effect relation is indexical; smoke is a sign of fire, or footsteps
in snow are a sign of a walker. The index-like features of language include
relational concepts of time and place, the deictic elements or shifters (e.g.,
now, here, I, and this, which all depend on other elements in the discourse).
3. A symbol is based on a learned conventional relation, ascribed contiguity,
or colligation, between form and meaning. This relation is completely
arbitrary, and this is exactly the basic characteristic of the linguistic sign
(as especially stressed by de Saussure). All symbols are "arbitrary" in this
way, and hence the term is superfluous in this context. Actually the term
arbitrary is slightly misleading. We have already seen that, owing to the
structure of language as a mechanism connecting sound to meaning, this
link between the concept and the sound image is necessary. Saussure him-
self compared it to a sheet of paper: one side is the meaning, the other is
the form. It is rather awkward to separate the two, for it is a very close
symbiosis indeed. The mind does not seem to cherish empty forms or un-
named concepts, nor is it easy to talk about matters for which there are no
words. Such situations require long circumlocutions. Thus the makeup of
the linguistic sign is not arbitrary, but necessary. It reflects the same link
between sound and meaning as the total language does.
What is arbitrary is that a particular sign be connected with a particular element

of the "real world." The connection itself is not arbitrary. The connection be-
tween sound and meaning is necessary for a sign system like language. We do
not and cannot deal with things in themselves; we must deal with signs pointing
toward things. The necessity of the linguistic sign may be even biologically
obligatory (§ 22.3), but the shape of the linguistic sign is arbitrary. The degree
of arbitrariness that remains is crucial for much of genetic linguistics, especially
comparative. This arbitrariness is outside the nucleus of the sign itself-it is in
the outer shape and the semantic range, and it is clearly seen in looking at
different languages. That is, it is arbitrary that different languages have such and
such formal shapes for, say, the meaning 'horse' (e.g., English horse, German
Pferd, Swedish hast, Finnish hevonen, French cheval, and so on). But when we
look at linguistic signs in terms of one language, we can see that there is a
tendency for a speaker to assume complete sameness between linguistic form
and reality. The sign captures and controls reality; in fact, it is reality in the
extreme case (nomen est omen, verbal magic, and so on). This is one source of
conflict between the speaker (who has not been linguistically trained) and the
linguist (who knows better) (see§ 18.7). Later we shall see how the obligatory
(nonarbitrary) aspect of the linguistic sign creates change (Part II) and how the
arbitrary side makes reconstruction possible (Part Ill). But before that we have
to go back to the other signs.
[1.11] The three types of signs (icons, indexes, and symbols) are only foot-
holds in the hierarchy of signs. In this sense, they are just cardinal points, not
unlike the cardinal vowels in the notation of the International Phonetic Associ-
ation (IPA). Photos and animal cries are also heavily indexical in relation to the
object and the source of the cry. The best signs are mixtures of all the ingredients,
a situation that is often clearest in poetry, where a symbol with associative power
(indexical) and sound symbolism (iconic) is very effective. It should be noted
that 'sound symbolism' means exactly the opposite of the technical term 'sym-
bol'. Onomatopoeic words, words that imitate nature sounds, are often naively
thought to be completely iconic, that is, perfect replicas of the actual sounds
they refer to. But that they are also symbolic is immediately evident in a com-
parison among different languages (third person singular endings separated from
the root/stem):
ENGLISH GERMAN FINNISH

the cow moo-s muh-t ammu-u
the sheep baa-s blok-t miiiiki-i
the goat bleat-s mecker-t miikiittii-ii
the pig grunt-s grunz-t riihki-i
the cat miaow-s miau-t nauku-u
the pigeon coo-s gurr-t kujerta-a
the cock crow-s kriih-t kieku-u
The cock goes cock-a-doodle-doo in English, kikeriki in German, and coquerico

(or cocorico) in French, whereas in Finnish it always utters the well-formed
sentence kukko kiekuu, ' the cock crows'. Many languages show velar stops for
the word for' cock', but it is quite clear that the animal cannot produce the same
sounds that human speech organs can. The columns given are taken as very
iconic within each of the three languages, and, in fact, they do agree among
themselves considerably more than the rest of the respective vocabularies. The
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS IS
agreement is by no means perfect, however, a fact that immediately establishes
the symbolic aspect of the terms. English and German are closely related lan-
guages, but they still differ. And it is only natural that Finnish diverges more,
because its sound system is very dissimilar from Germanic. In some related
material the agreement can be even greater; for example, the cat "says" miau
in Finnish, even though the verb is naukua. On the other hand, English pigs
go oink, the Finnish ones roh or nof; the symbolic elements are still considerable.
[1.12] The same is true of art. Most art in most cultures is highly repre-
sentative (except for music, perhaps), or what could be called nonabstract-in
other words, very iconic-because the necessary physical resemblance between
the referent and its formal marker (the signified and the signifier) exists. But
art is also based on many conventions, depending on the time and place of its
origin. In medieval art, for example, certain colors carry symbolic meaning.
The representation of, say, perspective depends on various conventions. In short,
for a full interpretation of a work of art one has to know certain conventions,
and these are symbolic. In general, one could say that the more "stylized" art
is, the more symbolic elements it contains. A" normal" piece of art is a symbolic
icon, exactly like the onomatopoeic words in a language. In both cases the
imitation of nature (the real world) is not perfect. Art gives the most concrete
example of the range from iconic to symbolic representation. It shows the
hierarchical character of the three basic types of signs-first, purely iconic rela-
tions between the picture and its topic, second, more abstract and stylized pic-
tures, and, finally, completely conventional forms of decorations that still show
definite meaning. But this meaning has to be specifically learned; it cannot be
deduced from the physical shape of the picture. This level is, then, largely sym-
bolic, exactly like the linguistic sign. The latter must also be learned, because
the meaning and the form have to be connected by a special rule which holds
for one particular case only. In Chapter 2 we shall see examples of this in the
development of writing.
One area of (artistic) signs showing various degrees of symbolicity and
iconicity is heraldry. It had its own rules in addition to the conventions of medi-
eval art in general. A form of heraldry has survived in trademarks. Many com-
panies have devised signs that blend all three sign elements, and if the mixture
is successful, the trademark is very effective. A frequent form of design is one
in which the initial letters of the name of a company are shaped so that together
they form a picture of the product of the company, its main tools of manu-
facturing, or its raw materials (all these standing in indexical relation to the
company). Thus the abbreviation IP, the registered trademark of the International
Paper Company, is a kind of index of the total name (Figure 1-6). The shapes of
the letters are completely symbolic in English; there is nothing intrinsic in the
fact that I is Ji/ and P Jpf and not vice versa. These two letters are written and
arranged so that they form a very stylized picture of a tree. Thus two symbolic
letters represent iconically a tree, which itself is an index of the company; the
principles involved hold for the other cases in Figure 1-6.
International Finnair Southern California Certina

Paper Company Edison Company
FIGURE 1-6. Four company trademarks that blend iconic, indexical, and
symbolic elements. The arbitrary symbolic shapes of the letters stand in
indexical relation to the company name and form an iconic picture of an
index of the company that gives a symbol for the company. (IP = tree,
F = airplane, SCE = electric cord, and C twice = watchwork.) [Reproduced
by permission from the International Paper Company, Finnair, the Southern
California Edison Company, and Certina-Kurth Bros., Ltd., respectively.]
(1.13 Subdivision oflcons] The word icon means literally 'picture'. The
discussion of artistic representation showed that there are different kinds of
pictures (as everybody knows); it is therefore necessary to divide icons into three
distinct subclasses: images, diagrams, and metaphors. Images are characterized
by a relation between form and meaning in which the former contains the simple
qualities of the latter; this is the kind of icon we were referring to above. Dia-
grams are characterized by a similarity between form and meaning that is
constituted solely by the relations of their parts (Chapter 5). And metaphors
embody the representative character of the form by exhibiting a parallelism in
the meaning (Chapter 7). Linguistics, like any other science, has to rely heavily
on both diagrams and metaphors. A diagram is predominantly an icon of rela-
tion, and to interpret such icons one needs conventions. Thus two rectangles or
circles of different size, used to show a quantitative comparison of steel or coffee
production in two countries, make up a diagram in that the relations in the form
correspond to the relations in the meaning. The symbolic (conventional) aspect
here is that one has to know that it is steel production we are comparing and
not, say, coffee. A diagram is a symbolic icon. As far as language is concerned,
such diagrammatic relations are its essence. Language is very frequently referred
to as a system (or network) of relations. Linguistic units are more important as
end points in various relations than as entities in themselves.
In fact, we have already seen the usefulness of diagrammatic icons in this
background treatment. Figure 1-1 is a crude diagram of language, but it was
made more precise in Figure 1-2, which shows many relational aspects. It would
be impossible to draw an image of language, but it is quite feasible to have an
icon of the experience of the linguists. Such icons are often called models, and
they are important frames of research in all sciences. Parts of Figure 1-2 were
drawn as even more detailed diagrams (Figures 1-3-1-5). The purpose of these
phonetic and semantic tabular arrangements is precisely to show relationships;
for example,.the relation of dto ois the same as that of g toy, and gander:gosling
as ram: lamb. Many more diagrams will be given later.
[1.14] The relational character of language permeates all levels of gram-

mar, but it has been recognized above all in morphology and syntax, where one
has to deal with the distribution of symbols. In other words, such distributional
elements are largely iconic (i.e., diagrammatic). This is a very important fact.
Thus vocabulary is predominantly symbolic, and the rules of the language,
iconic or diagrammatic (e.g., word order). The lexical tool is based on unmoti-
vated arbitrary signs, the grammatical instrument on constructional rules. The
diagrammatic relation between parts and wholes is often formally represented
in this dichotomy of lexical and grammatical morphemes. They occupy fixed
different positions within the word as a whole. Further, affixes, especially
inflectional suffixes, generally differ from the other morphemes by a restricted
and selected use of the sound units and their combinations. Thus, in English,
the productive inflectional suffixes are represented by dental stops, dental
spirants, and their combination in -st. Of the twenty-four obstruents of the
Russian consonantal pattern, only four function in the inflectional suffixes. In
morphology it is easy to find relational correlates between form and meaning.
In Indo-European, the positive, comparative, and superlative degrees of adjec-
tives show a gradual increase in length corresponding to the increase on the
semantic side, for example, high-higher-highest, Latin altus-altior-altissimus.
This is not a perfect universal, however, because there are also languages where
this relation does not hold, for example, Finnish korkea-korkeampi-korkein;
but even here the positive is the shortest one, and the inflected stems of the com-
parative and the superlatives are actually equal in length: korkeampa-, korkeim-
pa-. In German hoch-hOher-hochst the comparative is the longest by syllable
count, but the superlative is longest by sound count. On the whole this is how
forms reflect a corresponding gradation in meaning, and this is parallel to the
diagram of comparative steel production.
[1.15) What we have seen here is that symbols need not be iconic, but that
symbol complexes are arranged in iconic relations with object complexes (see
also the trademark example). This situation is much better known in algebra,
where every equation is a diagrammatic icon. In algebra one has to define certain
symbols, but after that, the rules take care of the iconic arrangements. !conicity
is particularly clear in, say, analytic geometry. But remember that language is
often referred to as a kind of algebra, and, in fact, linguistics has strived to
develop algebraic notations to represent the relational aspects of a grammar.
This approach has been very successful in the description of syntax, which can
be almost totally represented with graphs. Thus we are able to separate the
iconic (diagrammatic) forms from the conventional (symbolic) features of one
and the same system.
Metaphors need not be discussed any further at this point. They are also
relational, but rather than exhibiting mere part--whole relations, they concentrate
on the similarity of function (e.g., the foot of the mountain, the leg of a table,
and so on) (see Chapter 7).
[1.16] We have now characterized three basic types of signs as cardinal

points in a hierarchy, further dividing the icons into three subtypes:
icon ~image
sign~ index "'-diagram
symbol metaphor
These notions will be basic to both change and reconstruction, as has been
stressed already. Let us conclude this classification of signs with an observa-
tion by Charles S. Peirce, on whose work this characterization of signs is based.
By referring the different kinds of signs to temporal aspects he stresses the
creative power of language:
An icon has such being as belongs to past experience. It exists only as an

image in the mind. An index has the being of present experience. The being
of a symbol consists in the real fact that something surely will be experienced
if certain conditions be satisfied. Namely, it will influence the thought and
conduct of its interpreter. Every word is a symbol. Every sentence is a symbol.
Every book is a symbol. The value of a symbol is that it serves to make
thought and conduct rational and enables us to predict the future. Whatever
is truly general refers to the indefinite future, for the past contains only a
certain collection of such cases that have occurred. The past is actual fact.
But a general law cannot be fully realized. It is a potentiality; and its mode of
being is esse in futuro (to be in the future)-(Jakobson 1965).
This quotation also delineates the two necessary aspects of historical linguistics,
facts and general laws. Both are likely to be controversial in any particular case,
but an understanding of signs makes the situation more comprehensible.
In semiotics, the study of signs and sign systems, one calls the relation of the
signs to their referents semantic, that of signs to other signs in the code syntactic,
and the relation of signs to their users pragmatic. Linguistics is but a part of
semiotics (the dominating one), but it is clear that semantics has a correlate in
language, syntactics has a linguistic counterpart in syntax, and pragmatics points
to the social setting of language (e.g., sociolinguistics [Chapter 3], psycholin-
guistics, ethnolinguistics, and so on) (see § 21.2).
The discussion of the sign types(§§ 1.10-1.16) will give the

basic background for the treatment of change (through
Chapter 9). It is important to understand the nature of the
sign types, for they provide the underlying, unifying factor
in the various mechanisms of change and reconstruction
(Part III and Chapters 18-20).
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS I9
[1.17 Change and Sign Types) Genetic linguistics is a cover term for both
historical and comparative linguistics because both deal with languages showing
genetic affinity: historical linguistics treats linear relationships, and comparative
linguistics treats collateral relationships. Historical linguistics treats change of
various kinds; comparative linguistics sees through change as best it can and
establishes earlier stages when much of the change had not yet taken place. In
short, historical linguistics takes us downstream on the time axis, comparative
linguistics upstream. The two types of genetic linguistics correlate with different
types of the linguistic sign. Change occurs within one language and is thus largely
independent of the changes in any other language (ignoring borrowing, of
course). Within one language the linguistic sign is not arbitrary, but necessary,
and assumes considerable iconic character.
We shall see that most change is due to the iconic features of a language
(Part II). This is true both of phonological (Chapter 4) and analogical change
(Chapter 5), just as semantic change is to a large degree based on the indexical
contiguity of signs (Chapter 7). Reconstruction, on the other hand, rests solely
on the symbolic side of language (Part III). Because the shape for a given mean-
ing in any language is arbitrary, it follows that if two languages exhibit pervasive
similarity in the forms that correspond to similar semantic features (diagram-
matic relations in fact, but this time between two languages), then the link be-
tween form and meaning is one only; each language continues one and the same
form-meaning set, with some alteration or other. In order words, change, based
on iconic relations, causes languages to resemble one another less and less (Part
II), whereas the unmotivated, arbitrary nature of the linguistic sign maintains
resemblances between related languages (Part III)-resemblances that can often
be unmistakably discerned even after sizable changes have taken place in the
languages. These are the two diametrically opposed forces that operate on
linguistic signs. These facts support the statement that only symbols enable us
to predict the future. If icons and indexes point to past and present, respectively,
their value for reconstruction is limited, because reconstruction occurs in the
future relative to a past point of time. Since symbols are more enduring and
directed toward the future, they give us the reverse perspective of "predicting"
the past. The present is the future seen from the point of reference that we attempt
to reconstruct. Of course, all linguistic signs are symbolic to some degree, and
the more this is true, the more reliable they are for reconstruction. Thus iconic
elements are the least valuable for comparative linguistics, however great their
importance in other areas of language (language use, literature, and so on).
In connection with the durative aspect of symbols, it is interesting to note that
culture, also, depends on symbolic structure. Language, of course, is part of the
total culture, and an important part (Chapter 21), since among other things it
allows for division of labor. This fact is clearly based on symbolic behavior,
which separates the sign from its referent in time and place. Systematic planning
becomes possible. In contrast, most animal signs are indexical ouch!- type sounds,
indicating that something is happening here and now. Culture is learned sign
behavior, that is, symbolic, and it is learned from previous generations, exactly
like language. Culture is man's primary adaptive mechanism, and it supports

and shapes man's biological continuity (Chapter 21). But language, as a carrier
of culture, itself has a biological basis, that is, man's species-specific capacity to
speak and learn a language, as well as the biological presence and shape of the
organs that produce speech as their by-product (Chapter 22). Thus the strong
cohesion between culture and language, both of which are based on symbolic
sign behavior, has connections in human evolution. To sum up, symbols make
human language possible, language is an integral part of culture, and culture
supports biological survival.
[1.18 Division of Linguistic Researclt] Linguistics is traditionally divided

into three branches: descriptive, historical, and comparative (genetic linguistics
is the cover term for the last two). The task of descriptive linguistics is to ascertain
and formulate the structure of a language at a particular given time. Thus one
can perfectly well write a descriptive grammar of Old English or Classical Latin.
The term 'synchronic' is generally a synonym of descriptive, although it often
includes, in addition, what might be called diatopic aspects: dialectology,
sociolinguistics, and the like. Synchronic is the antonym of diachronic: no time
sequences are taken into consideration, and the frame of reference covers an
idealized single case or cut only. Diachronic is very much a synonym of historical,
referring to the study of language as it persists through time. Comparative
linguistics has two tasks: establishing the fact and degree of relationship for two
or more languages (Chapter 16) and reconstructing earlier (prehistoric) stages,
called protolanguages (Chapters 18-20). The first task can be done alone, but
it must be settled before one can carry out actual reconstruction. One of the
justifications of comparative linguistics has been that it gives a starting point
from which one can deduce the histories of all the daughter languages.
Structural linguistics is not synonymous with descriptive linguistics. Structural
is a point of view; it means a treatment in terms of the whole system, and its
opposite is an atomistic, piecemeal treatment of parts without regard to the
whole. 'Structural', to be sure, covers various conceptions of structure. Thus
the generative-transformational approach adopts one kind of structure, better
called the transformational one; other current theories are also generative. Also
well-known structural frameworks are the Trager and Smith model; tagmemics;
the Prague school, with its distinctive features both in phonology and semantics;
stratificational grammar, which is an outgrowth of glossematics (the Copenhagen
school); and the system-and-structure or scale-and-rank models adhered to
mainly in England. A typical example of an atomistic historical treatment is
plotting a Latin vowel with its modern outcome in, say, a French dialect, without
any attention to the whole sound systems. In a structural approach, the whole
network of the relations between the different sound units is the object of the
historical linguist.
[1.19] A serious terminological difficulty has arisen from the fact that
genetic linguistics has preempted the term 'comparative'. Any kind of compari-
son for any other purpose (e.g., translation, classification of languages by their
structural characteristics, language teaching, language universals, and so on)
has to be referred to by a different term (see§§ 21.14, 22.8). Sometimes the words
'typological' or 'contrastive' serve this purpose (nonhistorical comparison), but
often they are not inclusive enough. The Greek counterpart to 'contrast' and
'comparison', syncrisis, has been proposed for this task. Others, in order to
avoid confusion, use the compound 'historical-comparative' for the highly
technical notion of 'comparative' in genetic linguistics.
(1.20] Comparative linguistics has also often been called comparative
philology, especially in England. The reason for this is that comparative lin-
guistics was practiced mainly with regard to the older Indo-European languages,
where philological screening of the material was a prerequisite (Chapter 17).
Means of getting at data

Either A or B or both
prerequisite to C c
A B
Contact=
Frame of reference field work Philology Reconstruction
1
Synchrony
(idealized single case,
past or present)
2
Diachrony
(change through time
and reconstruction,
i.e., geneticism)
3
Diatopicality
(variation in space and
social strata)
4
Syncrisis
(typological, contrastive,
and generic aspects)
FIGURE 1-7. The frames of reference for linguistics. Shaded areas show that
all are involved in genetic linguistics. Row 3 is an important basis or pre-
requisite of row 2. [Based on Dell Hymes, "Linguistics: the field," modified
with permission of the Publisher from the International encyclopedia of the
social sciences (David L. Sills, ed., 9, 358b © 1968 Crowell-Collier and
Macmillan, Inc.)]
In the philological study of language the total cultural setting (customs,

artifacts, social structure, and so on) is considered in connection with texts;
linguistics is used in connection with various kinds of history, archaeology,
geography, botany, folklore, numismatics, comparative religion, law, and the
like. Linguistics, in principle, studies language for language's sake, but the total
cultural setting has entered nonhistorical linguistics as well, in the form of
sociolinguistics, anthropological linguistics, ethnolinguistics, and psycholin-
guistics (Chapter 2 I). These are in a way modern 'synchronic philologies', al-
though the name philology is used only for a situation where an interpretation
of texts is involved (e.g., 'classical philology' for antiquity and 'modern philol-
ogy' for more recent texts). Closely connected with philology is literature, that
is, language used as a medium of art; its subdivisions are stylistics, poetics,
metrics, narration, oratory, rhetoric, and drama (see§ 17.1).
Linguists can explore the approaches mentioned above (and even others, e.g.,
mathematical linguistics, lexicography, phonetic sciences, and semantics) in con-
nection with different languages or language families, or within geographical
areas, or in connection with semiotics, the science of signs. Thus an enormous
number of possibilities are available for study, and no linguist masters all the
combinations. Figure 1-7 sums up the different frames of reference of linguistic
investigation and the different means of compiling the material. Again, these
are cardinal points only; in the actual work everything is complementary. In
genetic linguistics rows 2 (change) and 3 (variation) are the central ones, but the
other areas also influence its course. One must also remember that each box of
the diagram (Figure 1-7) raises questions of theory: what kind of features one
should use, what kind of rules and units, whether the rules should be ordered
and how, and so on. Such theoretical considerations have no parallel in the
gathering of material (data), but they offer guidelines for handling the facts (we
shall return to this shortly).
[1.21 History of Linguistics] Historical linguistics should not be confused

with history of linguistics. The only thing they have in common is that both
involve change through time. Part of the confusion between the two derives
from the early importance of historical linguistics, so that histories of linguistics
have to deal heavily with it. By the nineteenth century, there were good descrip-
tions of Latin, Greek, and Sanskrit available; historical linguists implicitly
assumed that the structures of the other languages they worked with were
adequately described, as indeed they basically were, since most scholars were
native speakers of modern Indo-European languages. Crude analogizing from
these well-established structures led to workable results in other, mainly Indo-
European, languages; and up to the 1920s linguistics remained predominantly
historical and Indo-European.
It has also been mentioned that any aspect of linguistics can be applied to
any particular language or language family. But the early prominence of the
study of Indo-European languages has led to another very widespread miscon-
ception-that historical linguistics can be equated with Indo-European lin-
guistics. This is utterly wrong. The linguistic description of any language family
is a sufficient condition and a prerequisite of genetic linguistics in that family.
(1.22 "Dead" Languages) Another frequent misconception is that his-

torical linguistics deals primarily with languages transmitted only through his-
torical records, that is, the 'dead' languages. Such languages are traditionally,
say,
Sumerian Ancient Greek
Akkadian Sanskrit
Hittite Latin
Etruscan Old English
Tocharian Old Icelandic
It is clear that the languages in the two columns are not equally dead; those in
the second one are still spoken in an altered form, whereas those in the first
column are actually stone dead. A dead language is no longer spoken in any
form; it has no speakers. This is only an accidental fact and is in itself not
directly connected with historical linguistics. Of course, it has serious conse-
quences in that our knowledge of such languages tends to be quite fragmentary,
because no further fieldwork or checking is possible. Dead languages can be the
object of descriptive linguistics, with the same limitations, of course. (All this
was implied in Figure 1-7.)
(1.23 The Nature of Scientific Discourse, History, and Language) The

nature of scientific discourse displays two distinct parts: (1) factual statements
about data, which rest on observation and which are either true or false, and
(2) a hypothesis, a statement put forward in explanation of the facts. A fact is
an empirically verifiable statement about phenomena in terms of a conceptual
scheme; a fact is not an object in nature but a statement about nature. The
hypothesis must be formulated so that it can be shown to be either inadequate
or substantiated to a high degree of probability by further facts. A single contrary
case may disprove the hypothesis, although it need not. The hypothesis must be
based on the facts available, and the facts should not be made to fit the hy-
pothesis. The problem is that even the establishment of facts can be highly con-
troversial in genetic linguistics, as in any science. The facts of history are
generally not perfectly clear. Eyewitnesses to such a "simple" event as a traffic
accident can disagree substantially. Everybody is familiar with the tedious court
procedure of establishing the facts. The same problem recurs in historical lin-
guistics, where the evidence tends to be equally fragmentary. The facts and the
explanatory truth are very elusive indeed. The linguists themselves determine
the facts, as well as what they do to the facts, and they themselves decide what
is significant about them. There is no universal truth given in advance. Signifi-
cant statements about facts, the hypotheses, must rest on reality and not vice
versa. However, the data considered to be relevant often depend on the aims
and goals that the science has at any particular time, or the aims that some
leading practitioners convince others to be primary. In other words, new theo-

retical breakthroughs require a reexamination and reinterpretation of facts.
More fundamental for an empirical science like linguistics is that new facts
require a revision in the theory, because a science must be able to cope with
phenomena with scientific adequacy; that is, a theory must account for facts
exhaustively, consistently, and economically. When the theory no longer satisfies
these conditions, it must be recast. Thus a linguist, like any other scientist, works
between the devil and the deep, between rationalistic hubris and empirical
banality. There are periods in the history of science when one aspect carries the
day: one can characterize the first half of this century as predominantly em-
pirical, and the present time as heavily rationalistic. This kind of polar alterna-
tion is frequent in other areas of culture as well. Both ends of inquiry must be
kept in mind. As for 'theory', one starts to speak of it when the fit between
facts and hypothesis does not need an adjustment. The reader, however, should
be careful of this word in linguistic literature, because it is used in a wide variety
of meanings. In fortunate cases the context will specify its denotation.
[1.24] Also history, if it is not written as a chronicle, a mere annalistic

record of the past, shows the difficulties of combining facts with hypotheses.
Subjective judgment necessarily creeps into the scholar's ordering and explana-
tion of events. In other words, there can be no unbiased history. The reason is
that, like theory, history is never directly observable; we never have all the
evidence we should like to have. In general, relevant history tries to explain
the interconnections of the events. Thus 'history', in the narrow sense, fits into
the scheme as follows:
1 facts chronicle
2 hypothesis history
All historical sciences are very complicated and present extra procedural prob-
lems for the philosophy of science. General laws do not exist or, at least, are not
within the range of our ability to observe; one has to work with individual
events. One has to make the "right" selection of the documents, make state-
ments about the facts yielded by this first step, and only then proceed to ex-
planatory statements. Selection, interpretation, and historical criticism precede
the ultimate explanation; by comparison, in natural sciences the ultimate ex-
planation is connected almost directly to the facts. Further, the historical ex-
planation contains at least three features that make it different from explanations
in the natural sciences:
1. The lack of general laws makes induction impossible.

2. Experimentation cannot be used, because we deal with past individual
phenomena (this is one of the main reasons for the relative indeterminacy
of the historical sciences).
3. Historical explanation is almost always genetic; that is, a state of affairs
A is explained by an earlier state B, which in turn is explained by a previous
state C, and so on.
Many of these problems recur in historical linguistics, of course, but fortu-

nately there are also differences. As mentioned in connection with Figure 1-7,
the four main frames of reference complement each other and thus lessen the
problems inherent in pure historicity (row 2). For example, induction is the
main characteristic of comparative linguistics(§ 10.6), which is often referred to
as the most scientific branch of linguistics or of humanistic study in general (see
§ 18.17). This is because reconstructions have high predictive power; they can
often be supported or even verified with further material (Part III). But on the
whole, historical linguistics repeats the stages of the study of history. One cannot
remain with the facts, but must strive step by step toward ultimate explanations.
Here lie the real challenges for the human intelligence in science.
[1.25) It has been said that genetic linguistics is actually an art rather than
a doctrine of exact science. But all scientists must exhibit imagination and intel-
lectual sensitivity as well as self-discipline and exactness in their work. Conse-
quently, no two scientists are identical, and the outcome of their studies will
differ accordingly. It should also be clear that the ability of different individuals
to make historical inferences varies a great deal. Different individuals are simply
not equal in any activity. Thus, of those who know the rules of chess, some are
able to carry out the game markedly better than others, and only a few truly
excel. The same obtains in the use of language. All speakers know much the
same basic grammar, but some use language better than others. This is true
not only of such areas as literature, but also, say, speech perception: in noisy
situations, adverse to easy communication, some people understand better what
is said than others.
As in anthropology, archaeology, paleontology, and the like, which also try
to reconstruct the past, a successful worker in genetic linguistics must possess a
flair for piecing together fragmentary bits of information. As in any other em-
pirical science, we do have a body of exact procedures and guidelines, but this
does not in itself ensure proper or correct application. The actual practice of
genetic linguistics may seem like a special skill, an art; and it is perhaps more so
than descriptive linguistics is because of its more lacunary material and other
difficulties encountered in the study of history, as we saw above. But, by the
same token, some degree of" art" is required in the successful practice of other
scien.ces as well. The difference may still be very great, but it is one of degree
only.
It is universally agreed that regardless of the linguist's future area of special-
ization, his training should include the principles of genetic linguistics. He
might never actively apply them, but they will deepen his understanding of lan-
guage. Although everybody may not contribute to genetic linguistics, genetic
linguistics contributes to every linguist. This book will provide basic concepts
and principles; in their subsequent application the (student) linguist is on his

own. Whether this study will lead to fascination or frustration depends on human
factors outside our science proper.
(1.26 The Origin of Language] A prime challenge for man has been
speculation about the origin of a communication system like that in Figure 1-2.
The topic has long been in disrepute, and once (1866) it was even prohibited in
French learned societies, but in quite recent times it has been discussed anew
by linguists together with anthropologists and evolutionary biologists (Chapters
21, 22). Although the area lies outside genetic linguistics, a brief paraphrase of
the newest speculation illuminates some of the basic characteristics of human
language as well as the independent bases of semantic and phonological change.
Animal communication, the transfer of information (a message) from one
nervous system to another, occurs through various media and various channels
(i.e., sound, sight, smell, taste, and touch). Although man receives and conveys
information through all these channels, sound is the most essential for language.
According to Hockett there are thirteen characteristic design features that are
used in one kind of animal communication or another:
1. Possession of a vocal/auditory channel.
2. Broadcast transmission and directional reception, which enables the signal
to travel a certain distance in all directions and be localized by binaural
direction finding.
3. Rapid fading of the signal so that it does not clog the channels (unlike
animal tracks or writing).
4. Interchangeability between sender and receiver; the sender can also
receive what he sends and vice versa; that is, the user of the communica-
tion system is a speaker-hearer.
5. Total feedback of the message sent; the sender hears his own message.
These five features characterize all mammal communication; the next
three are peculiar to man and other primates.
6. Specialization in sending sound waves just for the purpose of communi-
cation, in contrast to sounds that animals emit in performing biological
functions (e.g., the panting of a dog).
7. Semanticity, a relatively fixed association between the sound in the
message and the situation in the real world.
8. Arbitrariness (noniconicity) of the association; we have discussed this
before(§ 1.10).
The rest of the design features are common to all human languages.
9. Discreteness, in that any two linguistic units selected at random are either
'the same' or 'different'. There is no intermediate grading. For example,
the sound units have a fixed range. In English the initial sounds in gap
and cap are sharply and functionally different from each other. There is
nothing in between (e.g., no word *~ap 'a cap with gaps [holes]'). Gradi-
ence is only possible in paralinguistic features (e.g., different loudness of
LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS 27'
shouting as an index of anger; gibbons are also said to possess this
feature).
10. Displacement, in that the message is not tied to time and place, as we
have seen in connection with symbols.
1I. Productivity, the ability to produce and understand utterances which are
novel, a feature often called creative.
12. Traditional transmission of the system from earlier to later generations.
Only the capacity to learn language is biologically inherited (§ 21.3).
13. Duality of patterning. This last one is the most important single feature;
for example, the thousands of words in any language are built up by
arrangements of a relatively small number of sound units, which them-
selves do not mean anything.
Human language can now be defined by productivity, displacement, duality,

arbitrariness, discreteness, interchangeability, complete feedback, specialization,
rapid fading, and broadcast transmission and directional reception. These
features make further achievements possible, for example, false or imaginary
messages, or talking about speech, as we linguists do. Bees iconically convey
messages of distance and direction, an example of displacement, but a dance
about a bee dance is impossible.
[1.27] The hierarchical order of the above design features and man's bio-
logical characteristics point toward the primates as a source of information for
the origin of language. Primates possess call systems, which contain some kind
of holistic "calls" for a limited number of units of experience. Such units are,
for example, 'threat, danger, desire for group contact', and the like; the corre-
sponding holistic sound contours are describable as roars, barks, grunts, and so
on. There is only one-to-one symbolization: a limited number of meanings
corresponds to a limited number of sound units, each being monopolized by
one meaning only. If one indicates meanings by capitals and sounds by lower-
case, the signs are A/x, Bfy, Cfz . .. , and the primate call systems contain only
from a half dozen to two dozen of them. Their use is very indexical (i.e., here
and now); there seems to be no displacement.
The protoprimates or the protohominids must have had a call system of this
kind. Thanks to environmental changes (i.e., living away from the trees) bipedal
motion became possible. This, in turn, left the hands free for carrying, with
enormous cultural consequences. At the same time, the articulatory apparatus
was changing, because upright posture separated the glottis from the velum,
making room for more flexible manipulation of speech organs. The expansion
of human experience within the "real world" required more and more formal
sound contours. One way to ease the pressure was to resort to composite calls
(i.e., blends of the already existing calls). These composite parts would gradually
get a special meaning of their own, and the initial stages of syntax (word order)
would be in the making. The system was now on its way toward productivity.
Hockett calls this stage "pre-language." Some change was already possible,
'
and thereafter new blends might have increased in number. Speech perception
was, by necessity, directed toward receiving the total calls, because the end parts
of the calls could not be predicted by their beginnings. This system had to be
learned by tradition, and thus required a firmer cultural setting. This is a mecha-
nistic approach to the problem, even though it is quite clear that the mechanistic
position cannot explain all of evolution (Chapter 22).
(1.28] With the expansion of experience, further blending of utterances

produced an ever-increasing stock ofpremorphemes, which had to be holistically
different from one another in phonetic contour; the articulatory-acoustic space
must therefore have become more densely packed. This probably led to a collapse
of the system a number of times, but at least once it was rescued by the principle
of duality. Morphemes were now identified by smaller sound units in varying
arrangements (e.g., tin vs. nit). The one-to-one correspondence between sound
and meaning was broken, and a true language came into being. An immediate
result was that sound change became independent of semantic change. Two
sound units could now merge without any effect on the semantic side. Semantic
components may coalesce into new idioms and metaphors without any reflection
on the phonological side. Or, if a contrast were blurred, the speakers could re-
place resulting ambiguity by paraphrase, or" analogy." The system finally had
a safeguard against disorder resulting from change, which could now be ac-
commodated easily (see § 22.5). All this must have taken tens of thousands of
years, and duality may well have arisen once only.
But this is not the place to speculate further about details. Language evolved
in intimate symbiosis with culture and biological continuity(§ 21.3), and we shall
see later how the cultural aspect (i.e., man's social setting) directs its further
change (see, in particular, Chapters 7, 9). In Chapter 2 we shall see how the
development of writing followed this outline of the origin of language, with one
difference: because language already had duality, it did not have to be invented
anew for writing. In genetic linguistics we need not know more about the origin
of language; we take the existence of language (of the type in Figure 1-2) for
granted and study its changes or reconstruct its earlier stages (§ 22.5). With our
normal linguistic methods we fall very short indeed of reaching the origin of
language-by some hundreds of thousands of years, perhaps (see Part V).
[1.29] The main defect in nineteenth-century speculation about the origin

of language was a complete separation of culture and biology from language.
The thinkers of the time assumed that a modern man had evolved without lan-
guage, but within the structure of some kind of society. Thereafter, he proceeded
to invent language, imitating nature sounds (the bow-wow theory), or laboring
under physical stress in group work (the yo-he-ho theory), and so on. This line
of thought, however, does not provide a satisfactory total framework, although
it might hit the target in individual cases of later vocabulary creation. Consider·
ing the psychological unknowns of evolution, one has to admit that even the
blending theory is, in a way, a modern bow-wow theory (Chapter 22) .
•
REFERENCES
1.1 General introductions: Bloomfield 1933, Hockett 1958, Gleason 1961, R.

Halll964, Robins 1964, Langacker 1967, Bolinger 1968, Lyons 1968, (ed.) 1970,
Wallwork 1969, Gaeng 1971; 1.2 Hockett 1961, Chafe 1962, Gleason 1964,
Trnka 1964, Sgall 1964, Lamb 1966; 1.3 Ebeling 1962, Lamb 1966, Hammar-
strom 1966, Trnka 1967, Knimsky 1969, Sigurd 1970; 1.4-1.5 Phonetics in§ 1.1
and, e.g., Malmberg 1963a, Denes and Pinson 1963, Smalley 1963; 1.6--1.7
Hjelmslev 1963, Chafe 1962, Lamb 1964, 1966, Bendix 1966, S0rensen 1968,
Lehrer 1969, Goodenough 1956, Lounsbury 1964, Fox 1967, Burling 1970,
Chafe 1970; 1.10-1.15 Peirce 1955, Barthes 1967, Jakobson 1965, Andersen
1966, Shapiro 1969, Wescott 1971; 1.10 Saussure 1959, Benveniste 1939, Bolinger
1949, Valesio 1969, Lyons 1968, Zawadowski 1967, L. White (ed.) 1956, Ogden
and Richards 1923, Fox 1970; 1.15 Chao 1968; 1.16 Barthes 1967; 1.18-1.20
Hymes 1968a; 1.18 Barthes 1967, Hill (ed.) 1969, Lepschy 1970, Z. Harris 1951,
Coseriu 1969ab, Koutsoudas 1966, Ruwet 1967, Bechert (etc.) 1970, Pike 1966,
Blansitt (ed.) 1967, Cook 1969, Brend 1970, Vachek 1966, Hjelmslev 1963, Lamb
1966, Starosta 1969, Graur (ed.) 1.211-547, 2.715-1158; 1.21 Jespersen 1964,
Bloomfield 1933, Malmberg 1964, Dinneen 1967, Ivic 1965, Robins 1967,
Mounin 1967, Arens 1969, Graur (ed.) 2.227-342; 1.23 Beveridge 1950, Kaplan
1964; 1.24 Kirn 1963, Bochenski 1965, Kraft 1955, Robins 1967; 1.26 Hockett
1958, 1960, Hockett and Ascher 1964, Sebeok (ed.) 1968, 1968; 1.27 Chafe 1967;
1.29 Jespersen 1964.
Among the hundreds of journals that carry articles in genetic linguistics one
should note the following: Language (Lg.), Word, Lingua, Linguistics, Journal
of Linguistics (JL), Glossa, Orbis, Die Sprache (with its bibliography on Indo-
European), Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskap (NTS), Indogermanische For-
schungen (IF), Zeitschrift fiir vergleichende Sprachforschung (KZ), Zeitschrift fiir
Mundartforschung, Kratylos, not to mention journals in the various philologies
(e.g., Romance, Germanic, Slavic, Semitic, Oriental). Useful compilations are
the Linguistic Bibliography, the MLA Annual Linguistics Bibliography (published
by General Linguistics), and The Analecta Linguistica (published by the Hungarian
Academy of Science). One should also note various encyclopedias, for example,
the International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences [Macmillan (Free Press),
1968], the Encyclopedia of Linguistics, Information and Control (Meethan and
Hudson, eds.), Current Trends in Linguistics (Sebeok, ed.), or other series, for
example, the Georgetown Monograph Series on Languages and Linguistics,
Samm/ung Goschen, Que sais-je ?, the Bobbs-Merrill Reprint Series and the
Proceedings of the International Congresses of Linguists, the latest Graur (ed.)
1969-1970. Among dictionaries of linguistics one can note Pei 1966, Ramp
1963, Nash 1968, Marouzeau 1961, Vermeer 1970, Hofmann and Rubenbauer
1963, Knobloch 1961f., Carreter 1962, Axmanova 1966, and for rhetorical
terms, Lanham 1969, and Lausberg 1967.
References to standard introductory treatments will be given in Appendix One.
Because the bibliography is only a short selection, all works in the category of
Paull920 and Wartburg 1969 are not listed. For practical reasons, many anthol-
ogies or collections will be mentioned under the editor's name only, in spite of
the injustice to the actual authors.
The order in which authors are listed in these reference notes is basically
chronological (serving thus the history of linguistics as well), but it is not strictly
so. Other factors that influence it are the order of treatment in the text itself,
the degree of a work's influence on this book, the degree of difficulty of the
work, and the language the work is written in.
When the "working date" used in a cross reference to any publication has
been superseded by the actual publication date during the production of this
book, the actual date may be found appended to the bibliography entry in
parentheses.
CHAPTER 2
WRITING AND LANGUAGE
The development ofalphabetical writing is used to exemplify

the sign types. Writing and its changes are presented as a
microcosm of linguistic change and as support for recon-
struction.
(2.1 Writing As a System of Signs and Its Connection to Language] Writing

is a system of signs that represents language. The definition of language often
specifically excludes writing, because it is a secondary representation of the
primary speech. Furthermore, writing is a very recent innovation and is not a
necessary accompaniment to language. But in societies that possess it, the in-
fluence of writing is all-penetrating and decisive. The often-heard term 'written
language' is legitimate if one remembers its historically secondary status and
takes it to mean 'language represented through writing'. It is here that laymen
err most. The importance of writing in modern society has often led to the
notion that only writing is true language, because it is normally used in con-
nection with prestige dialects or norms, and because writing can often bypass
phonology in such societies.
Grammatology, the study of writing, deals with the shapes and distributional
regularities of graphic signs and tries to establish the exact link between these
and the linguistic units they represent. This is particularly important when the
languages are no longer spoken and we have to go by written records alone.
Writing would seem to have five possible links with language, represented by
double lines in Figure 2-1, which repeats Figure 1-2 in a slightly different form.
The figure does not indicate a direct link between the two channels; in a way
such a link does exist in sound spectrograms, which are pictures of acoustic
"noise." But this is a very recent development in phonetics and can be left out
of a discussion of typical writing. Pictures show a direct iconic relation of graphic
representations to the real world, and this is why one often speaks of 'picture
writing' (pictography, ideography). This is represented by link 1 in Figure 2-1.
Picture writing, however, is not real writing but a form of artistic expression;
it serves as the starting point of writing, exactly as leather is not a shoe but an
important ingredient or prerequisite of shoes. Maps come closest to being
genuine picture writing; but they cannot qualify as writing, because there is no
direct connection with language. When artistic representation is stripped down
to its bare essentials in order to transmit a communication, or when a picture
is used for mnemonic purposes, we come closer to real writing, especially in the
latter case (the former situation still closely follows the conventions of art). If
31
Real or imagined world
2 Pictography
Semology' Ideography
Semasiography
Q)
b.O
3
~
::s
bJ) Morphology
!=:
~
~
4 Alphabetic
b.O
Phonology writing .s
.t::
Graphemics ...
~
Graphic
channel
FIGURE 2-1. The relation between language and writing.
one wants to memorize or identify an object with a picture, one wants to retrieve
the linguistic counterpart of the sign. The connection may be quite loose; for
example, a picture with a tree and an ax might be read off as the felling of a tree,
to hit the tree with an ax, cutting wood, and so on. In other words, the semantic
experience is much more definite than the corresponding formal expression in
language. This situation, if it exists, can appropriately be called semasiography
(writing meanings), but it is still only a forerunner of writing, because the reader
has so much leeway (as does the writer in encoding his messages, but to a lesser
degree). Semasiography is roughly represented by link 2 of Figure 2-1. In prac-
tice, it is impossible to distinguish between ideography and semasiography,
because the semological units in language are hard to identify. Only when the
connection between the graphic sign and the linguistic unit is definite and con-
stant do we have real writing. The graphic sign has to be connected with sound.
If the sign holistically covers a sequence of sound units (e.g., a word), we have
logography (which is often mistakenly called ideography). The important differ-
WRITING AND LANGUAGE 33
ence between link 2 and link 3 is the strict conventionalization of the picture and
its reading. If the graphic sign represents a syllable, we have syllabic writing,
and if individual sound-units, alphabetic writing (the study of which is often
called graphemics), as represented by link 4. All the nonsemasiographic systems
are called phonographic, because they represent the phonological side of the
linguistic sign. The theoretically possible link 5 does not seem to be realizable:
phonological units often co-occur in one (temporal) segment, whereas writing
must convert this simultaneity into two-dimensional space. Thus special tactic
conventions are necessary, and these must be handled in a separate graphic
system (link 4, graphemics). In graphemics, the procedures are parallel to
phonemics (§§ 10.1-10.5). An invariant grapheme may have positional allo-
graphs; for example, the Greek sigma, J.:, has lowercase variants u and s (word-
finally); and instead of the sequences TT-u and K-u, or TT-s and K-s, unit symbols
,P and g occur, respectively.
[2.2] Most writing systems include signs that are not phonographic; for
example, in Europe, a star preceding a date means 'birth', and a cross, 'death'.
The sign 1 is not peculiar to any given language, but can be read as one, eins,
yksi, and so on. A writing system may have 'determinatives' that label abstract
semantic or syntactic categories, as in Hittite: appropriate words are prefixed
with signs meaning god, wood, country, man's name, nation, and the like; these
are purely graphic and do not reflect any trait of the spoken language. In English,
similarly, names are written with capital initials; in German, all nouns are; and
so on. Many systems combine both logographic and alphabetic (or syllabic)
elements. Thus English orthography is mostly alphabetic but is to some extent
logographic, since the relation between sound and graphic symbol is not one-to-
one; different ways of writing the same sound differentiate homophonous mor-
phemes. For example, the diphthong fay/ can be written (among other ways)
igh and iCe (where C represents any consonant), and the letter w is not pro-
nounced in an initial cluster with r. Possibilities of this kind are not used whim-
sically, but with specific linguistic signs: right, rite, wright, and write, all spell
/rayt/. The alphabetic constant is r-i-t; the rest is determined by the particular
word. The system is haphazard and accidental, being the result of etymological
spelling, and does not represent any conscious effort to reduce ambiguity. Note
that logographic writing represents words and morphemes, as the name implies;
logograms are linguistic signs that embody both the formal morpheme and the
semantic unit it represents. Basically, all four words (right, and so on) are the
same morpheme /rayt/. In general, one can know when orthographic i represents
/i/ as in win, and when it is fay/; there are a few exceptions like wind, which is
either /wind/ or fwaynd/. Compared with other European orthographies, the
English one is heavily logographic, although always on an alphabetic skeleton
(e.g., pane-pain, rain-J•ein-reign, hare-hear, cite-site-sight, and so on). This
system has definite advantages in communication, because it differentiates be-
tween homophones, and it accommodates easily great dialect diversity, but, of
course, learning the system is a burden. In writing systems, where the logo graphic
symbols are holistic (not built up from alphabetic parts), phonetic indicators are
used to distinguish between morphemes. By way of illustration, let us assume
that there were an English logographic writing system which used the picture of
the sun for the morphemes sun, day, and bright. Pronunciation could now be
specified with phonetic markers n, i and t, for example, SUNn 'sun', svNi 'day',
and SUN! 'bright'. In principle this is the system of Sumerian cuneiform writing,
for example. It is more logographic than, but structurally similar to, the Modern
English system. Both systems lie between morphology and phonology, if mor-
phology is taken as a collection of words or linguistic signs. Real morphemic
writing is seen when a logographic sign is transferred to other linguistic signs
that use the same phonological shape, for example, when the picture of the sun
(in our imaginary English) is not only the sign of sun but also of son, or when the
picture of the eye represents both the noun eye and the pronoun I. Such signs
write sequences of sounds rather than words or meanings.
[2.3] There is, generally, no exact one-to-one correspondence between

language and writing, as we have seen from wind, which represents two forms,
and write-right, and so on, which represent one form. This is the general prin-
ciple in English (e.g., fred/ = both read and red; and read both /riyd/ and /red/,
and so on). This imperfect match between sound and graphic sign makes the
changes in either one independent of each other, just as in the linguistic sign,
the lack of one-to-one correspondence between sound and meaning makes
sound change independent of semantic change. Thus a change in spelling (e.g.,
through > thru, or night > nite) does not necessarily reflect a change in pro-
nunciation directly. (But, of course, such spelling changes are often made possible
by pronunciation changes somewhere in the history of the language. Thus write
and right faithfully record an Old English contrast between [wr] and [r], while
right currently has a spirant [x] in some English dialects even though it was lost
in Standard English in the fifteenth century.) In some cases there is no change
in the spoken language at all, despite extensive orthographic changes. Thus when
Turkish replaced its Arabic orthography with a Roman one, there was no
change in the language; and when Norman scribes introduced new spelling
practices for the writing of English-the many French loans of the period aided
this process-the language remained the same (§ 8.9).
[2.4] Alphabets can refer to different levels of phonology, that is, to phones,
phonemes, or morpho phonemes-in other words, to various segmental units. In
Middle High German the syllable-final devoicing of stops was generally written
as follows: grapfgrabes, lop/lobes, tacftages, sicfsiges, leitfleides, or zeigenfzeicte,
and so on (glosses below), although toward the end of the thirteenth century
g replaces c [k] in these words. Thus the writing of these stops represents the
phonetic/phonemic level. In Modern High German the nominatives are written
Grab 'grave', Lob 'praise', Tag 'day', Sieg 'victory', Leid 'pain', and the past
tense zeigte 'showed', although the pronunciation of the stops has not changed.
The stops are now written morphophonemically; that is, morphophonemically
voiced stops are always written with invariant symbols, because the voiceless
variants can be predicted from their environments. The link between sound and
writing has moved up the hierarchical scale; this is supplemented by the capital
letters, which indicate the category 'noun', a category even more abstract than
the morphophoneme. These orthographic customs do not reflect any change in
the language itself.
In English, morphophonemic spelling generally arose from a different source:
the orthography remained the same, whereas the language changed. The stressed
vowels of pairs like sane/sanity, divine/divinity, and serene/serenity were once
pronounced as well as written the same (see § 1.3). When the vowels changed,
the orthography remained unchanged and thus became morphophonemic (that
the vowels are contrastive, and not allophones, is proved by pairs like vain: van,
fine :fin, feed :fed). The same outcome has two histories: in the German case,
orthography was pulled up to a higher structural level; in the English case, the
sound system dropped away from the orthography, which remained higher up in
the hierarchy (see Figures 1-2, 2-1). (As in all other matters, English orthography
is not quite consistent and has respelled a few items, for example, vain/vanity
and Spain/Spaniard.)
[2.5 Writing As Evidence of Change and Variation] Since writing mirrors

language, however variously, it provides us with clear evidence of linguistic
change in gross outline. Although the linguistic changes that occur in the lifetime
of a single speaker remain largely unnoticed, written records from a longer
period of time attract even a layman's attention to change. A sampling of English
texts would yield the following specimens:
ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE (Tenth Century)

Se cyning het hie feohtan ongean Peohtas; and hie swa dydon, and sige href-
don swa hwrer swa hie comon. (The king ordered them to fight against the
Picts; and they did so, and had victory wherever they came.)
ANONYMOUS SONG (Thirteenth Century)

Sumer is icumen in,
Lhude sing cuccu!
Groweth sed, and bloweth med,
And springeth the wude nu-
Sing cuccu!
SIR GAWAIN AND THE GREEN KNIGHT (Fourteenth Century)

Hir brest and hir bry3t prote bare displayed,
Schon schyrer pen snawe pat schede3 on hille3 (955-956) ...
pat no3t wat3 bare of pat burde bot pe blake bro3es,
Pe tweyne y3en and pe nase, pe naked lyppe3 (961-962) ...

A mensk lady on molde mon may hir calle,
for Gode!
Hir body wat3 schort and pik,
Hir buttoke3 bal3 and brode,
More lykkerwys on to lyk
Wat3 pat scho hade on lode (964-969).
(Her breast and her bright throat, displayed bare, shone clearer than snow that
falls [is shed] on hills ... That nothing was bare of that lady but the black
eyebrows, the two eyes and the nose, the naked lips ... A worshipful lady on
earth one may call her, by God. Her body was short and thick, her buttocks
smoothly swelling and broad, more delicious to taste was what she had with
her [on load].)
The selections show semantically "simple" basic material as in the description

of body parts, in which vocabulary change occurs slowly. The readers may be
familiar with the language of Chaucer, Shakespeare, or the King James Bible,
for example. If not, they can easily verify change by consulting these early texts.
In general the older a text is, the more foreign it looks; this, of course, shows that
longer stretches of time can and do accommodate more changes.
[2.6) The English situation is paralleled in all languages with written

records over a substantial time span (e.g., Old High German to Modern German,
Latin to Old French to Modern French, Ancient to Modern Greek, and so on).
The inner consistencies within each time segment indicate that the language itself
has chans.ed and not just the writing, but it is the linguist's or the philologist's
difficult task to establish the exact link (Figure 2-1 ). Occasional misspellings
indicate clearly that language has changed. For example, a spelling *offen would
indicate that the [t] in often had dropped. Similarly, if we found the verb write
spelled *right, we would know that at that time initial [w-] and medial [-x-]
were no longer in the language phonetically. This situation actually occurred
when deleite was respelled delight, partly influenced by an imagined semantic
connection with light. Such cases where orthography is modified against ety-
mological justification are called inverse spellings. But writing not only provides
visible proof of language changes, it also indicates linguistic variety. In modern
societies, generally, a standard language is endorsed by strong central govern-
ments, and dialectal variation is suppressed, at least in writing. Formerly, there
was much more flexibility; regional dialects were mostly accepted on a par, and
different writers could use slightly different spellings (often influenced by their
native dialects) within the same dialectal standard. These are matters that greatly
complicate the study of the relation between sound and writing. Thus philologists
must be able to handle writing in connection both with linguistic change and
with linguistic variation, which implies the whole social setting of the time. As
an example of dialectal variation let us look at the first four lines of Caedmon's
Hymn (from the eighth century) in the West Saxon version and the original
Northum brian:
WEST SAXON NOR THUMBRIAN
Nu we sculan herian heofonrices Nu scylun hergan hefrenricres

Weard, lJard,
Metodes mihte and his modgeponc, Metudres mrecti end hi& modgidanc,
weorc Wuldorfreder, swa he uere uuldurfadur, sue he uundra
wundra gehwres, gihures,
ece Dryhten, ord onstealde. eci Dryctin, or astelidre
(Now we shall praise the guardian of the kingdom of heaven, the might of the
creator, and his intelligence, the work of the father of glory, as he, eternal lord,
established the beginning of each of the wonders.) The situation is exactly the
same in other languages (e.g., Old High German, Classical Greek, and so on),
but the Old English example will suffice.
(2. 7 The Development of Writing: From !conicity and Indexicality to Sym-

bolism] The selections from English in§ 2.5 showed change in writing (and
language). The origin of such an alphabetic system, unlike that of language, is
well documented, because writing is a recent development and because its very
purpose was, of course, the permanence of records. It is useful to review the
history of writing in connection with the sign types treated in the first chapter
(§§ 1.1 0-1 .17), because the history of writing provides many parallels to linguistic
change.
Writing started as iconic art, and whenever the artistic conventions prevailed,
true writing did not develop. A reduction in iconicity led to semasiography,
which represents the beginning of nonartistic conventionality (i.e., symbolism).
At the same time, indexical relations played a prominent role. It is inconvenient
to draw pictures of certain notions and thus some kind of contiguity or juxta-
position could be used. A picture of a weapon gave a ready symbol for the
meaning and form 'to kill', the picture of the sun could be used for words like
day and bright, and so on. A frequent type of indexical transfer is that a charac-
teristic part was used for the whole. Thus, for example, the Sumerian cuneiform
signs for the words man and woman represent the pictures of the corresponding
genitals, simplified in the form of roughly a stick and a triangle. The symbolic
element of such signs is clear by comparison with our Western tradition, where
the respective signs are drawn as figures with trousers and a skirt (of course this
is outside normal writing). The different iconic shapes of the Sumerian and
European symbols depend on the different indexical connections. The Sumerian
sign for GASAN 'lady, mistress' represents an elaborate female hairdo and is thus
closer in spirit to the European trousers-skirt convention. There is often, as
here, considerable room for indexical relations; we saw this earlier in connection
with the design of trademarks, whereby either the raw materials, the tools, or the
end product could be chosen for the symbol (§ I. 12). These developments bring
us to logographic signs, which combine iconic, indexical, and symbolic elements.
[2.8] Pure logographic systems seem never to have existed. Even if in-
dexical relations made the drawing of pictures possible for many items, there
still remained words like to be, proper names, and the grammatical morphemes.
What happened was that the graphic sign was used independently of meaning
and started to represent form alone. This happened through homophones.
Thus the Sumerian word ti 'arrow' was written with a picture of an arrow, but
the same sign was used also forti 'life'. In English the verb be could be written
with the same symbol as the insect bee, and we have already seen another
hypothetical example in English, sun-son. Now the symbol does not represent
a word (linguistic sign), but a form, a morpheme. The step that produced this
new relation is called the rebus principle, or the principle of phonetization. It is
interesting to note that this step depends on an iconic relation between sound
and its graphic symbol. Similarity or sameness on the phonic side establishes
similarity or sameness also on the visual side. This is thus a diagrammatic rela-
tion, which underlies one of the most powerful forces of linguistic change,
analogy (Chapter 5). Here, then, an iconic first stage produces a more conven-
tionalized symbol, whose iconic elements may become totally obscure. Similarly,
in language, when metaphors become fossilized, they become symbols without
analyzable parts.
Once phonetization had taken place, semantically empty syllabic signs arose
automatically, because many of the morphemes thus written would be mono-
syllabic, in fact heavily so in Sumerian (some 56 per cent of the vocabulary),
Chinese, frequently also in Egyptian, and Hieroglyphic Hittite (Luwian). All
these languages had syllabic signs in addition to logographic signs. Thus the
so-called logographic writing systems are actually logosyllabic. A purely logo-
graphic writing system would be very unwieldy indeed, because each word would
require its own symbol. One other way in which the pressure arising from the
need for so many symbols was alleviated was the use of compound symbols (i.e.,
iconic arrangements of the existing symbols). For example, the symbol for
Chinese wu 'military' combines the characters of chih 'to stop' and ko 'arms'.
This is exactly what language does with its relatively limited number of mor-
phemes, combining them into compounds, idioms, and other arrangements (e.g.,
man of war).
[2.9] A word-syllabic writing system gives rise to a pure syllabary when

the logographic signs are dropped. Thus the system loses most of its iconicity;
but this is a cheap price, because the thousands of signs are reduced to a hundred
or so. Such a number of symbols can easily be learned and used, and their shapes
can be greatly simplified. All four logosyllabic systems, Sumerian (which may
have influenced the creation of the others), Hittite, Chinese, and Egyptian, did
develop syllabaries. This happened when foreigners took over the word-syllabic
systems. They could more easily break traditions (see§ 21.6), and the logo graphic
signs were discarded as dead weight. Let us look at the development of the
Egyptian system, which underlies all the European systems. The Egyptian
syllabic signs did not indicate vowels, and in this form the syllabary was adopted
by the West Semitic peoples. (The adoption was basically one of principle,
because many of the symbols were newly created and did not continue the original
Egyptian shapes.) In the West Semitic syllabary b was, in effect, a syllabic sign
for bi, be, ba, bo, and bu. To indicate the vowel exactly, additional signs were
sometimes used, e.g., b-q (q = aleph ', glottal stop) for baqa = ba. The sign qa
does not stand for an independent syllable here; it just signals that the preceding
sign is read ba rather than bi, be, bo, or bu. Similarly, the sign for yl was used to
secure a reading like b1yl = bi. This practice remained unsystematic, but it
clearly shows a tendency toward vocalic writing.
(2.10] When this system was passed on to the Greeks, they reinterpreted
a sequence like bq the "logical" way. As the two signs stood for the sequence of
two sounds, ba, it was reasonable to make the segmentation directly b-a rather
than the original ba(-a). The Semitic syllabic sign for a glottal stop plus vowel
became thus the Greek letter a, and the Semitic sign for bi, be, and so on, was
stripped of its vowels to give the Greek letter b. The alphabet was born. Now
each letter represented a single sound segment, either a consonant or a vowel.
Single symbols for a cluster of two consonants did exist (e.g., 1/J = ps, exactly
like Roman x = ks), as they still do in modern alphabets, but these are peripheral
"aberrations." Only the Greeks are known to have developed an alphabet, and
it has now spread all over the world, mainly through the Roman adaptation.
(The impetus for the rise of the Korean system is not known; it may be original.)
In more recent times, linguists have applied the alphabetic principle to develop
universal phonetic notations, which are, of course, known to the readers of this
text from introductory descriptive linguistics (a basic sketch has already been
given in §§ 1.4-1.5). Suprasegmentals are the last phonological features to be
accommodated by alphabets; their inclusion is mainly due to modern linguists,
although there were antecedents in Greek Alexandria and India. For languages
in which tone and pitch play an important phonological role, there is the addi-
tional possibility of writing the suprasegmentals to the exclusion of the segmental
features. In a way, the drum and whistle 'speech' reported from West Africa
and Mexico convey suprasegmental units only. But such systems are not instances
of writing; rather they are parallel to radio broadcasting with a poor signal,
which lets only parts of the sounds through.
[2.11] Thus we have seen how a predominantly iconic visual representation

underlies the symbols of the alphabet. When one turns the letter A upside down,
it still shows the frame of the original picture of the head of an ox. Similarly,
the horizontal strokes of the letter F continue the two horns of a snail; but all
this can be known only through special study. As far as modern languages go,
the alphabet is completely symbolic in its shapes. There is nothing inherent in
the shape H which makes it especially suitable for the sound [h]. This is the
value it has in the Roman tradition, although it is also used for indicating length
(German Lehm), spirants (English this, alphabet, shin), affricates (English chat),
or nonaffricates (Italian che [ke]). In Classical Greek H symbolizes [e·], in
Modern Greek [i], and in Russian [n]. Then again the sounds [h, e·, i, n] are
written with completely different shapes in the Indic Devanagari, which also
derives from Semitic sources. This clearly shows that the modern letters are
symbols; but their arrangement within any particular language is iconic. Writing
is a map of sounds or morphemes. Chartographic maps contain symbols that
stand for woods, forests, bridges, swamps, mountains, houses, and so on; these
symbols represent diagrammatically (iconically) the relations between these
features, once we know the rules to read them off (e.g., where north is, and so
on). Similarly, once we know the rules for interpreting letter sequences, we can
read the relations between the sounds. Letter order represents the sequence of
sounds iconically. This is like language, as we have seen, where the symbolic
units are arranged iconically. It is interesting that alphabets use compound
symbols (e.g., sh, th, and ch) exactly like logography or language in general.
The development from iconic to symbolic shapes can also be dictated, in part,
by writing materials. Thus the use of clay tablets and the stylus transformed the
iconic pictures of the earliest records into completely symbolic arrangements of
dents. The Sumerian symbol for UMBIN 'wheel ' is a stretch of some twenty im-
pressions in the clay, having no similarity whatsoever to the original picture,
although, of course, the large number of wedges still represents the spokes and
the rim, in an unassembled or dismembered state, as it were. Similarly, the
Germanic runes have no curved strokes, because they were incised in wood with
a knife. In China the use of paper and brush resulted in graceful characters,
and, in fact, calligraphy is an important aspect of Chinese writing. Again, there
are parallels in language, where external influences also cause change-mainly
in the form of borrowing, but also because of changes in the material culture.
(2.12 Writing of Writing] Various communication needs have led to the

use of tertiary symbols for the secondary symbols. Thus the Morse code sym-
bolizes the graphic letters by means of sound or light (or even graphically through
dots and dashes). The code is simply an alphabet of the alphabet; it does not
represent sounds directly-just the letters, whose phonetic values depend on the
particular language used and not on the code. The system of flag signs used in
navies is structurally of the Morse type: it also represents the alphabet. An
alphabet of an alphabet meant for tactile reception is Braille. Although stone
inscriptions can also be read with fingers, the difference is that Braille symbolizes
the letters, whereas inscriptions contain the letters directly. (Cuneiform impres-
sions in clay were suitable for tactile reception by the blind, but their small size
and the enormous number of different signs probably would make perception
impossible through the fingertips, as would the cultural context: writing was the
art of a few.) Shorthand systems can be based on the standard orthographies,
but they can be geared directly to the pronunciation as well, or represent various
compromises, like the English Pitman and Gregg systems.
Requirements of speed and space have led not only to shorthand systems,
but also to abbreviations and acronyms. These, again, are developments where
a part stands for the whole. In this century there has been a sharp increase in
these, for example, dorm(itory), prof(essor), exam(ination), Gestapo (Geheime
Staatspolizei); USA, NATO, USSR. Originally such abbreviations occurred in
writing only, and spread from there to speech. Now the practice is so popular
that abbreviation can be carried out directly on the spoken forms. Normally
initial parts are used; and this is an obligatory rule in making monograms. Thus
a person called Charles Wright acknowledges a monogram C. W. This is based
solely on the orthography, because in sound the names begin with [t], (t-s), and
[r], respectively, exactly as in, say, Tim Right.
[2.13 The Influence of Writing on Language] Nowadays the influence of

abbreviations and acronyms on language is enormous. They give new forms
that can be used as bases of derivation (e.g., Italian /e udine 'members of the
U.D.I.' [Unione Donne /taliane]); and when uppercase writing is given up,
"normal" linguistic signs result (e.g., radar [radio detecting and ranging]). Thus
here again indexical developments produce largely symbolic elements, which
for only some speakers retain their indexical and iconic (linguistic context)
features. The symbolic aspects are immediately apparent to foreigners who can
read a language well enough but stall on acronyms; and even natives can no
longer handle all of them, so special dictionaries have to be written.
The mere shape of the letters is the basis of many descriptive terms, for ex-
ample, I- and L-beams of iron (cross section), A-frame houses, T-shirts, U-turns,
and so on. The last one differs in principle from U-Hau/ or IOU, which represent
a modern development of the rebus principle or phonetization. For the logo-
syllabic system of writing this step was a necessity, whereas for modern English
it is just facetious-although it does save writing space at the same time. Syllabic
writing is exemplified by forms like Bar-B-Q. Writing has led to all kinds of
"word" games, which are generally known under the name of logology. These
have a long history under such notions as abracadabras, cabalisms, palindromes,
anagrams, cryptograms, ciphers, word squares, crossword puzzles, and so on.
Their influence at different times in different societies has been great, with
corresponding effect on language and literature. We have already referred to the
artistic potential of letters in connection with trademarks (§ 1.12); but artists,
in general, and especially cartoonists, transform the shapes of letters freely to
iconic shapes for particular needs; in addition, there is calligraphy. Interestingly,
communication has produced not only shorter and faster forms for the letters,
but also longer ones; the modern communication channels which created the
Morse code have also necessitated more redundant symbols, the so-called 'pro-
words': A/fa, Bravo, Charlie, and so on (see § 9.5). This phenomenon provides
a further example of "reverse development" in the history of writing.
[2.14] The above was a brief reminder of the rather extensive influence
that writing exerts on language in various ways which are not obvious to the
uninitiated. A better known case is spelling pronunciation. Orthography is more

conservative than pronunciation (which, of course, is its raison d'etre). Since
sounds change independently from spelling, the fit between sounds and letters
may become bad, or inadequate. Now, there are two possibilities for correcting
the situation if things cannot stand as they are: either reform the spelling, or
change the pronunciation. As we have already seen in the right, rite, wright,
write example, English spelling has generally remained unchanged for a long
time. Another instance of this is the loss of initial /k-/ before /n/ without spelling
modification: kn~(e, know, knee, and so on. (English orthography has not been
altogether without change, of course; for example, Old English /h-/, lost before
fr, n, 1/, is no longer spelled: OE hring, hnappian, hlitd > ring, nap, loud.)
Alternatively, we get a spelling pronunciation when the sound is adapted to
conventional writing. Thus often lost its [t] before the eighteenth century, and
British English seldom pronounces it. In America, however, the [t] is frequently
reintroduced from the spelling: j~ft;)nj. Similarly, the past tense of the verb eat
is jet/ in Britain, having thus a poor fit with the spelling ate; in America the
spelling pronunciation jeyt/ is the norm, which reestablished a perfect fit with
the orthography (§ 5.3). Around the eighteenth century [dy] became [dz], thus
Indian jindz;)nj, which is still heard among older people in certain social circles
in England. This pronunciation was remodeled after the spelling back to /indian/,
and the affricated pronunciation acquired a new spelling, Injun, as well as a
new connotation (see §§ 5.7-5.9, 7.9). On the other hand, a word like soldier
continued with [dz]. A curious instance of spelling pronunciation is the reinter-
pretation of the sign jJ (thorn) as y, and hence the spelling Ye for jJe 'the'(§ 19.8)
and the subsequent pronunciation fyiy f. Spelling, especially in learned vocabulary,
has blocked or reversed many sound changes in English. Again, there is a
linguistic counterpart to spelling pronunciations-hypercorrect forms (§§ 3.3,
5.3).
[2.15] The spelling of particular words can also be influenced by the spell-
ing of other words. This is spelling spelling. Thus the "past" tenses of shall and
will write the I which was once pronounced: should, would. The past tense of
can has been influenced by these, being spelled could (compare delight § 2.6).
Similar things happen in pronunciation, where words in particular semantic
subsets influence each other (blends and contaminations). These kinds of changes
have also been called analogical; the analogy may come from another language
or an earlier stage of the same language. Thus the English word island never had
an [s] in it; the Old English form was iegland (German Eiland, Swedish Oland).
Similarly, Modern English debt comes from ME det(te), which was borrowed
from French without a [b] (and the French spelling is still dette). The prestige
of Latin, however, was strong enough to modify the English spellings, making
them more iconic with the Latin counterparts insula (which is altogether un-
related to English island) and debitum, decreasing the iconicity between the
English sound and the corresponding spelling. In Latin, of course, the words
did contain [s] and [b], respectively.
[2.16] It is important to note that in all three cases mentioned-spelling
reform or "pronunciation spelling"(§ 2.3), spelling pronunciation(§ 2.14), and
"spelling spelling" (could, debt§ 2.15)-the driving force is iconicity (for 'pro-
nunciation pronunciation' see§ 9.10). In the first two, it is the iconic relation
between sound and letter. The letter is a symbol of a certain sound, and the
iconic tendency would always have it as a symbol of the same sound. This drive
toward one-to-one correspondence between sound and letter can result in changes
at either end of the relationship. Spelling spelling transcends the relation between
sound and writing, because it refers back to semantics or other linguistic signs,
or to the wider social context of prestige dialects or languages. But such con-
vergence is still iconic: functional counterparts become more similar on the
formal (written) side, resulting in a better "fit." In spelling mistakes and inverse
spellings we see clearly how the conventionality of writing tends to be broken
in favor of iconic representation, and we get a spelling reform when the' mistake'
is accepted as the norm. 'Mistake' gives the point of view of tradition. On the
linguistic side, every change is a mistake of this kind, although linguists avoid
value judgments by speaking of' innovations'. Such innovations generally" make
sense"; that is, they are iconic.
[2.17 The Influence of Writing on Comparative Linguistics] So far we

have reviewed those aspects of writing that explain the principles of, or give
parallels to, linguistic change. All these are important for people who decode
or decipher writing systems whose fit to their languages is unknown. Classical
philologists need these principles for epigraphy (the study of inscriptions), and
more modern philologists for paleography {the study of medieval cursive alpha-
bets). Before any written material can be used for linguistic purposes, philological
screening has to establish its fit to the real language, as well as its fit to the real
cultural situation, if semantic material is needed. Thus writing is often the sub-
stance from which material for historical and comparative linguistics is drawn,
as contrasted with direct field work (Figure 1-7). But it is the manner in which
texts were multiplied before the advent of the printing press that teaches
comparative linguistics an important principle.
Before printing, texts had to be copied by hand from earlier copies. In
antiquity, this was often a large-scale operation, with a number of slaves copying
the same text from dictation. Single copying was later one of the characteristic
activities of the medieval monasteries. It is easy to see how mistakes would
creep in, because even today we are familiar with such hazards: a certain amount
of hand copying still occurs in anybody's education. Different manuscripts of
the same text are by no means equally valuable renderings of the original.
Modern scholarship has established a set of principles for determining the most
faithful copy. If a number of manuscripts display the same unusual mistake or
peculiar omissions, one should assume that the mistakes were faithfully copied
from the same original copy. In other words, rather than assume that the same
aberrant mistake had occurred many times independently, one assumes that
it had occurred only once. Thus one can establish the hierarchy of existing
manuscripts and their succession of copying, called the tradition (i.e., handing
down) of the text. This activity belongs to textual criticism. One of its famous
principles is that the more difficult reading (lectio di.fficilior) establishes the direc-
tion of copying: when two texts differ on a certain point, the one that is more com-
plicated or obscure, thus providing motivation for a simplifying mistake, is taken
as the original; mistakes usually simplify complexities, rather than introduce them.
[2.18] Thus manuscripts can be grouped into family trees showing daugh-
ter and sister relations. Three manuscripts can show five different relationships
(shown in Figure 2-2). The missing links have been labeled with asterisks. In
principle, the situation is the same for a greater number of manuscripts, although
then the bifurcations look more complicated, and in actual practice more work
will be involved.
In Figure 2-2 we see the model which was also useful for drawing family trees
for language families and which influenced and reinforced the Darwinian theory
of the origin of species (Chapters 15, 22). In language, the counterpart of the
mistake in textual criticism is a linguistic change, an innovation, which corre-
sponds in turn to mutation in evolutionary biology. Language and biology seem
to be parallel, in that small shifts can ultimately lead to great differences. Newest
results from both fields reveal extensive structural parallels between linguistic
and biological change; the danger of making false comparisons lies only in loose
terminology, or in taking the terms of such comparisons too literally (Chapter
22).
A *X *X
A
I
*X N.. *X
1\1\ I
B c B c B c A B
II\
C A B c
(a) (b) (c) (d) (e)
FIGURE 2-2. Five possible derivation trees showing the copying relationship
between three attested manuscripts A, B, and C.
Thus we have seen that writing does not only affect language, but that a study
of textual traditions has provided a useful model for comparative linguistics.
[2.19 The Importance of Writing for Genetic Linguistics] Without writing,

society as we know it today would be quite impossible. Its role in the develop-
ment of the city culture from the ancient Near East through the Industrial
Revolution up to the conquest of the moon is enormous. In more recent times
its tasks have been eased by electronic recording devices, but its importance will
hardly diminish. This is an area peripheral to the central issues of historical and
comparative linguistics, however, and, consequently, we must leave it at this
juncture to anthropologists and culture historians in general. Still, there remain
two important contributions of writing to genetic linguistics: writing shows how
iconicity and indexicality create change, and it extends our observations on
language change into the past by a few thousand years.
The first aspect of the importance of writing has been emphasized throughout
this chapter. Writing and the development of the writing systems are a microcosm
of language change. The development of pictographs into alphabets shows the
same trend as the origin oflanguage (i.e., from bigger holistic units to an arrange-
ment of smaller units). The chapter provided further exemplification of the
different sign types and showed that iconic and indexical relations create, change,
and reorganize symbolic units, and that symbolic elements are not directly
responsible for change. Such notions will be important in the remainder of the
book, even though linguistic parallels were only briefly referred to here.
Although writing has been used during just a fraction of the history of lan-
guage, it provides so much antiquarian information that it is difficult to imagine
genetic linguistics without the support of written records. Sumerian writing
started around 3100 B.C., Egyptian perhaps a century later. Around the middle
of the second ·millennium B.c., there was an upsurge of writing systems in the
Near East, as well as the appearance of the Chinese system. The Phoenician
syllabary is rather late, only about 1000 B.C., and a century later it gave rise to
the Greek alphabet and Aramaic writing, which was to serve as the source of
the writing systems of India, Iran, the Caucasus, and Arabia. Roman writing
begins about 600 B.C., and the rest of Europe follows much later indeed. This
is not long, compared with the 100,000-500,000 years man is assumed to have
had language (or maybe even from one to fifteen million years). Writing is not
necessary to the practice of genetic linguistics, but because the methods have
proved to be valid in cases where we do have written records, we can often
check the reliability of our methods. The investigation of three language families
-in particular, Indo-European, Semitic, and Chinese- has profited from the
availability of very early written records. The first two, especially, have shaped
the development of genetic linguistics. It is no wonder that they still hold a
prestigious position among the achievement!> of genetic linguistics.
Recorded linguistic changes must number in the thousands, providing us with
valuable material for making statements about universal change. Later we shall
apply the comparative method without any regard to earlier stages of the lan-
guages used (Chapter 11). We can then check the results of the method. This will
teach us about the reliability of the methods even in cases where we cannot
check the results. Usually the value of written records comes out most clearly
when we do not have them; this is the case with most of the languages of the
world. Records only a hundred years old usually contain very valuable informa-
tion about change, or they may confirm inferences independently made.
REFERENCES
General: Pulgram 1951, 1965, Gelb 1963, Diringer 1968, M. Cohen 1958, Jensen
1969; 2.2 Venezky 1970; 2.5 Frey 1966; 2.7 Wescott 1971; 2.8 Chao 1968, 2.10
Th. Stern 1957; 2.12-2.13 Malkie1 1968; 2.17-2.18 Maas 1958, Dearing 1959,
Hoenigswald 1960a, 1966, Stevick 1963.
CHAPTER 3
LINGUISTIC VARIATION
An understanding of regional and social variation of speech

is necessary for the study of linguistic change (Figure 1-7,
row 3).
[3.1 Ubiquitousness of Variation-Basis of Change) Any speech com-

munity shows that idealized, single, static, synchronic grammar (Figure 1-7,
row I) is unreal. Its relation to the actual situation is like that of a fossil to a
living specimen. There is no language without variation, and this is true of
nature in general: no two natural items are exactly alike. Such variation does
not always attract our attention, but it has its uses; this is the principle that
makes fingerprinting possible for identification purposes. Linguists always
stress the point that no speaker pronounces the same sound twice in exactly the
same way. If this is true of one speaker, there is even more variation between
two speakers, and so on, until we reach the whole language, or even a language
family. But in this sea of infinite variability, some variations are rule-governed,
specifically by socially shared rules. And variation does not manifest itself only
in sound, but in all areas of language. Any study of language variation belongs
to dialectology, which falls into two distinct parts: dialect geography and social
variation (Figure 1-7, row 3). The latter is the central target of sociolinguistics,
which studies the covariance of linguistic structure with social structure. But a
brief summary of both is necessary for genetic linguistics, because dialect
geography is particularly important for comparative linguistics, just as social
variation is for historical linguistics. Once more, the two sides of genetic lin-
guistics correlate with similar polar concepts in an adjoining sphere of linguistic
inquiry. Dialect geography will be treated later (Chapter 14), but social variation
must be included in the background as a necessary prerequisite for understand-
ing change. (In a situation where each branch of linguistics ties in with the others
[Figure 1-7], one runs into an organizational problem, because presentation
must be linear. Thus the fact that certain topics must be presented in two con-
texts is not fragmentation, but a sign of the unity of linguistics, where fields
intersect in wide configurations.)
[3.2 Synchronic Dialect Correspondence) Meillet characterizes a dialect as

diversity in unity and unity in diversity. There is no way of telling when a
"dialect" ends and a "language" begins, and often an exact boundary between
two dialects is equally evasive; but the notion of dialectal variation is quite
familiar and useful. The sound system of two dialects can be identical even
47
though the actual manifestations are utterly different (see § 3.5). Thus all the
dialects of English share more or less the same underlying system, although
their surface variety is immense. In American English alone the vowel of grass
can be [e;), re;), rer, re, a, a;)], not to speak of English on other continents. Such
differences do not impede communication at all, because people who come into
contact with any of these variants learn the proper correspondences; for ex-
ample, my [re;)] corresponds to X's [e;)] and Y's [a::J]. Every speaker builds such
correspondences into his grammar, depending on the dialects he hears, since
he is more likely to go on speaking his own variant (e.g., [re;)]) than to adopt the
variants of each interlocutor. (Often there is no noticeable difference between
two dialects, although, in fact, there must be.) For a striking example, let us
look at a few items from the so-called "Fox dialect" (spoken in the community
of Fox, north of Red Lodge, Montana) in juxtaposition with "General Ameri-
can" forms. Keeping the notation of the published report (even though it looks
very odd to professional linguists), we can emphasize those correspondences that
show difference3 between the dialects by boxing them in:
GA fllrelt] jol r f;J

gAn kAm fPl Gl
an
Fox fl~ ~r~ gAn kAm ~::Jn~
'flat' 'Oregon' 'company'
prelsfiliJ rn~
preruiJ rn~
'passing' 'because' 'busy'
r-;l I lel f6l 1:1 rdlaun fdzlouk v I z a t

~~L!J WEI liJaun ~ouk vw i s I !
'with' 'they' 'down' 'joke' 'visit'
ka:fi pf;Ttl loln [t51Em

ka:f1 p~ ~n tjem
'coffee pot on' 'cut them'
The speakers in and around that locality know these correspondences, although
they are likely to speak one dialect only. The Fox dialect, extreme as it is, is a
derivative of General American in the sense that it can be mapped from General
American with a few rules: lengthening in certain environments, devoicing, the
merger of the dental slit spirants with dental stops, merging [v] and [w] in one
sound transcribed [vw], and so on. Merger-the situation where two or more
contrastive features of one dialect correspond to a single feature of another-
LINGUISTIC VARIATION 49
is well known from those Southern dialects where pen and pin have the same
vowel. In contact with this dialect and with others, speakers learn the proper
correspondences e-i, and i-i. The real sound substance of an actual grammar
are these interdialectal sets of correspondences (diaphone[me]s, see§ 14.3) and
not the segments in the speech of one speaker only(§§ 13.7, 13.8). Nobody speaks
only with himself; at the very outset-in the language learning process-one
needs other speakers.
[3.3] The examples have so far referred to regional variation. But any
speech community displays systematic variation on other scales-social layer
(occupation, ethnic background, and so on), age, sex, and social context. The last
is known as 'style', or more technically as 'register'. Most speech communities
have at least three varieties: the normal conversational, plus something above
it (formal) and below it (substandard, slang). All these factors are systematically
incorporated into the speaker's use of the language, and thus should be spelled
out in our grammatical descriptions. Practically no descriptions satisfy this
requirement. Of course, the notation and the amount of work necessary create
immediate practical problems. Figure 3-1 correlates the pronunciation of [9] in
Lower class-----------
Working class--------80
Lower middle class,

........... , ...........
Lower middle class -----i"""'~---

20
Upper middle class-----
oL_~==::::::::t~~
A B c D
Casual Careful Reading Word
speech speech style lists
Contextual style
FiouRE 3-1. Class stratification diagram forth in New York City. [Reprinted
with modification from William Labov, "Phonological correlates of social
stratification," American Anthropologist, 66: 6, pt. 2, 169 (1964) (©American
Anthropological Association).]
New York City (where it alternates with an affricate [t9] and a Ienis (unaspirated)
stop [t]) with different social strata in different contexts. The upper middle class
is closest to having spirantal pronunciation (the prestige form) in every style.
The lower middle class comprises two groups: those who are able to shift con-
siderably toward uniform spirantal pronunciation in careful speech and those
who cannot. The lower working classes are clearly distinct from these by using
fewer purely spirantal pronunciations. But within each class pure spirantal
pronunciation increases with greater formalization of style and context. The
same kind of orderly variation can exist between sexes and age groups.
Pronunciation/language is one of the strongest social indicators; it tells about
the speaker's occupation, income, education, and social attitudes and aspirations.
Speakers who want to climb the social ladder must know quite well the sets of
correspondences that obtain between their speech and that of the prestigious
class. Hypercorrect forms clearly show that speakers are using correspondences
rather than individually learned items (e.g., in the case of the little girl who
moved from an r-dialect into an r-less one, where her playmates said [ya·d]
instead of [ya·rd]. She overdid this relation when she reported to her parents
about a giant she had heard about called [ga·rd]. The prestige factor is, of course,
rather special here, as the girl tried to use the parents' norm when talking to
them; but it is prestige, nevertheless). One single rule handles the corresponden-
ces automatically only when there is a two-way bidirectional mapping relation
between the dialects, as between the [t] of the lower class and the [9] of the
middle class in New York City. Once this relation is learned, no mistakes arise.
But when there is a one-way mapping relation into a dialect with fewer con-
trasts, speakers at the "impoverished" end have to learn every item separately.
Thus a Fox speaker learns that his [1, (,!, vw, tS] each take part in two corre-
spondences, with [t, 9; d, o; v, w; tS, dz], respectively; and an r-less speaker
finds out that his [ga·d] corresponds to both [ga·d] and [ga·rd]. This operation-
the matching of corresponding segments between two formal varieties of the
same meaning-is known as the comparative method. This method enables one
to discover the single sound system underlying the variations that show diagram-
matic relations of sounds against the same semantic background. In General
American and Fox, for example, the meanings 'because' and 'busy' show the
correspondence b-p for the first consonant and z- s for the last consonant. The
comparative method will be treated later; the notion of the correspondence is
introduced here because it is a relevant concept in a multidialectal synchronic
grammar, which is the general kind of grammar for any speaker(§§ 8.16f., 11.2).
Throughout the remainder of the text, two conventions of writing the sets of
correspondences will be used: horizontally, as b-p, or vertically, in a boxed-in
cartouche as above. The former saves space, but the latter brings out maximal
clarity for analysis.
[3.4] Variation exists not only in sounds, but also in morphology and
syntax . One of the most obvious features of slang or occupational jargons is of
course a special vocabulary. In some languages women use special vocabularies
among themselves in addition to special phonologies, and this has led to reports
that they can have a special language altogether; although this is doubtful, it
shows the extent of the differences. But in any language, women, at the very least,
would use certain items more often than men (e.g., terribly beautiful). Nursery
words are an exceptionally clear instance of the differences in age gradation.
Variation in morphology exists on exactly the same scale as the sounds. The
items can be completely unrelated, like pail vs. bucket, or can have some formal
relationship, as in I saw it vs. I seen it. Differences, of course, reach syntax
also, such as I haven't got any money vs. I ain't got no money. This is a general
situation; for example, in Brahmin Tutu the negative tenses of the verb
distinguish between gender, number, and person, whereas non-Brahmin Tulu
lacks all this in its negative forms. But we have to leave the matter with these
brief hints.
[3.5] Often variation appears to be more significant than it really is. Non-
standard Negro English has traditionally been heavily stigmatized, even to the
point of declaring that it is not language at all. Superficially, the differences from
General American are large: [bol] 'bold', [fayn] 'find', [rek] 'act', [fis] 'fist'
show phonological variation, with morphological consequences in forms like
[pres] 'pass; passed; past'. Syntactic variation includes things like [hi way!] 'he
is wild'. But the relation between General American and Negro English is as
orderly as among the dialects mentioned previously. The Negro English forms
mentioned here can be derived from the Standard English ones with rules that
apply in definite environments. The difference from the Fox situation is that the
rules here obey statistical laws (see § 9.8); there are no speakers who always
apply these rules, and none who never applies them. Some rules would escape
casual analysis; for example, in general, wherever Standard English can contract
the copula (He's wild), Negro English can delete it (He wild), and wherever
Standard English cannot contract, Negro English cannot delete (as in the last
word of That's what he is). Dialects are apt to differ chiefly in low-level rules,
and superficial differences tend to be greater than those found in their deep
structures, if there are any. On the other hand, it seems that some features of
Negro English are not derivable by one-way mapping from Standard English
(e.g., he done told me, he be sleeping, which involve aspectual contrasts absent
in Standard English).
[3.6] Differences in semantic orientation which correspond to different

social strata are not always easily observable, but from India, where the caste
distinctions are rather fixed, we have striking examples. Thus in Tamil, the
Brahmins and the non-Brahmins divide the area of male affinal kin as in Figure
3-2:A. Sometimes one dialect shows different connotations for items that are
in free variation in the other (Figure 3-2:B). In other words, regular systematic
variation correlated with facts outside the linguistic system itself exist in every
level of grammar. Linguists cannot explain linguistic events by linguistic events
alone but must look into the total social network in which the language is used ·
Brahmin Non-Brahmin
A. son-in-law marumaha
maap!e
younger sister's husband
elder sister's husband attimbeer maccaa
wife's brother maccina
B. food (neutral) sa ado sooru "' saado

'food'
[food (pejorative)] I sooru
I
eat (neutral) saap<;iu tinnu "' saap<;iu
[eat (pejorative)] I tinnu
I 'eat'
FIGURE 3-2. Different semantic segmentation in two areas in the dialects of

Iyengar (Brahmin) and Mudaliyar (non-Brahmin) of Tamil. [Reprinted with
modification from A. K. R amanujan, "The structure of variation: a study in
caste dialect" (Milton Singer and Bernard S. Cohn, editors), Structure and
change in Indian society (Chicago: Aldine Publishing Company, 1968);
© 1968 by Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, Inc.]
We have returned to the semiotic situation, especially its pragmatic side(§ 1.16).
Sociolinguists now hold that speech should be studied in terms of the whole
speech community, and that the object of such study is a sociolinguistic system,
not mere language.
If the variations in different social contexts in the speech of the same speakers
are related, but very different, one speaks of diglossia; if the context requires
the use of distinct languages by the same speakers, the situation is known as
bilingualism.
[3.7 Variety, Change, and Reconstruction] We seem to have avoided

genetic matters completely by showing only that rows I and 3 of Figure 1-7
must be combined in actual practice. And when we did encounter a situation
where the comparative method, the prime tool of comparative linguistics, was
needed, we did no more than refer to its treatment elsewhere. But it has already
been mentioned that rows 2 and 3 belong together also, and this is why they were
shaded in. In other words, variation and change are int~rdependent, exactly as
in biology. Variation is a prerequisite of change, and regular change is a pre-
requisite of the comparative method (Chapter 11). Thus this is the best order of
treatment. We always have noncontrastive fluctuation within the structurally
relevant parts of language, before change. Sound change never creates fluctu-
ation from static unity, but replaces earlier variation with new variation.
Social dialects can become regional and vice versa. Parts of Australia and
the southern United States, for instance, were populated from the London pris-
ons, which of course detained people mostly from the lowest classes; they left a
definite imprint in the language of the new regions. The same situation obtained
in Roman colonization. The Latin that spread out was not that of the higher
classes and of literature, but the dialect of the people; further, it was taken to
the provinces at different times. Conversely, when a region becomes culturally
dominant its dialect becomes the socially prestigious one. This is the general
situation in Europe: London for English, Ile de France for France, Castilian
for Spanish, and so on. But nonnational cases also show this development. The
Fox dialect was once simply a regional variant of American English. Now, with
the young generation sticking to the more prestigious form supported by teachers
from the outside, by television, and so on, the Fox dialect has become a social
one; it is now the dialect of older people and is correlated with farming as an
occupation. Similarly, many of the southern American regional features have
become ethnic in the North, where Negroes have been moving in great
numbers and where they have met the inevitable social barriers of American
· society.
When social meaning is attached to variation it starts to play a role in the
language, and imitation of the prestigious forms takes place (the details depend-
ing on the configurations of social forces). Because of the interplay of such forces,
one model may engulf other distinct variants (§ 9.10). A shift in society may
assign immediate prestige to a new variant. The dialect of the older speakers
may perish with the death of the speakers themselves, leaving room for some
other variation elsewhere. Regular change thus results from elimination of
variation in social interplay and from the rise of new variation in some other
subgroup of society, where new social meaning is assigned to random variation.
This is also how change occurs in biology. It is the species that persists through
time, not individual variants. Similarly, language persists, not individual utter-
ances, which always show variation within and among speakers. A static system
does not explain change; a language that has ceased to change is dead (see
Chapter 22).
(3.8 Conclusion] This chapter has shown that synchronic dialectal diver-
sity must be treated by the same method as related languages, although the
method itself was left for later discussion (Chapter 11 ). It was briefly stated that
change and reconstruction are ultimately connected with variation, and it
became clear that Figure 1-7 does indeed represent cardinal points only. Chapters
1- 3 have delineated the place of genetic linguistics within other branches of the
total science of language, providing valuable guidelines for the following dis-
cussions of change and reconstruction. Going more deeply into synchronic
linguistics is not possible in this context, although synchronic linguistics is part
of the necessary background for genetic linguistics, as our constant references
have shown and will show.
REFERENCES
General: Hymes (ed.) 1964, Bright (ed.) 1966, Lieberson (ed.) 1967, Fishman
(ed.) 1968, Alatis (ed.) 1969, Graur (ed.) 1.549- 773; Fischer 1958, Gumperz
1958, 1961, 1968, Bright and Ramanujan 1964, Hymes 1968b, Bolinger 1968,
Burling 1970, Katici<5 1970, Dahlstedt 1970; 3.2 Pilati 1969; 3.3 Joos 1962,
Labov 1964, 1966, Fonagy 1956-1957, Kazazis 1970; 3.4 Burling 1970, Loman
1970; 3.5 Labov 1969, 1970, Houston 1969, 1970, Wolfram 1969, 1970, Loflin
1969, Fasold 1969, 1970, Burling 1970; 3.6 Ferguson 1959, Ramanujan 1968,
Kazazis 1968.
PART II
HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS:
HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
CHAPTER 4
SOUND CHANGE
The description of sound changes and their various classi-

fications provide the terminology central to most of genetic
linguistics. Allophonic environment and grammatical con-
ditioning are discussed.
[4.1 Evidence for Changes-Mere Change in Pronunciation or Distinctive

Structural Phonemic Change in Number or Distribution] There is no doubt
that the sounds of all languages change, given a long enough period. Tradition-
ally one classifies such change under two structural headings: (1) mere change in
pronunciation with no effect on the sound system, and (2) structural phonemic
change, which affects the number or distribution of phonemes. In Figure 4-1
we have no structural change between the first and the second stages because
the contrasts remain intact; only the outer garb of the units has changed. But
between the second and the third, and the third and the fourth stages we have
changes in distribution and number of units.
First stage aaaxxyyyy} Mere phonetic . change

S Second stage bbbxxzzzz }
Change in distribution of units
E:::
l Third stage
Fourth stage
b b b xxxxzz
b b b x x x x x x
}
Change in number of units
FIGURE 4-1. Changes in number and distribution of phonemes.
The fact that most English dialects have replaced a trilled (initial) r with a
retroflex spirant r, as in red, is a case of mere phonetic change. Similarly, English
t and d used to be dental; now they are alveolar, and no structural change has
taken place. In Dutch all (or most) /'s are 'dark' (much like in sill, bottle), a
change of no systematic consequence even though most of the other Continental
Germanic languages have' bright' /'s. As in the case of the dialect correspond-
ences discussed in Chapter 3, there is regularity through time. For example, Old
English ii repeatedly corresponds to Modern English fowf (which can be spelled
three ways):
1 OE lip ligan biit biin hiim riid stan hal
t NE oath own boat bone home road stone whole
This regularity between the sounds of an earlier stage and a later stage is called
57
58 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
a phonetic (or sound) law. The term 'law ' is to be taken in a physical sense, as a
statement of regular behavior. We write this 'law', this correspondence between
two stages of one and the same language, as OE ii > NE fowj, where > means
'changes into'. (Note that this is different from the dialect correspondence, for
example, General American alveolar d-Fox dentalcj, where we use the dash for
the synchronic relation. The wedge is used only for variation through time,
for example, earlier English dentalcj > alveolar d.) The law ii > jowf does not
hold, however, if the ii occurs after a w-cluster : hwii > who, twii > two. But the
exception is regular, because it occurs in one environment only, where the rest
of the law does not apply. This is the general situation; for example, we have
the two correspondences in time
OE
or
cjwil
NE
~
which occur in mutually exclusive environments: the second (stated twice above,
the second time with conditioning shown) after a w-cluster in Old English, the
first elsewhere (i.e., ii > ow, except that Cwii > Cuw). Sound laws are not as
exact as physical laws, and linguists should not be startled to find exceptions
(e.g., swii > so; this change, however, is quite regular if w is first lost after s-,
whereafter *sii > so) (see§ 5.7).
[4.2 Allophonic Variation and Splits] Old English /f, p, sf were phonetically
[f, p, s] until about A.D. 700:/if'five', wuif'wolf', ofer 'over', porn, weorpan/
wearp 'become/became', ping, sen dan, nosu 'nose', wesan/w<£s 'to befwas '. About
A.D. 700 a mere change in pronunciation occurred in that a voiceless spirant
between voiced sounds after stressed vowel became voiced: [over, weoroan,
nozu]. Spelling remained the same, and the phonemic contrasts were not dis-
turbed; only the number of allophones doubled: /f/ [f, v], /l>/ [p, 5], and /sf
[s, z]. These voiced allophones became independent phonemes through later,
unrelated changes:
I. Borrowings from Kentish (and other Southern dialects), which had also
initial voiced spirants (readers may be familiar with the speech of Squire
Western in Tom Jones), replaced inherited items likejt£t 'barrel' (compare
German Pass) and fyxen (compare German Fuchsin) with vat and vixen.
This process was also reinforced by French loans, as in vile. Since fiett
(compare German Fett) gave fat, we have now minimal pairs vatffat,
vile/file. The speakers had to learn that some morphemes contained in-
herent v's which always remained as such, although the oldf's alternated
morphophonemically with v's in certain environments, as they still do.
2. Intervocalic long spirants /ff, pp, ss/ were simplified into [f, p, s], and these
of course contrasted with [v, o, z], which had been the intervocalic voiced
variants of the old short /f, p, sf.
SOUND CHANGE 59
3. Upon the loss of final -a in Middle English we get voiced spirants in final
position, e.g., ME [bao<l] > [baa] ( > fbeyof), contrasting with the noun
[brep] (see Figure 4-3, line 4). The -a is still written as -e, but now it means
the preceding spirant is voiced: bath/bathe, wreath/wreathe, tooth/teethe,
and so on.
Here then we see how allophonic variation, which initially had no impact on
the contrast system, was phonemicized by later developments: borrowing and
sound change. The number and distribution of sound units changed. English
developed morphophonemic alternation between voiceless and voiced spirants
after the original endings were dropped. In French the development is the reverse,
although the result is the same. Latin masculine novu(m) and feminine nova(m)
'new' started out with the similar v ('same' in French) but different endings.
When the masculine ending dropped, the feminine one was still retained as -a:
• masc. neuv, fern. neuva. Final v was devoiced, neuf, and then with the drop of the
-a we get [ncef, nce·v ], an exact parallel to the English grammatical alternation
safe/save, and so on. In French it is masculine versus feminine, in English, noun
versus verb; in French, v > v "'f, in English, f > f,..., v.
[4.3 Latin Rhotacism As a Historical Event] Latin has a fair amount of

allomorphic alternation between s and r: nefiisfnefarius 'impious', jlosfjloris
'flower', uro/iistus 'burn', queri/questus 'ask ', est/erit 'be' (pres.jfut.), and so on.
Earliest Latin documents, and documents in closely related languages or dialects,
show further that many of the r-forms originally had s, a fact confirmed by
comparative evidence from other Indo-European languages. Forms like jlos,
ustus, and est show that somes's did not change into r's (some forms, like miror
'wonder', always had an intervocalic r); the evidence shows that s > r only in
intervocalic position. We can now state the law:
By about 600 B.c., Latin s between vowels became r (all s's between vowels
became r's).
To emphasize that sound laws are historical events that occur at a certain time
in a certain language under certain conditions, Edgar Sturtevant compared the
above statement about Latin rhotacism to another possible hypothetical his-
torical event, which he called "The Law of Waterloo":
All Prussian soldiers six feet tall were killed in the battle of Waterloo.
The Latin law as formulated does not seem to be completely true, since there
are still words with intervocalic s's: divisus 'divided', causa 'cause', caesus 'cut
down', visus 'seen'; nisi 'unless', desino 'desist', and so on. Morphophonemi-
cally the first four words haves's that are ld + tl (dlvidere 'divide', videre 'see' +
past passive participle ending -tus: scrip-Ius 'written', ama-tus 'loved', etc.),
and, in fact, Old Latin orthography shows a double ss in these words; for
example, caussa. That is, at the time when intervocalic s changed, these words
did not haves but ss, which later became short after long vowels and diphthongs.
As for nisi and desino, they are compounds that apparently had not yet been
formed at the time when s changed, and thus the s's in question were word-
initial: si 'if', sino 'allow'. These cases do not fall under the conditions of the
law; they are Prussians not yet born at the time of the battle. Another set of words
shows intervocalic s's after short vowels without these~ two possibilities of ex-
planation: asinus 'donkey', casa 'hut', rosa 'rose '; genesis, basis. However, we
can easily establish these as loans from other Italic languages and Greek. Hence
these did not exist in the language at the time of the change; they are Prussians
naturalized after the battle of Waterloo.
Thus the first formulation has withstood quite well the apparent discr pancies
in Latin words showing intervocalis s's. A more serious attack comes from two
words: miser 'miserable' and caesaries 'hair ' . But note that here the environ-
ment of s is different, in t. at it is followed by an r. Now our law needs an •
additional clause:
except when followed by r.
These are Prussians under six feet tall and hence not subject to the law of Water-
loo. According to this clause, the word for 'sister', soror, should be *sosor
(compare sister, Skt svasar-). Here one notices that the s, which has, in fact,
changed before a following r, is preceded by s earlier in the word. We must add
a further clause :
except when also preceded by s.
In other words, this Prussian is six feet tall after all, although his posture ap-
peared bent. Now the law covers the facts quite well. There is only one excep-
tion, nasus 'nose'. But one exception against hundreds of regular cases does not
invalidate the law. In historical linguistics one always finds a certain number of
unclear cases or irregular changes.
This and the English and French v "'f case, as well as many of the following
examples, will show how sound change creates morphophonemic alternation.
Looked at from the point of view of analysis, they are examples of internal re-
construction, because internal reconstruction is based totally on morphophone-
mic analysis (§§ 10.7-10.17, Chapter 12).
[4.4 The Split of Latin k in French] Latin k develops three reflexes in

French :
I II III
cor > coeur 'heart' centum > cent ' hundred' cantare > chanter' sing'
cliirus > clair 'clear' ceruus > cerf 'hart ' carbo > charbon 'coal'
quando > quand 'when' cinis > cendre 'ashes' causa > chose 'thing'
SOUND CHANGE 61
That is, k > k (k remains before o and in a cluster), k > s before front vowels,
and k > s before a. These are three correspondences through time, comple-
mentary in terms of their environments in the earlier stage:
Environments in Latin
~
E 1 Latin
French
fklk
~
5tJ fkls
~
it] ~s ~
~
This is what regularity means; it is the reliable predictability of the outcomes of

the later stage in terms of the total situation of the earlier stage. After anC and
enC give ac, and Cw V > CV, we have examples of the French outcomes in
identical environments ka 'when', sa '100', s{i 'song', and thus clear structural
change, even without looking into other mergers elsewhere in the language (see
§ 6.2). In sound change there is a one-way mapping relation from earlier to later
stages only. There is no way of knowing on the basis of French alone that the
[s] in cent was originally different from the [s] in sentir < Latin sentlre 'feel'.
[4.5 Umlaut Phenomena] Umlaut, which is attested in all the Germanic

languages except Gothic, was also a very trivial change at the outset, whereby
back vowels become fronted by an lor j after a following consonant. This can
be exemplified by a very small selection from English (* = not directly attested,
but inferred through reconstruction; Part III):
I II III OE IV NE
*hal hal hal 'whole'
*ha/-ijJ *httli/J httl/J 'health'
*hal-jan *httljan httlan 'heal'
*dom dom dom 'doom'
*dom-jan *domjan doman > deman 'deem'
*gos gos gos 'goose'
*gos-i *gosi gos > ges 'geese'
*miis miis miis 'mouse'
*miis-i *mysi mys > mis 'mice'
*fiil fiil fiil 'foul'
*fiil-ijJ *fylijJ fyljJ > filjJ 'filth'
*fiil-jan *fyljan fylan > filan '(de)file'
Umlaut itself is thus the creation of front allophones [re, o, y] to the phonemes
/a, 6, fl/ (the step from column I to II). Such sounds did not exist earlier, and
even now they are just automatic variants, when l or j follow: /a/ = [a, re],
/6/ = [6, o], and /fl/ = [u, y]. This was a mere change in pronunciation, which
later acquired structural significance only through an unrelated phonetic change
-the loss of those high front vowels in unaccented syllables (i.e, the step from
column II to III)-which had originally conditioned the front allophones. Now

we have minimal pairs between front and back vowels, which proves that they
are different phonemes, although they are still related by morphophonemic
alternations. The last column witnesses further (later) changes which are all
regular, but we shall return to them below. Note the cha.nges appended to column
III, that is, the unrounding of front rounded vowels (o > e, y > i). They remain
at the same tongue height when lip-rounding is eliminated, and thus merge with
the existing e and i. This change does not have any <:onditions attached to it;
·the change is the same in every environment. (Velars still tell the two sources
of the front vowels, for example, cinn > chin vs. cynn > kin.)
(4.6] Similar umlaut processes, whereby following vowels affect preceding

ones and then drop, are very common in the languages of the world. Perhaps one
of the most striking cases comes from Rotuman. Like many of the Oceanic
languages, Rotuman originally had five vowels, as it still does on the morpho-
phonemic level: i, e, a, :J, u. (We write the mid vowels with open symbols, for
reasons that will become clear, and the glottal stop with q.) Now, a develops
a back variant v when it occurs before q and h followed by :J: fvq:J 'nail' and
mvh:J 'to become old'. It gives a higher and backer p when followed by i or u
(the high vowels):fpqu 'back' andjpji 'to shape'. When followed bye, a gives
ii: iife ' I ,000' and pare 'protect'. Mere changes in pronunciation have occurred;
fa/ has three new allophones, [a, n, Q, a], conditioned by q:Jfh:J, ifu, and e,
respectively. The high vowels also raise the mid vowels by one notch, and thus
we get a narrow e before ifu: hefu 'star' andfepi 'slow', and also a narrow o:
folu 'three' and mori 'orange'. Now fef has two allophones, [e, e] and /v/ [v, o].
The same initial five vowel phonemes remain, although they have doubled their
sum of allophones. Then, in a grammatical environment, which Churchward
calls the "incomplete phase" (a kind of indefinite aspect; see§ 4.26), final vowels
drop, and the result is an enormous number of minimal pairs based on the earlier
allophones:
fvq:J-+ fvq 'nail' ppqu-+ppq 'eel'
fpqu-+fpq 'back' p:Jq;J-+ p:Jq 'to blister'
asa-+as 'name' afa-+af 'to mark'
psu-+ps 'smoke' iife-+ iif '1,000'
psi-+ ds 'to go to see'
efe-+ t:f 'coconut-pulp'
sere -+St:r 'knife' :Jj;J-+ :Jj 'to announce'
seru-+ser 'comb' ofi -+of 'to be finished up'
The allophones have split up into ten phonemes. Th~:re was a clear hierarchy
to the catalysis. First the mid vowels served as catalysts to fa/ and then the high
vowels were catalysts to all the others, remaining intact themselves. But this is
not the whole story. When final -£ is dropped, a preceding :J gives 5: m:Jse-+
m5s 'to sleep', t:Jre -+ t5r 'to remain'; and similarly i, although disappearing,
SouND CHANGE 63
i ii u
(, 5 ., )
a
C_]J
FIGURE 4-2. Rotuman vowel triangle showing the splitting up of vowels
through raising umlaut (upward arrows) and fronting umlaut (left pointing
arrows).
umlauts a preceding o: mori -+ mor 'orange' and tori-+ tor 'to use extrava-
gantly'. Similarly, juri-+ fiir 'to turn', fuqi-+ fiiq 'thunder', and psi-+ ds 'to
go to see', andjpji-+ jdj 'to shape'. In other words, we end up with fourteen
vowels on the phonetic surface, although, again, the morphophonemic groupings
are not affected. Scholars differ on the number of phonemes they posit for Rotu-
man; the number has been variously posited as 5, 7, 10, 12, and Churchward's
14 (presented here). The derivation of the vowels can be summed up as in Figure
4-2, where the curved upward arrows indicate the first raising umlaut ( t) caused
by i and u and the straight arrows the fronting umlaut (+-) caused by i and e.
The splitting up of the vowels is still a synchronic mechanism in the language,
since eight of the vowels are unambiguously analyzable as sequences of two
morphophonemes: fa/ = Ia + el, fa/ = Ia + il, /o/ = Ia + t>l before h and q,
/Q/ = Ia + ul, fof = It> + ul, /o/ = I" + il, /5/ = I" + el, and /il/ = lu + il.
This analysis is strongly supported by the fact that the sequences with high and
mid vowels followed by the mid and low vowels, iCe, iCJ, iCa; uCe, uCJ, uCa;
eCa; JCa (where C represents any consonant), do not drop the final vowel at
all. Instead, the final vowel is transposed to the other side of the consonant:
ieC, ioC, iaC; ueC, uoC, uaC; eaC: JaC, for example, sib--+ siok 'to be untrue',
pija --+ piaj 'rat', pure --+ puer 'to rule', hula --+ hual 'moon', and hJsa --+ hJas
'flower'. These diphthongs represent single syllables, exactly as /il/ = lu + il
infiiq, and so on. Note further that when the mid vowels get next to the high
ones, the raising umlaut occurs (as it does also for a sometimes, but we have to
ignore it here). Because the front umlaut and the metathesis are so closely
related, one might try to interpret the vowel drop the same way (i.e., sere >
*seer> ser, and so on). No vowel transposition or drop occurs if the word ends
in two vowels, but, again, the second vowel from the end is affected, because it is
shortened in the "incomplete phase": for example, pupui--+ puptii 'floor', lelei
--+ lelei 'good', keu--+ keu 'to push', and jaJ --+ jiiJ 'spear'. Thus even here we
have ultimately a slight reduction in length, although not the loss of a whole
syllable as in the above cases.
All the above changes are still living morphophonemic processes in Rotuman,
and this is why the arrow~(§§ 6.7, 6.8) rather than the wedge > was used in
the examples. There are also a certain number of exceptions to the above changes/
rules, but such things are to be expected in every language. The overwhelming
regularity is the factor that counts, and it was presented as regular here. Two
aspects of the Rotuman case are unusual. It is noteworthy that the ..:-umlaut of
a raises the a much more than the (second) i-umlaut. The corresponding ;J- and
u-umlauts of a remain in the more usual proportion: the high vowel raises the
aone step higher than the mid vowel. The reason for the asymmetry is that the
first raising umlaut pulled a into the back vowels and only the second fronting
umlaut brought the a among the front vowels. This is how a lost ground it
the i-fronting. And when the latter occurred, the ..:-raising was a completed fac.t
[4.7) Even more curious is the fact that the fronting umlaut operates only
when the front vowel is dropped. In those environments where the final vowel
remains, the preceding vowel shows the shape at th1~ tail ends of the straight
arrows (Figure 4-2). That is, the drop of the vowel and the fronting are simultane-
ous processes; there is no gradual contact influence that would produce fronting
before the drop of the vowels. Linguists usually would like to posit a single step
at a time, for example, first metathesis, fuqi > *fuiq, and then *fuiq > filq, and
so on. We have no direct evidence for the middle term; rather, by all appearances,
the metathesis and the fronting could as well have been simultaneous. The same
paradoxical situation is known also in Old Norse i- and u-umlaut, as well as in
Livian (a Baltic Finnic language in Latvia). When a Livian final -i drops, it
causes fronting of a preceding back vowel, e.g., [nom. sg.] tammi > tiimm 'oak'
and [gen. sg.] tammen > tamm. No umlaut results if the front element remains
in the word, either as a vowel (e.g., vanhim > vanim 'oldest', vasikka > va's'ki,
t'a'iski 'calf'), or as palatalization (e.g., patja > pad'a'mattress'). A nominative
singular like nurmi drops its final -i and gives nilrm 'lawn', whereas the partitive
plural retains its i and remains as nurmidi, with a back vowel. Again we have
one apparent exception, kaksi > kaks '2 ', but s instead of s still reflects the i
as a feature of palatalization.
We have seen a typical case where, as the words of a language get shortened,
the number of sound units multiply; and mere changes in pronunciation were
given a different structural status through a different change, the loss of the
original conditioning factors.
[4.8 The English Vowel Shift) The great English vowel shift, which
affected all long vowels, had very little structural significance when it first hap-
pened, because the nuclei remained, on the whole, separate from each other, as
shown in Figure 4-3. "Long vowels" are here analyzed as long rather than
diphthongs to begin with, merely for the sake of simplicity. The important point
is that although the vowels shift places, they all remain distinct until the time
of Wordsworth, when there is a reduction and redistribution in the number of
"long" vowels. The shift is still going on in English. But before the time when
SOUND CHANGE 65
Modern
Chaucer Shakespeare Wordsworth English
bite I bite ::li ai ai

bete e beet ~~-1
bete re 'strike' beat e-
[OE ii] name a name re e ei
[OE a] foal 5 foal 6 6 ou
fol 6 fool u u u
foul u foul QU au au
FIGURE 4-3. The great English vowel shift.
the long vowels started to shift, long vowels were shortened when followed by
two consonants or one consonant and two unstressed vowels, thus:
-CC -CVCV
l filth divinity
e kept serenity
/£ health
ii cranberry sanity
j [<e] (see below)
6 gosling
u husband, hussy
Umlaut, unrounding, vowel shift, and vowel shortening produce forms like
whole "' health "' heal,foul "'filth "' (de)file, and sane/sanity. As always, such
vowels still tend to go together morphophonemically, although not to such an
automatic degree here as in Rotuman. When OE ii was shortened before it be-
came ME 5, the result was a complete separation of the variants: for example,
stone and staniel < stan-gel/a 'stone-yeller, a kind of hawk'; home and place-
names like Ham-den (compare [-::!m] at the end of names like Nottingham); and
goat and Gatton 'goat-town' in Surrey (compare, also, holy [which belongs to
whole] and hallow[e'en]). The single element *a in column I in§ 4.5, umlauted,
shortened, and otherwise conditioned, has the following outcomes in Modern
English: /ow/ in whole, stone, clothes; /ref in staniel, hallow; j'Jj in Nottingham;
/uw/ in swoop, two; fa/ in hot, holiday; fof in cloth, broad(this is a dialect borrow-
ing); /iy/ in heal, speech; fef in health, next; and /i/ in silly, nimble. Again there
are also "irregular" cases (e.g.,Jolly [fool], scholar [school], and zealous [zeal]),
where shortening occurs before one consonant only. But such an irregularity is
regular in the sense that there are many cases of it.
[4.9 The First Germanic Consonant Shift] The first Germanic consonant
shift, known as Grimm's law, is another good example of a sound 'law'. Note
that Germanic is not a directly attested "historical language" like Latin or Old
66 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
English, but inferred through reconstruction (Parts Ill and IV). Pre-Germanic
had the following stops: p t k, (b) d g, and bh dh gh (see § 11.12) of which the
last three might have been murmured (breathy phonation). The voiceless stops
were replaced by spirants: p t k > f p x (with h in some environments at the
attested stages; see§§ 11.3, 11.7) (e.g., Latinped-: Englishfoot; tres:three(and
tooth, below); and cord-: heart). The voiced stops shifted into the position
vacated by the above change: b d g > p t k (e.g., Lithuanian dubils: deep: Latin
dent-: tooth; andfoot, heart, above; and Latin ager:acre). And, finally, the last
series filled in the new vacant slot: bh dh gh > b d g (e.g., Sanskrit bhdriimi:bear;
Skt rudhird:red; and Greek khen:goose). Latin, Lithuanian, Sanskrit, and Greek
are standing in for Pre-Germanic merely for conveni(:nce-and Greek not too
well at that-because we have no direct attestation from the protolanguage,
although the comparative evidence is quite solid. English, for its part, is standing
in for Proto-Germanic here. So far nothing much has happened, because all
three series are still distinct; but this is the nucleus of Grimm's law. (Such" mere
phonetic" changes seem much less trivial from the point of view of distinctive
feature analysis, which concentrates exactly on this level of phonology; see§ 6.9.)
But, as usual, there is one environment in which th(: shift did not take place:
when the sounds p t k occurred second in a voiceless cluster, they remained as
stops, for example,
Latin stare Latin captivus
'stand' 'captive'
English stand OE hteft
Latin piscis Latin spuere
'fish' 'spit'
Gothic fisks OHG spiwan
Thus there was a change in distribution after all, because these unchanged p t k
were identified with the outcomes of older b d g.
One further set disturbs the operation of the law as developed so far: in some
cases the outcomes of p t k are not voiceless spirants but b d g:
Greek huper , , Greek pater , 1~ th , Greek hekurd 'mother

0 H G ubar over OE fteder a er OHG swigur in-law'
A related fact is that instead of an expected sin West Germanic we sometimes

get an r: Sanskrit snu$d : OE snoru 'daughter-in-law'. The expected voiceless
spirant and the voiced stop alternate in paradigms, like OE weorpan-wearp-
wurdon-worden 'become'. As we have seen above, paradigmatic alternation is
very likely to derive from an earlier identity differently altered in different en-
vironments. Latin k gave s s k in French (§ 4.4), and here we have the same
multifariousness: Pre-Germanic t gives Proto-Germanic p d t. The environment
for the voiced outcomes (b d g) baffled scholars for a long time and was supposed
to be haphazard, until Karl Verner saw that it was, after all, conditioned by
clear phonetic facts-the position of the accent, which has been preserved in
Greek and Sanskrit. His solution is now known as Verner's law. In all the cases
where we have voiced outcomes, the accent in Greek or Sanskrit follows the
SOUND CHANGE
sound in question. Note further the Sanskrit paradigm in juxtaposition with

Old English:
Sanskrit vdrtate vavdrta vavrtimd vavrtiind 'turn'
Old English weorjJan wearjJ wurdon worden 'become'
Thus the position of the accent enables us to predict exactly when the outcomes
ofp t k are!]J x, and when b d g. If the sound is in initial position or immediately
preceded by the accent, we getf p x, otherwise b d g. After this difference arose,
the accent (stress) moved into the root syllable, although the original position is
still indirectly reflected in the morphophonemic alternations P "' d, and so on.
In the umlaut phenomena we had the same situation; the original sounds were
reflected in the results.
[4.10) There is still some controversy about the order of the stages in the
consonant shift. In addition, we have treated the Germanic sounds b d g as
though they were simple structural entities that contrasted with the other two
series. Actually, they were spirants phonetically and changed into stops rather
late (if at all, in some Germanic languages; see§§ 6.3, 9.9). Let us now sum up
Grimm's and Verner's laws, taking the dentals as a model, and using a sequence
different from the above. Figure 4-4 is one possibility. We write one change at
I PIE II III IV V PGmc VIOE

1 dhUr--+Mr- Mr- Mr- tl/dur- duru} 1
{poWr
2 treyes
pater - + fa)>er-+ faller
tds - + 1»rfs llds
fader
llrfs
freder
llrie 2
stiiyn- stain- stain- stain- stain- sta~ } 3
3 dw6y dwai dwai dwai-+twai twa
FIGURE 4-4. A possible sequence of steps in Grimm's and Verner's laws.
each stage. First we have dh > d, then t > ]J (p > f); up until stage III no
structural change has occurred. We have the same phonemes, but number 2
now has two allophones: a stop in voiceless cluster, and p elsewhere. Between
III and IV Verner's law applies: the voiced outcome of unit 2 is the san .e as
unit I, and after d > t, the stop allophone of 2 goes together with unit 3. We
started out with three units and we end up with three units, but with a new dis-
tribution, and hence a change in structure (for further tabulation see § 6.3 and
Figure 6-2).
[4.11 Excrescence of Sounds) We have seen how sounds drop out or

change into other sounds. The reverse is also possible: in some clearly defined
phonetic environments, new sounds may appear. The Old English word jJuma
'thumb' is the base for a derivative pymel (in which ji shows that the suffix
originally had ani underlying the attested e). In the inflected stem them and I
68 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE 7
A B
[m] [1] [m] [b] [1]
Lips closed open closed -----:)- open
Tip of tongue down up down ~up
Velum down up down up-----:)-
FIGURE 4-5. Rise of excrescent [b] caused by readjUtstment of articulatory
movement.
were in contact, (e.g., pymle); the sequence of articulatory adjustments in the

cluster ml is shown in Figure 4-5: A. By raising the velum too early to the position
that it takes for /, we get an automatic b after m (i.e., !lips closed, tongue down,
velum up, that is, closed). The b next gives way to I whcm the lips and the tongue
are readjusted (Figure 4-5: B); the whole ensemble underlies English thimble.
If the lip position is not relevant, as in the case of OE punrian, the stop that
develops is different, here a d: thunder (compare German Donner 'thunder',
where this did not happen). The stop is homorganic to the preceding sound.
This change is very frequent when liquids and nasals come together either with
s or with one another (sr > str, ms > mps, nl > ndl, mr > mbr, ns > nts).
The reverse is also possible. If the velum is lowered too late, the nasal grows
a homorganic stop in front of it. Thus in West Lapp we get *ruma > robme
'ugly', *sane> suodna 'vein', and *polJe > buogl}a 'bosom'. When the lips
and the tongue had already taken the position for the nasal, the velum remained
up (and this defines a stop); the nasal segment commences when the velum is
lowered. In the Lapp change *tuppe > tohppa 'sheath', the transition from the
vowel to the p involved a difference in voicing. Here the vocal cords were de-
activated too early, during the last part of the vowel; thus the vowel ended as
voiceless, and a voiceless vowel is an h. An automatic h preceding a stop is
called preaspiration (for examples of *k > hkk and *t > htt see§§ 10.15, 11.15).
And again, if the vocal cords remain at rest too long in the transition from a
voiceless stop to a vowel, we get aspiration after the stop (e.g., t > th, p > ph,
and k > kh, however we were to write it).
In English there is even alternation based on excresc:ent sounds. Owing to the
loss of a vowel, nasals and liquids became contiguous in words like humble,
whereas the original sequence remains in humility (also tremble "' tremulous,
and so on). These are later developments than OE pjimble (where also m VI "'
mbl alternated in the beginning). This excrescence is a persistent characteristic
of English, because even today, when the same sounds come together, we may
get the same development: fam(i)ly > fambly, mem(o)ry > membry in sub-
standard speech. Re-member (like thunder) developed -mbr- (> -mber #)at an
earlier period.
In the above cases the ultimate result was an addition of a whole segment,
although it arose by "sloppiness" in only one feature, which created a new
SOUND CHANGE 69
combination of features as a transition between two sounds. But a whole new
segment full of features can be added in statable environments; for example,
Latin initials with s + consonant develop an e in Spanish and French, and French
further loses the s: sponsu > esposo, epoux 'husband'; scala > escuela, ecole
'school', and so on. Excrescent sounds involving more than one feature can be
consonants as well; in Kekchi (a Mayan language), initial y- and w- develop
into ty- and kw-.
[4.12 Structural Classification of Changes] We have now seen the em-

pirical evidence for sound change. In fact, the chapter started out in anticipation
of classification; this was to draw attention to the subsequent treatment, which
specified the two possible results in the system: either mere phonetic change or
a change in the system's structural relations. Both, however, are change, and
for many purposes the distinction is not very useful. It must be mentioned,
however, both because so much of linguistic literature observes this classifica-
tion, and because it teaches us about language and linguistics, in particular, that
the specific structure that the linguist posits will determine his account of the
result of the changes(§§ 1.9, 6.17). Actually, it should become quite clear that the
first type of change is the normal kind, and that structural changes are triggered
only when enough phonetic change has piled up.
Changes in the number and distribution of phonemes are basically of the
following few types:
I. Complete loss
fxf--0
is rather infrequent, but it occurred in the development of Latin /h/ into
nothing in Romance. A more frequent situation is (diagrams to be read
from left to right only)
2. Partial merger
OL Latin PIE Germanic ME NE
t~jJ
fxf:S,:fxf s~s
~~~i
fyf fyf r~r d~t l~l
with examples already discussed above. A subtype of this would be
3. Partial loss
OE NE
fxf~x/ k~-k- acknowledge
0 0 after # before n knowledge
(see § 2.14)
70 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DoES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
4. Complete merger
OE OE/ME OE OE
is also frequent. And we have already seen many examples of
5. Split
Latin French
fxf k
Jxf
< Jyf
k~~s
English, Livian,
and Rotuman umlaut
The diagram includes a split in two only, but the examples have shown that
it can be multiple. Further, we saw that
6. Excrescence
0--fxf OE jJymle > NE thimble (and so on)
does not really come out of completely nothing, because the environment
is phonetically specified. One can also look at loss as merger with zero.
Thus every split becomes a result of merger, and excrescence is a split of
zero.
But such classification is too general to be of practical value. Types 2, 3, 5,

and 6 produce alternations and thus generally continue to play a role in the
synchronic grammar, unless subsequent changes ultimately eliminate the alter-
nations; these four changes are thus the prime support of internal reconstruction
(§§ 10.7-10.17 and Chapter 12). The same classificatory scheme can be used for
morphophonemes, although there, structural changes are much more infrequent.
A good example is the Rotuman vowel splitting which leaves the morphopho-
nemes intact. Later in the chapter, however, we shall see cases ofmorphophoneme
splitting (morphophonemically conditioned sound change;§ 4.27). Cases like 5
are referred to as phonologization or phonemization of an earlier (allophonic)
variation; correspondingly, the loss of contrast in 4 is dephonologization.
This leads directly to the question of the role of the (classical) phoneme in
sound change. As we have seen so far in this chapter, sound change charac-
teristically does not occur by phonemes, but generally allophones get phone-
micized by changes independent from the earlier allophonic distribution
(compare§§ 4.21, 6.22, 7.15). The prevalent opinion in recent times has been that
the phoneme plays no role in change. But this is too strict a position. There
are indeed cases where the surface contrasts embodied in phonemes are relevant
in change. In French, all vowels once became nasalized before nasal consonants,
for example, fb;mf masc., fb;m'd/ fern. 'good' (compare § 4.2) > [b5n], [b5n'd].
Then the nasal was deleted before a pause or another consonant, giving a
masculine [b5]. But now nasalization is no longer an automatic allophonic
SOUND CHANGE 71
feature, because a contrast is established between nasalized and oral vowels:
jb5/ bon 'good', fbof beau' beautiful'; /b5te/ bonte 'goodness', /b;)te/ botte 'with
boots'. Such a contrast is found only before a pause or a nonnasal consonant;
before a nasal consonant nasalization remains predictable (allophonic). Now,
denasalization takes place precisely where there is no surface contrast, thus
[b5n::l] > [b;)n::l] (> [b;)n]), as if accentuating the fact that nasalization is now
distinctive on the surface and not merely "extra elegance." The general principle
in this sequence of events is that if, on the surface, a feature is contrastive in
some environments but not in others, that feature is lost where there is no
contrast. Such phonemic contrasts can also be relevant in analogic change(§ 5.3).
[4.13 Articulatory Classification Changes] The most useful classification

of changes is the one that uses the same parameters as the definition of sounds
(Figures 1-3, 1-4). We have seen raising the tongue height in Rotuman (e.g.,
:J > o, and English ii, e > i), fronting of the tongue advancement in Rotuman,
English, and Livian (e.g., u > ii), and unrounding in English (change in lip
position), u > i. A change in the activity of the vocal cords affects both vowels
and consonants. We saw devoicing in PIE d > Germanic t, and voicing in
Verner's law and OE p > o in voiced environment. The development of Lapp
preaspiration was an example of too early devoicing, and the Germanic aspira-
tion of the type t > th is a case of prolonged turning off of the vocal cords.
Consonantal changes may include a shift in the place of articulation (i.e., a shift
in the columns of Figure 1-4), or in the manner of articulation (i.e., a shift in
the rows of the same table). Merely by looking at the table one can see what the
changes can be, and examples will, in fact, be given later.
The usefulness of the frames of the phonetic tables as an overall matrix for
sound changes lies in the fact that it provides convenient names for talking about
change, for example, spirantization, affrication, nasalization, palatalization, and
g/ottalization. These are names based on the end result of the changes, (i.e.,
sounds becoming spirants, affricates, nasal, and so on). There are some obvious
gaps in this nomenclature; for example, there is no handy term for a continuant
sound becoming a stop, as in German p > d, or Germanic *o > d (if not
despirantization, then the closest term is perhaps German Verschiirfung). This
frame of reference concentrates on what happens to the sound irrespective of
its place in the speech chain. Different information is provided by other classi-
fications which also take into account the environment of the change, and we
can proceed to them now. The following main types can be given diagrammati-
cally in advance (a and x are any two sounds or features).
I. assimilation ax > xx (anticipation)

ax> aa (lag)
2. dissimilation aa > ax,xa
3. metathesis ax> xa
4. haplology aa >a
5. contamination yax, zbx > yax, zax or ybx, zbx
[4.14] One of the most frequent changes is assimilation, whereby a sound

adopts features from another sound (i.e., literally, 'to become similar'). This
usually happens only when two sounds are in contact. In Latin, consider the
negative morpheme in-, and the preverb com- 'together' (e.g., in-elegant and
com-itative; we can take examples which have been borrowed into English,
where the whole mechanism is still a morphophonemic: one). When these nasals
occur before stops, they adopt the corresponding place of articulation but
remain constant for the other features (nasality, voice) for example, im-possible,
ii)-COIJ-gruent ([in-kol)-] also occurs), in-discreet, com-p/.rde, and con-tingent. Such
an assimilation is called partial, because all the composite features of the sound
did not change. Before liquids, where the assimilation comprises both manner
and place (e.g., il-legal, col-lateral, ir-relevant, and cor-roborate), the result is
complete identity of the two sounds; the assimilation is total. In Finnish there
is a glottal stop at the end of certain words, although it is neither written in the
standard orthography nor pronounced in all varieties of Finnish; the presence
of this "phantom" sound is very apparent, however, for another reason: it
assimilates totally to any following consonant. From the imperative teeq! 'do!'
we get teem m(in)ulle 'do for me', teet taas 'do again', tees se 'do it', teev vain
'go ahead and do', and so on. The excrescent preaspiration in Lapp is also a
partial assimilatory process, because the vowel adapts to the stop in voicing.
Voicing assimilation, in general, is very frequent indet~d (compare examples in
German, § 2.4). Sometimes in word or sentence-final position we get extra stops
when the articulatory organs adapt to the following silence. When one cuts short
the pronunciation of no [now] by closing the lips and shutting off the vocal cords,
both occurring in anticipation of the following silence (which means that the
lips are closed and the vocal cords still), we get nope, a fairly frequent expressive
pronunciation among the young. The same thing (stoppedness plus voicing) hap-
pened in vermin > varmint. Such assimilation leads into excrescence (§ 4.11 ).
A total assimilation to following silence means that the silence begins early, in
place of the sound in question (e.g., old > ole, slept > slep [§ 3.5], Pre-English
*mysi > OE mys, and ME [bdlivd] > NE /bi'liyv/ believe). One does not speak
of assimilation for the loss of final sounds; it is so frequent that linguists have
given the phenomenon a name of its own, apocope (chopping-off). By contrast,
loss of medial sounds is called syncope (e.g.,Jamily > famly, memory > memry).
[4.15) The spirantization of stops can often be viewed as assimilation to

a neighboring continuant sound (elimination of stoppedness). A very frequent
type is assibilation, a stop becoming a sibilant, namely an s-sound (e.g., Greek
t > s in some environments, compare osmosis and osmotic). Figure 1-4 shows
that this must occur in the apico-dentaljalveolar and fronto-palatal positions
of articulation, the area of palatalization. The latter is an assimilation of a con-
sonant to a high front vowel, usually following; it is an assimilation of tongue
position. The vocal tract is narrow for the front vowe:l, and the stop is shifted
into or toward this area, as in English [J(i·p] vs. [ku·l] (or [J(iyp] vs. [kuwl]) keep
vs. cool. A palatalized [!(] can shift further front and give [i]. When this affricates,
SOUND CHANGE 73
the result is [ts] or [ts]. In other words, palatalization is movement between the
columns, and assibilation between the rows, of Figure 1-4. We stated above that
Latin k assibilated into sin French (before front vowels). This was a shortcut,
because in reality k palatalized first into K:, and this gave a I= tv. Then thenar-
row transition from stop to vowel [y] was assimilated to the voicelessness of the
stop part and the groove tongue shape of the following vowel, giving ts. The
assibilation was completed when closure disappeared altogether, yielding s.
(Different Romance languages have gone different ways with regard to this
point.) In English we get basically the same assibilation from [ty] > [tS] (e.g.,
won't you), except that the point of articulation is farther back. Although palatal-
ization and assibilation often intersect, they are distinct phenomena (columns
versus rows in our diagram!).
The umlaut phenomena of English, Rotuman, and Livian exemplify a
somewhat less common event, assimilation at a distance. They were generally
partial; in Rotuman, the tongue height was raised before high vowels, and in
all three languages back vowels were fronted before i (and so on), but these
changes never yielded total identity of the conditioner and the conditioned.
(4.16] In the cases mentioned so far the sound that changed leaned to a
sound that followed. This is called regressive assimilation. The opposite is ac-
cordingly progressive. The drawback of these terms, however, is that it is very
difficult to remember which is which. A simple remedy is to call the first type
anticipation, because one or more (even all) features of the following sound are
anticipated in the production of the preceding sound (whether in contact or at
a distance). The opposite is lag, in which some or all features of a sound persevere
into the next or following sound; for example, [sevQ] > [sevrp.] seven, in which
the labial articulation of the preceding labio-dental is maintained for the nasal.
Compensatory lengthening is a case of lag. In this event a consonant is lost as far
as the articulatory adjustments go, but its place is taken by (the bundle of
features of) the preceding vowel. A Pre-English nasal was lost before a voiceless
spirant, as in *tonjJ, *fimf, and *gons (compare Swedish tand, Gothic fimj, and
German Gans), giving its place over to the vowel and yielding OE top, gos, !if
(as it were, toojJ, goos, andfiif; that is, the assimilation is total, and at contact).
Lagging assimilation is common in inflectional and derivatory suffixes, which
lean backward toward the stem or root. The English past-tense marker /-d/
generally assimilates in voicing to the stem-final consonant of the verb, for
example: /kik-t/ kicked, slep-t, /r;)s-t/ rushed vs. /h;)g-d/ hugged, fstreb-d/ stabbed,
/st;)r-d/ stirred (compare, however, mean-t). We have here partial lagging contact
assimilation. The original vowel of the Finnish illative case was e, as it still is in
one word only, sii-hen 'into it'; otherwise thee assimilates to the preceding vowel,
for example, piiii-hiin 'head', piii-hin 'heads', puu-hun 'tree', maa-han 'land',
suo-hon 'bog', kyy-hyn 'viper', yo-htjn 'night', and tie-hen 'road'; we then have
total lagging assimilation at a distance. Whether total or not, this is what gen-
erally occurs in vowel harmony, as in Finnish, Hungarian, Turkish, and so on.
If a diphthong is monophthongized so that the result is a long vowel of the

tongue height intermediate between the two components (e.g., ai > e, au > 6),
we have anticipation and lag at the same time, a "fusion" that produces an
average (ai > ei or i = anticipation alone, and ai > ae or ii = lag alone).
Consonants also can show similar mutual conditioning. In Sanskrit we get cch
when d and.§ come together over a word boundary: tac chp:zoti 'he hears that'
(tad sr-).
In actual speech morphological boundaries are replaced by phonological
syllable boundaries in many languages, depending on the favored syllable types.
In English this is most apparent in place names, which are functional units
irrespective of their component parts, for example, [nu'wil)gl~md] New England
and [row'dailand] Rhode Island, or even semantically opaque compounds like
[hrela'wiyn] Halloween. Such phonological syllable boundary assignment, irre-
spective of morpheme boundaries, is characteristic of many languages (e.g.,
French, Hungarian, and Finnish).
It has become clear that assimilation is one of the most important kinds of
change. Neighboring sounds accommodate each other, which is the general
reason for allophonic variation, of course, and, in this sense, assimilation is well
known from synchronic linguistics. In summary we can note that there are three
basic axes for classifying assimilation:
lag/anticipation
partial/total _____ I _ ___ contact/distance
ASSIMILATION
This does not explicitly treat articulatory space (Figures 1-3, 1-4), which is the
frame for other changes as well.
[4.17] The reverse of assimilation is dissimilation, in which a sequence of

the same or similar sounds becomes further differentiated. In many areas of
human muscular activity, repetition of the same movement is difficult. This is
the operative principle of tongue twisters (e.g., Theodore Oswaldtwistle, the
thistle sifter, in sifting a sack of thistles thrust three thorns through the thick of
his thumb), which apparently exist in all languages. It may well be true that dis-
similation is due to neural ease, in the same way that assimilation is connected
with articulatory simplification. The former often sporadically affects sequences
of liquids and nasals so that a liquid is replaced by a nasal and vice versa (e.g.,
Finnish rii/ssi > riinssi 'tax exemption', kumppani > kumppali 'companion',
Italian venenu > veleno 'poison', and Hittite *naman > Iaman 'name'). A se-
quence of the same liquid can be differentiated by replacing one with the other,
a lateral with a trill or vice versa (e.g., Latinperegrinus >pilgrim, and Cheremis
16/po > lorpo 'alder'). Or just a sequence of dentals is differentiated (e.g.,
Lithuanian *nizdas > lizdas 'nest' and Finnish nysifnyde- > lysiflyde- 'handle').
Dissimilation need not be sporadic; it can be quite regular throughout the whole
phonology. In Sanskrit and Greek, when a sequence of two aspirate stops occurs
SouND CHANGE 75
within a root, the first one dissimilates into the corresponding plain stop, e.g.,
Pre-Greek *thrikh-6s 'of hair' > trikh6s and Pre-Sanskrit *bhuddhd > buddha
'awake'). In Ngaju-Dayak (Borneo), an original sequences ... sis dissimilated
into t ... s. Using Malay and Tagalog as stand-ins for the protolanguage, we
have
N.-D.
Malay sisik tisik 'fish-scale'

susu tuso 'breast'
Tagalog sisid teser 'dive'
suksok tusok 'press in'
When a repetition of the same (or similar) sequence of sounds is reduced to

one occurrence only, we have haplology. Latin niitri-trix > niitrix 'nurse',
stipipendium > stipendium 'tax, contribution', German Superintendent > Super-
indent, or even English haplology > haplogy. Note that this last example is
completely iconic, as the term shows the phenomenon for which it stands.
M orphophoneme is generally known as morphoneme in Europe.
[4.18] When a sequence of sounds is reversed we speak of metathesis.

Latinpericulum gives Spanishpe/igro ' danger' and parabola> palabra 'word'.
This mechanism is very frequent with liquids: ME brid > NE bird, OE wyrhta >
NE wright, and OE be(o)rht > bright; and, in fact, Germanic languages are full
of such reshufflings. Metathesis is most frequently just a lapse and seldom gets
established as a norm. Even whole morphemes get metathesized in lapses; for
example, a linguist (Lounsbury) once lectured " ... we can predictly correct
... "; he did not notice this at all, and neither did the audience, it seemed. But,
contrary to the general opinion, metathesis can also be a regular change which
affects a particular sequence throughout the phonotactics of a language. If we
indicate the liquids (r, I) by R, vowels by V, and consonants by C, we can indicate
a regular Slavic metathesis by a formula (C)VRC > (C)RVC, which occurs in
most Slavic languages. Compare English robot (from Czech) with orphan (from
Late Latin) and German Arbeit ' work', the latter two showing the original
place of the r; *gordu > Old Church Slavic gradu 'city', *melti > OCS mleti
'to grind', and so on. From Ilocano (in the Philippines) we can note a meta-
thesis which is definitely more than sporadic: t . .. s > s . .. t (this can also be
stated as a metathesis of closure and spirantness in connection with dental plus
voicelessness). Using the corresponding Tagalog forms as representatives of the
earlier sequences, we have Tag. tavis:II. sa·ait 'weep', tubus:subbot 'redeem',
tigis : si·git ' decant', tam is : samqit 'sweet', gatos' trillion': gasut 'hundred', and
tastas: satsat 'rip' (the last two in terms of syllables). And most important,
the Rotuman metathesis (§ 4.6) affects all words that satisfy the formal re-
quirements; exceptions are rather sporadic. The Rotuman case, furthermore,
is rare, in that metathesis also continues as a synchronic grammatical mechanism
(compare§ 5.11).
[4.19 Contamination and Blending] If the assimilation is toward another

word in the semantic field we have contamination or blends; meaning, and other
linguistic signs, now enter as factors of change. The related word can be seman-
tically opposite as readily as the same. Thus Englishfemelle /fiym~l/ was replaced
by female after the opposite, male. Similar antonymic influence took place in
Vulgar Latin; for example, gravis-+ grevis 'heavy' after levis 'light', sinister__..,..
sinexter 'left' after dexter 'right', and reddere-+ rendere 'give up' after prendere
'seize'. It is possible that yep for yes after nope belongs here, if it is not produced
by "clipping," yeah >yep, exactly like no > nope (§ 4.14). According to the
usual correspondences, we would expect the initial of English four to be wh-,
matching Latin quattuor (like what-quod). The Germanic outcome in this number
might well have a purely phonological explanation, but it has also been plausibly
explained as an anticipation of the next numeral, five, as the two would have
frequently occurred together in counting situations. The Russian numeral for
'nine', devjat', would normally have had initial n (as it does in English nine and
in the other Indo-European languages). Again dis due to the anticipation of the
din desjat' 'ten'. The Latin word for 'five' should be *pinque. The attested
quinque either is an anticipation, within the word, of the following labiovelar
qu, or else is a lag from quattuor (i.e., the reverse of the English case); or rather
both. Some German dialects replace elf' eleven' by olf after zwolf' twelve', and
so on in other languages. The influence of synonyms is exemplified by Finnish
viipale 'slice ', replaced by siipale after siivu, also 'slice'. Old French had two
words for 'native inhabitant', cite-ain and denz-ein. In Anglo-Norman the first
one "took" the z from the second, citizein, and the second, the i from the
first, denizein, and we end up with English citizen and denizen.
The discussion introduced contamination to show that the environment of
pure sound change can include morphology and semantics. When this happens,
however, we no longer have mere sound change. In Chapters 1 and 2 (in par-
ticular, §§ 2.15-2.16) we discussed diagrammatic icons, which are better known
as analogy. We shall return to grammatical conditioning shortly and to analogy
in Chapter 5.
(4.20 Features and Segments in Change] It has become clear from the
survey and classification of sound changes that change applies to anything from
one feature to a whole segment, that is, a certain bundle of features (compare
the end of§ 4.12). Partial assimilation shows the former, total assimilation the
latter. Most frequently, however, features change one at a time. In one part of
the Germanic consonant shift, p t k become f jJ x; but this is one change only-
closure is replaced by spirantization in certain environments. When Rotuman
:J > oat the same time that & > e, or when Sanskrit ai > e [e•] and au > o [o·],
there was only a one-feature change in each language. On the other hand, if a
segment is added or lost, a whole bundle of features must be accounted for, as
in Latin scola > Old French escole. The symmetry of the above one-feature
changes has also been called analogy, that is, diagrammatic (p:fas t:p as k:x).
There is not always complete symmetry, however. The Latin medial stop dis
SOUND CHANGE 77
lost in Spanish, cadere > caer; but b is not, habere > haber, [b] > [B]. On the
whole, there is more play in the dental and velar areas than in labial articulation
(see§§ 11.5-11.8, 18.13 and Figure 18-2).
[4.21 Abruptness and Gradualness of Change] Another disputed question

is whether sound change is gradual or not. Phonemic changes are abrupt, and
this fact may have influenced the notion that phonetic change must, in contrast,
always be gradual. Vocalic changes do tend to be gradual over long periods of
time, but on the other hand many changes cannot possibly be (e.g., the change
of [9, o] to [f, v], independently and at different times, in Cockney and Black
English). Any metathesis must also be an abrupt change. The abruptness of these
articulatory leaps is different from the structural classification in which the
relevant changes are always instantaneous, because mere allophonic shifts are
not counted at all. The latter is parallel to ignoring the termites and their gradual
influence until the house collapses, which is counted as an instantaneous relevant
structural change. There is no answer as to the exact scope of the abruptness or
gradualness of sound change in every detail, but sound change is characteristic-
ally gradual (see § 6.22).
[4.22 Grammatical Conditioning of Sound Change] We have so far ad-

hered to the classical traditional approach to sound change, which was dominant
up to the 1960s, where only phonetic environments are permissible in formulat-
ing sound laws. This restriction contrasted with synchronic morphophonemic
analysis, which allowed for any grammatical information to be used in phonol-
ogy. Because language is one organic whole of the type represented in Figures
1-1 and 1-2, where everything depends on everything else (oil tout se tient), it is
logically thinkable that some sound changes would start from the grammar. It is
common knowledge that sound change leads to new grammatical configurations
(e.g., doomfdeem, goosefgeese, belief/believe, and so on); today these are gram-
matically conditioned alternations, but we know that their origin was phonetic
(§§ 4.2, 4.5). Speech sounds do not exist for the sake of speech sounds, but as
carriers for semantic units, embodied as linguistic signs, which are handled ac-
cording to the grammatical rules of the language. Scholars have, to be sure,
generally accepted grammatical conditioning by way of analogy, a type of change
where meaning and grammatical machinery shape the outer appearance of lin-
guistic signs. Thus the plural of OE cu 'cow' was cji. After the unrounding of ji
we get ki. This shape was subsequently modified on the basis of the semantic
antonym ox and its plural oxen. Here both meaning and a particular gram-
matical marker exert their influence on ki, which ends up as kine. We cannot
question the occurrence of sound change that takes place under phonetic con-
ditioning alone without reference to grammatical information (e.g., OE ji > i,
although to start with ji itself did occur mainly in certain grammatical contexts),
and we can certainly subscribe to the existence of analogy in which meaning and
grammar play the central role (Chapter 5). The question is: Is there something
between the two, that is, either analogy within mere sounds or sound change
--------------- - - -----·------ - -
dependent on grammatical categories and/or meaning? The answer is yes,

regardless of what we want to call this border area. To be sure, this answer is
not universally accepted. Figure 1-2 was drawn with separate sections for
phonology and grammar, but it was emphasized that there is no such clear
boundary. Linguists, however, have often taken such a model too literally and
have not allowed any grammatical influence on sound change. One of the
reasons for denying the influence of grammar is the principle of not "mixing
the levels" in linguistic analysis, a principle that reigned in American linguistics
from the 1930s through the 1950s. To deny grammatical conditioning implies
that only hearers are allowed to create change-not speakers, who come to
sounds through the rest of the grammar.
[4.23] Actually a certain amount of grammatical information for sound

change always was smuggled into historical descriptions, under the disguise of
word boundaries. Thus one used (and still uses) word-initial, -medial, and -final
positions as conditioning environments. Words are linguistic signs, and often
their boundaries are not phonetically marked at all. In Czech, for example, there
is no overt phonetic word boundary in kfeei 'cramp' (dat.) and k feei 'to speech',
but the pronunciation is still different: in the first one, k and f belong to the
same word, and f assimilates in voicing to the preceding k, [kfeCi]; in the second
case, we have a preposition that always leans to the following word. Here k
assimilates over the word boundary, the reverse of the first case, giving [greci].
Thus it is clear that the unity of the total linguistic sign plays a role.
In Sanskrit short i and u are lengthened before a y of some suffixes. The pas-
sives of mi 'fix' and su 'impel' are, therefore, mi-ya-te and su-ya-te. The com-
pound gerunds of su and k$i 'destroy' are -su-ya and -k$i-ya. The perfect
optative of sru 'hear' is su-sru-ya-s, but the lengthening does not occur if the u
is part of the present suffix -nu- (e.g., su-nu-ya-m 'I would press out'). The
lengthening is thus conditioned by a certain phoneme in the environment, but
not by every occurrence of the phoneme. In other words, one can state this in
the reverse order, too: the u of the present marker -nu- does not lengthen; this
particular linguistic sign is not subject to the change/rule. Also in Sanskrit, a
word-initial m induces assimilation of a preceding d (e.g., tan manyate 'he thinks
this' [tad]), but the sequence remains as such within a morpheme (e.g., padma
'lotus' [compare the Czech example]), or between a root and a suffix (e.g.,
sadma 'seat' [sad 'sit']). In Sanskrit the passive marker -ya- and the present
marker -ya- (man-ya-te) are phonetically identical. The corresponding morphemes
in the East Middle Indic dialects of the Asoka inscriptions are different. The
present -ya- merges with the preceding stop, giving an affricate pad-ya-ti >
paja-ti 'he goes', whereas the passive -ya- splits up pat-ye > patiye 'I fly' and
khiid-ya-te > khiidiyati 'he chews'. If the y belongs to the linguistic sign 'pas-
sive', it does not assimilate; otherwise it does (Note also satya > sace 'truth').
Now of course there is a possibility that it was Sanskrit that had lost an earlier
phonetic difference between the two signs, because there is no reason to believe
that the language of East Middle Indic is a direct continuation of Sanskrit. For
SOUND CHANGE 79
practical reasons, we derived these forms from Classical Sanskrit, just as one is
accustomed to derive Romance from Classical Latin. On the other hand, it is
equally likely that we have a case of genuine grammatical conditioning.
One frequently finds a different treatment of the same sound on the cate-
gorical verb-noun axis. Thus in Chinese we sometimes have different assimila-
tion phenomena for the tones of verbs and nouns, even where their etymological
tone is identical. In Oneida, a morphophonemic sequence JawaJ always gives
fuf [i1] in the verbal prefixes (§ 16.3) but remains as fawaf within noun mor-
phemes. In Finnish a morphophonemic sequence Jtahto-mmeJ gives a verbal
tahdo-mme 'we wish', but remains as tahto-mme in a noun 'our wish'(§ 10.13).
Perhaps in some such cases we have different chronology rather than real gram-
matical conditioning (in other words, we do not know the correct history).
After all, English belief/believe, and so on, would appear to have grammatical
conditioning for the spirants, if we had no knowledge of the earlier developments.
[4.24] Clear evidence for grammatical conditioning comes from Baltic

Finnic and Lapp; and, in fact, Finno-Ugric scholars have always used such
information, even while it was theoretically undesirable in the mainstream of
linguistic inquiry. Thus, in Karelian, word-final nasals have dropped unless the
nasal is the sign -n 'gen. sg.', as in venehe-n 'of a boat'. In the illative, however,
where the ending was -hen (§ 4.16), vete-hen > vedeh 'into water'. The -h still
remains to mark the illative, whereas the gen. -n could not afford to lose any-
thing. This is clear grammatical conditioning, because, phonetically, the endings
of venehen and vetehen (these forms are the historically earlier forms, and they
occur still in archaic or poetic Finnish) are exactly the same. The same situation
obtains in Onega Veps; the gen. sg. -n remains in the singular, where it is the
sole marker of the category, lehma-n 'of a cow', but drops in the plural mor-
pheme, *lehmi-oen > lehmid'e 'of cows', which could spare some sounds, as it
were. Estonian and Votian drop the final -n, even as a genitive marker, but in
North Estonian and West Votian the-n has been retained if it means 'I pers.
sg.'. Thus the verb 'I carry' kanna-n > kannan, but a noun gen. sg. 'of a base'
kanna-n > kanna. Again, these forms are phonetically identical, to begin with,
as they still are in Finnish (both kannan). Note that there is no way of predicting
why Karelian would retain its-nand Estonian would lose it; this is the actuation
problem of linguistic change (compare§§ 9.16-9.18).
But another warning is in order. Even if it is easy to formulate a grammatically
conditioned sound change, it need not be historically correct. When looking at
the total evidence from Estonian the above case looks somewhat different, though
it is still an example of grammatical conditioning. In the beginning of the
seventeenth century, the final-n was about to disappear everywhere, but it was
still retained if the following word began with a vowel. From such positions it
could be generalized back into every position in the first person singular, partly
(presumably) to avoid homonymy with the imperative kanna 'carry!'. In South
Estonian the -n dropped everywhere, but here the imperative had a final glottal
stop kannaq, at least in the Voru dialect, and no homonymy resulted with kanna
----------- -------------------------
So HisTORICAL LINGUISTics: How DoEs LANGUAGE CHANGE?
'I carry'. Incidentally, there is one compound in Estonian in which a word-final

gen. -n has been retained, and it is the single exception: maan-tee 'highway'
(literally 'land's road').
We also have cases in Lapp where sounds behave differently if they are the
sole markers of certain grammatical categories, and where sound changes stall
if homonymy would result. In the Western dialects of Finnish, case endings shed
(apocopate) their vowels, but stem-final vowels remain. Thus taka-na > takan
'behind' (but pakana 'pagan' remains), mu-lta > mult 'from me' (but multa
'earth, dirt' remains). The hyphens, here and elsewhere, have been added for
grammatical analysis and carry no phonetic meaning whatsoever. Similarly, final
palatal consonants were depalatalized in Russian inflectional endings; for
example, da-m' 'I give' > dam, but los' 'elk' remains as such.
Sometimes sound change is governed by different syntactic positions. In
Livian the final -n 'gen. sg.' has generally dropped, as in iza korand 'father's
house', but it is retained in the predicative function, as in s' e korand um izan
'this house is father's'. Here, however, such a distribution can be explained as
resulting from different stress (which would have the virtue of maintaining
strictly phonetic conditioning). This could be exemplified also in English, for
example, my house and the house is mine. A similar phenomenon occurs in Inari
Lapp. The genitive -n has been dropped in nonmonosyllables, as in (nom. sg.)
riijgifriiiijgi (gen. sg.) 'hole'. But as ari adverb meaning 'asunder', the form re-
tains the original genitive -n: riiiijgin (sukkd Iii riiiijgin 'the sock is worn out').
[4.25] It is interesting to note that the only relic in French of the Latin
accusative ending -m occurs in the pronominal rien, a grammatical particle. In
English, also, adverbs preserve endings that have been dropped from the nouns.
A well-known example is whilom 'in former days', which derives directly from
OE hwilum, dat. pl. of whil 'while, time'. This is, in fact, directly parallel to
riiiijgin, but a closer parallel is that English also used genitives as adverbs (e.g.,
whiles). A closure in the tongue position at the end of the word produced
whil(e)st (§§ 4.11, 4.14). The excrescence occurred only in adverbs (amidst,
against) and not if the -s was the marker of a "real" nominal genitive. The
Middle English adverbial genitives ones, twies, and j;ries had the same fate: they
were also cut off from the normal genitive. When the genitive ending assimilated
in voicing to the stem, only the productive genitive was involved (e.g., dog's fdogzf),
whereas the adverbial genitives remained voiceless and required a new ortho-
graphy to ensure the correct voiceless reading: once, twice, and thrice (these
now satisfy the environment for excrescence, and oncet fw<Jnstf, twicet /twayst/
occur). The new voiced genitive has also been introduced in some adverbs (e.g.,
Sundays, always, besides, betimes); but in any case, syntactic-semantic factors
were clearly at work. (Note that a collective pence also retains /s/ against the
productive plural pennies with /z/.)
[4.26] Let us return to the Rotuman formation of the incomplete phase

(§ 4.6). As was mentioned, the drop of final vowels with or without fronting
SOUND CHANGE 81
umlaut, metathesis, and vowel shortening occurred in a specific grammatical
environment, in contrast to the raising umlaut, an allophone development of
pure phonetic conditioning. The grammatical conditioning is a complex of syn-
tactic and semantic factors. The incomplete phase occurs mainly in compounds
or larger phrases of various degrees of complexity, that is, in specifiable syntactic
environments, but also in a semantic context of indefiniteness or incompleteness
(e.g.,famor qsa 'some people say'). The unmodified full form occurs when the
meaning is definite, complete (e.g.,famori qsa 'the people say'), or when posi-
tiveness, finality, emphasis, or desire to be certain is involved. Such aspectual
conditioning is clearly grammatical (semological) and even more "abstract"
than the syntactic factor (e.g., famori feqen 'the people are zealous', but famor
feqeni 'the zealous people, zealous people in general', qepa Ia h:Jaq 'the mats will
be taken', vs. qsap Ia h:Jaq 'some mats ... '; from h:Jqa 'to take').
[4.27 Morphophonemic Conditioning of Sound Change] In almost every

case we have reviewed, change led to morphophonemic variation; that is, there
was seldom any change in the structural relations of the units. The units just
acquired more alternants on the surface, in clearly defined environments. This
was true both for the phonemes (surface units) and the morphophonemes, and
it made no difference whether the conditioning was phonetic or grammatical.
The reverse is also possible: morphophonemic alternation can lead to change that
eliminates variation. Morphophonemic conditioning of change is grammatical,
because morphophonemes presuppose paradigmatic sets as the frames for
change, and can never be mere sounds irrespective of the grammatical machinery.
In Middle High German the syllable-final devoicing of voiced stops is proved
by the writing (see§ 2.4); thus the nominatives of buntfbunte 'motley' and bunt/
bunde 'league' were identical, as they still are in the pronunciation of Modern
Standard German. In some Yiddish and Swiss dialects all those voiceless stops
that alternate with voiced ones are replaced by the voiced alternant. Thus bunt
'league' > bund, but the phonemically identical shape bunt 'motley' remains
unchanged. The change does not affect every /t/; it "looks around" in the total
grammar, and if /t/ alternates with /d/, we get ft/ > /d/. This could be diagram-
med as follows (wavy lines indicate paradigmatic alternation; certain historical
shortcuts will be taken):
d
2
t > d
If there is no alternation the /t/ remains intact, as in buntfbunte 'motley'. As
another example of this, Old High German had a preposition aha, ab(e) 'away
from'. The form without the final vowel underwent devoicing and became /ap/
(which is still spelled ab in Modern German purely for etymological reasons);
such a form remains unchanged in the same dialects that replace bunt 'league •
by bund. Similarly, the Middle High German adverb enwec 'on the way, away'
gives (a)vek and the like (Standard German weg fvekj, again spelled etymologi-
cally). Like japj, javek/ is an indeclinable adverb that does not alternate in any
82 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS! HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
way, and it keeps its voiceless stop. The noun from which it is derived, MHO
wecfwege 'road, way', did alternate, and accordingly the word-final fk/ was
replaced by fgf:
g
l
k>g
and the nominative became veg. Thus semantic specialization and the lack of
inflection in the adverbs cut them loose from their earlier morphophonemes. In
Standard German, also, the adverb was cut off from the noun, but with different
consequences. Starting from the MHG noun paradigm vekfvegesfvege we first
get lengthening in open syllables, which gives vekfvegesfvege. This was a normal
phonetic change which occurred in one phonetic environment; it increased
variation in the paradigm, because in addition to the k "' g alternation there was
also e "' e. Similar alternations occurred in innumerable paradigms where a
short vowel in closed syllable alternated with a long vowel in open syllable (e.g.,
takftiiges 'day'). In Standard German, all such short vowels which alternate
with long ones have been lengthened; that is,
e ii
l l etc. =
e> e a > ii
This gives us now nominatives fvek/ and ftak/ (Weg, Tag) (angular brackets
indicate spelling). The adverb ( weg) was outside the paradigm and did not
alternate, and remained with a short vowel, fvek/. When morphophonemic in-
formation plays a role in such changes, the result is always a surface sound which
is closer to the underlying unit. In all the cases given so far, the outcome was
actually identical to the "upper story" member of the morphophoneme (the
basic or most frequent alternant), but it need not be. In Ukrainian those z's
that alternate with d's become affricates, while others remain as z's, that is,
d
l
z > dz
The outcome is not identical to the "upper story" member, but it does ap-
propriate closure from the latter. The result is a compromise between the two
variants, and the old alternation d "' z is replaced by d "' dz. Normally, how-
ever, the alternation is eliminated altogether, as most of the above examples
have shown; in addition, these examples have shown the prevailing replacement
of the conditioned variant by the basic variant. There are exceptions to this,
however. In Estonian, the sequence ks which alternated with s has been replaced
by s:
ks > s teokse > teose (gen.)
l 'work'
s teos (nom.)(§ 6.14)
SouND CHANGE
Another case is the Latin replacement of the inherited stem-final s in the nomi-
native singular of s-stems by the r which was the outcome of earlier s between
vowels (§ 4.3). The inherited pattern is transmitted undisturbed in two classes of
nouns. The preservation of s injlosfjloris 'flower', mosjmoris 'custom', and rosj
roris 'dew' can be phonologically described: finals is preserved in monosyllables.
A morphological condition states that neuter nouns keep their original variation,
for example, corpusfcorporis 'body' and genusfgeneris 'kind'. (This type is very
numerous and, not surprisingly, there are a few exceptions: the neuters robus
'oak' and *fulgus 'lightening' appear as robur andfulgur in Classical Latin.)
Otherwise, that is, in polysyllabic masculines and feminines, the word-final s
has been universally replaced by the r of the oblique cases (e.g., amor 'love',
labor 'work', timor 'fear', and so on). Here too one can find a stray exception
among the numerous members of this form class: honos 'honor' is not uncom-
mon in Classical authors.
[4.28] These changes affected certain members of alternating paradigmatic

sets, but such alternating sets can also act as conditioning environments to
sound changes. The most famous case of this is Lachmann's law, which has
become a standard example, though in most discussions it is wrongly interpreted.
The situation is as follows. The past passive participle of Latin facio' do, make'
is factus, whereas the corresponding forms of ago 'drive', /ego 'read', rego
'direct', and pango 'agree upon' all have a long vowel: actus, lectus, rectus,
piictus. The Romans themselves knew about this variation and commented on
it; they mentioned that it usually takes place when the verb root ends in a
voiced consonant that is devoiced before the morpheme -tus of the participle.
In modern terms this could be explained by the plausible argument that short
vowels in Latin had a longer allophone before a voiced consonant, and, when
this "half-length" occurred before a voiced consonant in the past participle,
it fell together with the phonemic long vowels of Latin. The difficulty, however,
is that this lengthening is clearly a Latin phenomenon, whereas the assimilation
*gt > *kt occurred in Proto-Indo-European. To account for the lengthening,
we need access to the whole complicated paradigmatic system of the Latin
verb. The starting point remains the contrast between the participle stem in /k/
versus the remaining forms in fgj, but lengthening takes place only if there is
also a long-vowel perfect tense (e.g., egi, legi, rexi, and pegi). Thus facio/feci/
factus does not lengthen the participle vowel, nor do fingofflnxifflctum 'stroke,
mold', findoffixiffissus 'split', stringofstrinxifstrictus 'draw together', and so
on. The actual spread of length to the participle is, therefore, an ordinary in-
stance of analogy in the traditional sense.
[4.29] The Finnish paradigm for 'water' includes (nom. sg.) vesi, (gen.
sg.) vede-n, (essive sg., another case) vete-nii 'as water', and so on. The stem-final
vowel is i in absolute final position, e elsewhere; and the preceding consonant is
din closed syllable, tin open syllable, and s before i (see§ 10.12). These alter-
nations are very regular and occur in a great number of nouns. The e ,. . , i
alternation is thus phonetically conditioned, although "word-final position," of

course, is actually a grammatical condition. The t ""' d ""' s alternation appears
also to be phonetically induced, but it is not. The change t > s occurs only
before a stem-final i which alternates with e, that is,
e
l
t>s before i
No assibilation occurs in words like neitifneidinfneitinii, where the vowel is an
unalternating i all the way. In some cases like this, however, the actual history
may be quite different (see §§ 6.10, 10.17, 11.17, 11.18); for example, many
scholars assume that the dental in neiti was earlier *o rather than *t. Cases like
this indicate that grammatical or morphophonemic conditioning in the syn-
chronic grammar need not mirror a grammatically conditioned sound change.
[4.30] As a conclusion to the sections on grammatical and morphophone-

mic conditioning of sound change, we can indeed acknowledge that such
phenomena exist, although we have also seen warning signs that not every case
that looks like them may be correctly so interpreted. This is one of the com-
plications of history and reminds us of a well-known maxim based on natural
phenomena: all is not gold that glitters. Of course, grammatical conditioning of
alternations is one of the basic characteristics of synchronic grammar, but most
of the time this is an incidental consequence of the piling up of pure phonetic
changes (e.g., English weorjJanfworden, mouse/mice, safefsave, doomfdeem,
French neuffneuve, Livian tammjtiimm; other examples will be introduced later).
Further, morphophonemic conditioning of sound change has taken us into the
domain of traditional analogy. We have to return to this topic in the next chap-
ter, and once more we can see that there need not be clear-cut boundaries in the
grammatical apparatus and its changes. One glides almost imperceptibly from
one area into another on the surface of it. This is why it has been so difficult to
establish the underlying exact conceptual boundaries between various mecha-
nisms (see§ 6.25). Therefore, our chapter divisions are cardinal points only.
[4.31 Change and Variation] This chapter has been purely descriptive, as
is very often the case when we deal with linguistic change; this is a limitation
dictated by the historical circumstances. That is, we describe facts that (we be-
lieve) happened. This is, of course, a necessary prerequisite to explanation, which
will be treated later (Chapter 9). Even without taking the speakers themselves
into consideration yet, we have seen how variation and change are interrelated.
In most cases mentioned, synchronic variation was the source of change, and
change led to new synchronic variation. A description that ignored allophonic
variation would be very inadequate for our understanding of change. Most
changes remain evident in the synchronic workings of a language for quite some
time; a linguistic state is to a large degree a partial summary of the history of
the language. The result and source of the change generally continue to function
SOUND CHANGE ss
in the morphophonemic rules; only in a very few cases did change actually
eliminate variation at certain spots. The Romance developments of Latin k were
conditioned by its environmental variation; but in French, all outcomes occur
in exactly the same environments, kii, sii, and sii, and no synchronic alternation
remains between these(§ 4.4). In Yiddish the adverb vek fell outside the paradigm
of its nominal origin and did not undergo the change to veg. These two forms do
not alternate any longer, and perhaps for most speakers no mental connection
exists. The same happened in Standard German, but there, the separation oc-
curred through the vowels, fvek/ vs. fvek/. This does not mean that variation was
eliminated everywhere; e.g., the German syllable-final devoicing of voiced stops
(vekfveges) is still an automatic phenomenon in the language. New loans undergo
it, for example, Job [yop] and Trend [trent]. In most other cases change is vari-
ation and variation, change. Generally, then, change leads from variation to
variation. Sound change is largely unobserved, because speakers interpret it as
variation. Every speaker must be able to handle variation if he wants to com-
municate at all (Chapter 3), and speakers have no reason to know that one
aspect of variation is change.
[4.32 Regularity of Sound Change] The startling regularity of phonetic

changes was the main rallying cry of the Neogrammarian practitioners of genetic
linguistics, who were actually the founders of modern linguistics. When each
occurrence of a sound under the same conditions became another given sound,
this was enough regularity for it to be called a law. This concept was aided by
the same regularity in variation (e.g., when every n became !I before a velar).
In fact, in allophonic variation the regularity is even more compelling than from
the historical point of view, although one must perhaps say that all grammars
contain some irregularities, or as Sapir put it, all grammars leak. Intolerance
toward irregularity in linguistic change is unjustified, although the working
hypothesis that every irregularity has its reason led to closer scrutiny of trouble
spots. Many hidden regularities were found when systematic conditioning
emerged from apparent disorder, and the ultimate regularity of change was
saved. But sooner or later a historical linguist can expect to encounter sporadic
changes. He has to live with them exactly as with gaps in historical attestation.
Often irregularity mixes in equal amount with regularity (in § 4.8 see zealous,
and so on). In such cases one just has to try harder. For instance, for a century
or so a Lithuanian outcome baffled Indo-Europeanists. PIE *oi gives either
Lithuanian ie or ai. The outcomes are regular in that we have many cases of
both, but there was no reason for one rather than the other in any particular
word. Now, such a regular irregularity can be convincingly resolved by regarding
ai as the native outcome and ie as a pronunciation borrowing from Slavic
(§ 8.8). The Neogrammarian absolute regularity (100 per cent) of sound change
is untenable, and this has always been recognized by most practitioners. The
French phoneticians and the Finno-Ugric linguists have, in fact, suggested that
the notion of the sound "law" has to be downgraded to a "tendency" only.
In any case, it is the regular aspect of sound change that gives backbone to
genetic linguistics, no matter how much the slipped discs of sporadic change
may annoy the linguists.
Irregular sound change tends to occur in certain areas of grammar and
phonology more frequently than elsewhere. Iconic signs (onomatopoeia and
similar descriptive forms) resist regular phonetic change best. Although these
categories have their symbolic aspects-they depend on the particular language
-scholars, on the whole, agree as to where they expect such forms, for example,
in names for all kinds of noises, scraping, quick movements, slow movements,
tabu or unpleasant notions, and so on. The [i] in ME pipen 'to chirp' is expected
to turn out with [ai] as we saw (§ 4.8). But the vowel has not changed uniformly
and there is still a kind of [i] verb, spelled peep, although the phonetically regular
fpayp/ pipe also occurs and the instrument pipe also has the regular outcome. OE
-cwjisan, ME queisen 'to crush' should end up as /kwayz/ or /kweyz/ in Modern
English. The word, however, is squeeze with fiyf (not to speak of the extras-,
assumed to come from Old French es- < Latin ex-, as in espresser 'squeeze
out' and similar words: extract, extort). Expressive vocabulary does not invari-
ably resist change, but it can. In Classical Greek the sound that sheep gave was
appropriately something like [bre·] or [bs·]. This form has undergone the
"regular sound changes" in the modern reading of the classical word, ending up
as [vi], clearly a far less iconic shape; but the normal modern form is still [be·].
The Proto-Germanic word for 'cuckoo' was *gaukaz, which in due time gave
MHG gouch, OE geac, ON gaukr, and Swedish gok [y-]. In English and German
the words have again become more iconic, that is, cuckoo and Kuckuck. This is
obviously not regular sound change but "analogy" from the actual sound of
the bird. One should also note that in synchronic grammar descriptive vocabulary
often contains sounds not found in the rest of the language.
Frequent forms, such as pronouns and grammatical morphemes, are also
prone to undergo irregular changes. Without giving examples, we can note here
that the Rotuman changes delineated above (§ 4.6) do not take place so con-
sistently in the pronouns. On the other hand, we saw that in certain syntactic
or grammatical contexts a form can regularly remain unchanged (adverbs once
[§ 4.25], vek [§ 4.27], riiiijgin [§ 4.24], compound maantee [§ 4.24], and pronouns
rien [§ 4.25], siihen [§ 4.16]). Once more, there is regularity in the irregularity.
Then again, there are exceptions like niisus, folly, and scholar, although there
are many cases of the latter, and hence (incipient) regularity.
What aids this heterogeneity of sound change is the way it spreads. Speakers
adopt the changes at different times both in terms of social layers, individuals,
and vocabulary sets. This provides enough room for irregularities to spring up
(Chapters 6, 9).
REFERENCES
General: Hockett 1965, Postal 1968, Koch 1970; 4.1 Sturtevant 1947, Penzl
1957 ; 4.2 Penzl1957, Hoenigswald 1964a; 4.3-4.4 Sturtevant 1947; 4.5 H. Bennett
1969; 4.6 Churchward 1940, Biggs 1965; 4.7 Posti 1942, Wickman 1958-1960;
SOUND CHANGE
4.8 Wolfe 1969, R. Krohn 1969; 4.9 Foley 1970; 4.10 see§ 6.3; 4.11 E. Itkonen
1966; 4.12 Hill1936, Moulton 1967, Fairbanks 1969, Benediktsson 1970; Schane
1971, Lehmann 1971; 4.13 Lehmann 1964; 4.14 Kent 1936, Sturtevant 1947;
4.15 Wang 1969; 4.17 Sturtevant 1947, Dyen (private communication); 4.18
Hockett 1967, Thompson and Thompson 1969, Dyen (private communication);
4.19 Hockett 1967; 4.21 Hoenigswald 1964b, Hockett 1965, Bhat 1968,
Andersen 1972, T. Itkonen 1970; 4.22 Sapir 1921, S. Moore 1927, 1928,
Collinder 1937-1939, Pike 1947, Kiparsky 1965, Postal 1968; 4.23 Jakobson
1949, Janert 1961; 4.24 E. Itkonen 1966, Kettunen 1962; 4.25 Greenough and
Kittredge 1929; 4.27 Kiparsky 1965, 1968a, Newman 1968; 4.28 Kurylowicz
1968, Watkins 1970; 4.29 Anttila 1969a; 4.31 F6nagy 1956-1957, 1967; 4.32
Specht 1952, Senn 1953, Katicic 1970.
CHAPTER 5
GRAMMAR CHANGE: ANALOGY
Analogy is a function of the relational aspects of grammar

and a mental striving for simplicity or uniformity.
[5.1 Proportional Analogy] The term 'analogy' is used in many senses,

all having to do with some kind of regularity. The earliest linguistic context of
the word was the Ancient Greek controversy as to whether language was
controlled by regularity or analogy, as against irregularity or anomaly. This
controversy itself was an extension of an earlier dispute as to whether the relation
between words and their meanings is natural or conventional. These questions
gave the impetus to rigorous investigation into language, and by now we have a
compromise answer. The nature-analogy position falls within the notion of
iconicity, and the convention-anomaly position reflects symbolic aspects. Both
forces play a role in the functioning of language, as we have seen (Chapter I),
and we have already observed various aspects of analogy (§§ 1.13, 2.2, 2.8,
2.I4-2.I6, 3.3, 4.I9). A widespread characterization of analogy and sound change
is that the former involves meaning, the latter, form only. This is valid for most
instances, but is by no means absolute. We saw in the principle of phonetization
(the rebus principle) a case of analogy that did not involve meaning (§ 2.8),
although here, of course, we are not dealing with language directly but with its
secondary representation. Nevertheless, meaning can be a factor in sound change,
especially grammatical meaning. Further, the regularity of sound change is also
analogical: when a sound x changes under conditions y in a word A, it also
changes in word B under the same conditions.
Although the domains of sound change and analogy overlap to a degree, the
latter is predominantly conditioned by morphology and other areas of grammar.
A grammar is largely a system of relations, and analogy is a relation of similarity.
We have already seen a two-term analogy, A: B, in the case of citizen/denizen, in
which two nouns meaning the same thing converged on the formal side (§ 4.I9).
Well known is the three-term analogy of the geometric mean, A:B = B:C,
which (in a way) operates in the case of Lapp htt: o = o: X, where the third
term is oo (§§ I 0.14, I 0.15, 11.15, I3.3). This Lapp analogy is not as perfect
relationally as the mathematical formula, but it has the same number of terms.
The most famous type of extraphonological change is the analogy of propor-
tionality, A :B = C: D (with four terms). Any system of grammatical description
(§ 1.18) can be reduced to analogical terms based on the kind of relations used
in each such system, and formal descriptions are based on proportional analogy.
In the traditional immediate constituent approach, positive intersentential
88
GRAMMAR CHANGE: ANALOGY
analogies were used, giving what does, in fact, appear in grammatical construc-
tions. In the transformational approach, the intrasentential relations between
deep and surface structure provide the bases for analogies, with the extra
dimension of giving information on what might appear in grammatical construc-
tions. Readers who are not very well acquainted with formalized grammatical
description need only accept the assertion that all these different theoretical
frameworks use the same principle of analogy but on different terms and axes
(see§§ 5.21, 6.24). This is just a reminder that the basic structures of all formal
descriptions are, in fact, analogical. Thus it is no wonder that analogy operates
mainly in the structure of grammar.
Proportional analogy is, of course, diagrammatically iconic, an icon of relation
(§§ 1.13-1.15). Language has a general iconic tendency, whereby semantic
sameness is reflected also by formal sameness; this force underlies contamina-
tion. We often can predict the areas where analogy will enter, if it does enter,
by noting such things as formal imbalance in a semantically symmetric situation.
[5.2) Sometimes a speaker who creates a new analogical form completes

the proportion. Children, especially, who have to defend their creations against
the conventions of the speech community, resort to this. We have the case of the
Danish child who formed a past tense nak 'nodded' for the present nikker
instead of the "correct" weak conjugation form nikkede. When corrected, the
child responded with the formula stikker:stak 'sticks:stuck' = nikker:nak;
that is,
stikker nikker stikker stak
stak = --x or nikker =X
In other words, the child referred to an existing pattern by means of an example,
as he obviously could not say "why not make the verb a strong one?" or the
like. Such shifts in subpatterns have occurred in all Germanic languages (e.g.,
English drive: drove= dive: X, where Xis dove). In Modern English only about
one third of the Old English strong verbs remain so; the rest have shifted into the
weak class. A proportion given by an English-speaking child is sing:sang =
swing:swang, where two subtypes of the strong verb are at stake. In these cases,
then, one can assume that one word is chosen as a model for a whole class
(§ 5.18f.), but there are also cases where a single unique paradigm can serve as a
model. The Elean Greek word for 'Zeus' was inflected thus: nom. Zeu-s, ace.
Zen-a, gen. Zen-6s, and dat. Zen-f. The oblique stem is not inherited, but was
built on the old accusative Zen. There was only one other noun with a similar
oblique stem: men- 'moon', whose expected nominative would be mei-s (which
actually occurs in many dialects). But the Elean form is meus. Both paradigms
shared an oblique stem in -en- and a nominative inane-diphthong. Both were
unique inflections, and they converged on the model of Zeus; that is, Zen-:
Zeus = men-: X. The formula does not imply that the old form is lost instan-
taneously when the new one comes about. For a time they occur side by side,
until one is assigned to a clear social or stylistic context, or until one variant is
lost. Thus both dived and dove still exist, as well as an older brethren and a
newer brothers, with clear stylistic and social differentiation. On the other hand,
the original paradigm (sg.) book, (pl.) beech was given a new plural books; and
after a time the old one was lost. Because the word shifted into the majority
pattern, it is easy to give a proportion: pen :pens =book: X (see§ 5.19). Note
that the example is one of principle only, to avoid Middle English complexities
of spelling.
[5.3] Many of the iconic developments we saw in the first three chapters
show proportional analogy or at least can be described through it. The rebus
principle shows this in Sumerian orthography,
meaning 'arrow' 'life'
form ti ti
writing =-x
where the proportion exists between the last two rows and X was solved with a
spelling ~. This is a case of" spelling spellings " (§§ 2.6, 2.15). The 'past' tenses
of will and can were ME wolde and coude, in which the n had been lost already
in OE ciioe ( < *kunjJe; compare tooth < *tanjJ ; § 4.16). After the loss of I we
get (using modern forms)
pronunciation fwudf /kud/ /layt/ /di'layt/
spelling would= -x or light = X
and the outputs could and delight. Similarly,

spelling fate (etc.) ate
pronunciation /feyt/ =X
produces the spelling pronunciation feytf. The mechanism of hypercorrect forms
shows the same relation:
Dialect 1 God
Dialect 2 (= Gard)
This is very frequent in all languages. In Sicily medial ll had been replaced by
apical rJ4 (stella > stir/.r/.a 'star'). New immigrants into the area extended the rJr;l
also into initial position:
Dialect 1 stella luna
Dialect 2 stir/.r/.a = X
and we get Hyper-Sicilian #una 'moon', and so on. Such examples could be
multiplied by the hundred.
Hypercorrect forms show relations between regional and social variation,
but the same formal situation may obtain between variants in the same norm.
When British English lost the r in forms like better before pause or another
GRAMMAR CHANGE: ANALOGY 91
consonant, variation /bet~ "' VI resulted. This now serves as a model for
bet~r-
words with final a's:
Environment 1 beta ay'dia (before C)
Environment 2 betar = --y- (before V)
and phrases like the idea-r of it and Arnerica-r and England result. After Estonian
k had been lost medially at the beginning of closed syllables, as in kasket > kased
'birches', we get alternation, that is, sg. kask "' pl. kased. Words that originally
had a stem-finals look now the same in the plural, for example, kuused 'firs'.
Instead of the expected sg. kuus we have kuusk, arising from a proportion like
the following one:
Environment 1 kased kuused (nom. pl.)
Environment 2 kask = --x (nom. sg.)
In both English and Estonian, alternation has been extended into words
where it did not exist before. Such paradigmatic sets can even create new pho-
nemes. Russian nonstop consonants (continuants) were palatalized before front
vowels; when these vowels dropped, there was a split (e.g., v vs. v', r vs. r', and
so on), and both can alternate within paradigms. A stop like k was affricated
into c (ts) and later, in some new environments, into c (ts); this morpho-
phonemic alternation k "' c "' c remains (compare the Old French outcomes of
Latin k without paradigmatic alternation;§ 4.4). But paradigms in which v and
v' and so on alternate have called into being a new phoneme /k'/ for an expected
C:
,
1st sg. rv-u vr-u tk-u
2nd sg. rv'-6s vr'-6s tk'-6s
'tear' 'tell lies' 'weave'
Similarly, the instrumental of kto 'who' is k'ern, for an expected cern. The form
cern is found as the instrumental of cto 'what'; thus it appears that the k- of
the animate paradigm was restored (with automatic palatalization before e) as
an indirect marker of 'animate', while the original form was semantically
specialized as 'inanimate'. The analogical origin of k' in Russian is clearly
revealed by its restriction to position before a morpheme boundary (see§ 5.13),
at least in native vocabulary, although loans like k'in6 'cinema' have extended
its distribution into other positions. Here we have extension of an alternation,
and, at the same time, leveling of an alternation that would have been much
more pronounced if analogy had not occurred.
[5.4 Nonproportional Analogy) Proportional analogy is only one kind of

analogy. Often proportions do not exist, for example, in contamination or
analogic lag and anticipation (§ 4.19). The last two types show an important
point: the prime area of non proportional analogy is the sentence or some other
juxtaposition. In other words, indexical elements are very important in addition
to iconic ones. Strong evidence against the necessity of proportional analogy

were forms where the older shape was just covered over by new material without
being replaced in toto. Thus the expected plural of co11', "ki" [kai], was adapted
to the pattern of its antonym ox by the addition of the plural marker n: [kai-n]
kine. The old plural still lurks in the word. Similar forms are frequent in the
speech of children (e.g., feets, or with past tenses like camed). Similarly, in
German, there are hielt-e 'held' and ging-te 'went', where the forms have been
modified so that the characteristic weak preterite -te results. In English the noun
seamster was already feminine, but one more marker has been piled on, giving
seamstress, although in this case proportional influence from mister/mistress is
also possible. The German Hinde 'doe' was also feminine, and again the
characteristic feminine marker of the language has been attached: Hindin. In
German the past passive participles have a prefix ge- (e.g., ge-mach-t 'made').
A verb like essen fused ge-essen into gessen. The resulting form was deviant, as
it seemed to lack the syllable ge-; it was consequently supplied with it again,
giving ge-gessen, the current form.
In these cases we have seen the iconic tendency for semantic similarity to be
reflected by formal similarity; cases that get out of line are likely to be rehabili-
tated.
[5.5] Another distinct case of iconic remodeling is folk etymology. The

term is quite technical, because it is neither folk nor etymology. It means that
unfamiliar shapes are replaced by more familiar ones. Thus the phenomenon
is related to contamination, and should perhaps best be called reinterpretation
or adaptation. Loanwords are often subject to this, because they are unanalyzable
in the adopting language and have forms unusually long compared with the
established morphemes of the language. A word like asparagus is rather long
for one morpheme in English and gave way to sparrow grass, which more or
less retains the number of consonants. What is important is that the form is now
a compound built up of known elements. There is even a fair amount of semantic
justification in that the vegetable is a kind of grass. Similarly, Latin margarita
'pearl' was replaced by mere-grota in Old English, a perfectly iconic compound
in terms of the language, that is, mere 'sea' and grota 'grain'. English-speaking
tourists used to refer to a kind of Finnish brandy calledjaloviina, literally 'noble
liquor', as yellow wine. Again the semantics is not completely arbitrary, although
the color is not really yellow nor is the drink a wine, but wines and spirits form
one semantic field in Western culture. An Indian lady was referring, quite
seriously, to Ku Klux Klanners as scrupulous clowns, which indeed supplies an
amount of topsy-turvy iconicity to the term. And for her the organization was
foreign enough to be reinterpreted.
Semantic justification is not a prerequisite, because form is after all independ-
ent of meaning. When cucumber gives cow cumber, or Ojibwa otchek ~wood
chuck, part of the arbitrary form still remains, but the arbitrary part is shorter
and the total seems to fit the rest of the vocabulary better because of the native
passport in the first part. A native element that has become obscure is equally
prone for replacement; thus an expected *sam blind 'half blind' (Latin semi-
' half') has given sandblind, where, in some situations, sand can be even semanti-
cally justified. An often quoted case in which semantics was also affected is
ME schamfast, which in Old English meant' modest' (literally' firm in modesty').
When the form was modified to shamefaced, we had a basis for a new meaning
'ashamed'. Proper names and the like that do not have a linguistic meaning
put no constraints on the form. The American soldiers of 1918 referred to
Chateau-Thierry as Shadow Theory, and in German the Latin name unguentum
Neapolitanum 'Neapolitan ointment' was made more familiar by umgwendter
Napoleon (Napoleon turned around). But such drastic formal reinterpretation
can also occur with definite meaning. The American soldiers rendered the French
phrase tres bien with three beans, retaining the meaning 'very well'. Indeed,
reinterpretation is the basis of the literary device of punning.
Reinterpretation need not change the forms that have been reinterpreted at
all. When Sturtevant's little son underwent treatment of the ear by irrigation with
warm water, the situation made him connect the word ear with the first part
of irr-igate. This was an inductive change (see § 9.16), aided by the situation, and
falling under contamination and folk etymology at the same time. The change
increased iconicity in the vocabulary of this child. But this new analysis did
not show anywhere. Only a later change made it visible, when the child took
his inductive reanalysis as a basis for a new deductive derivation. When his
nose was treated the same way, he used the new relation ear: irrigate = nose: X,
which gave nosigate, and this uncovered the earlier reanalysis. That is, propor-
tional analogy reveals an earlier nonproportional case. Similarly, the child who
saw four airplanes and learned that it was a formation made the "logical"
(iconic) reanalysis for-mation (instead of the correct form-ation). This surfaced
only when he saw two more planes and referred to them as a twomation. Again,
the initial inductive change surfaced with a regular derivationfour:formation =
two: X. New formations like food-holic and gum-holic show that alcoholic must
have first been reanalyzed as having a morpheme -holic 'addicted to'. The
women's liberation movement has institutionalized folk etymology by trying to
replace history and boycott by herstory and girlcott.
[5.6] Of course such reanalysis and new derivation by children is often

ephemeral, but the mechanism is clearly at work. It can, however, become
generally accepted by the speech community. English has synchronic ambiguity
in cases like a name vs. an aim, because they can be phonetically alike. In the
history of the language, there are cases where such ann (either part ofthe article
or other pronouns or the initial of a noun) has been interpreted the wrong way.
Old English efeta gave ME evete, which ends up as NE eft. The current normal
shape, however, was reanalyzed from anevete--+ a-nevete, giving newt. Similarly,
Middle English eke-name 'additional name' (compare to eke out a living)
incorporated the n from the article, anekename, ending up as nickname. The
Fool calls King Lear nuncle ( < mine uncle), and the pet names of Edward and
Oliver used to be Ned and No/ (mine Ed, and so on). The reverse has happened
to OE nafugiir ~auger, napron ~apron (compare napery 'linen' and napkin),

and also in adder from ME naddere (compare German Natter). In these cases
the n of the noun has been assigned to the article. In all the cases the reanalysis
was not visible in colloquial pronunciation as long as the nouns occurred after
the article or possessive pronoun. Only in other (syntactic) environments do
we get proof of the reanalysis (apron, nickname, and so on). Again, another
environment bears witness to an inductive change that had occurred earlier
elsewhere, with no necessary visible reflexes (see§ 9.16).
No proportions need work in such reinterpretations, even though they do
in subsequent derivations. Latin had a suffix -nus (e.g., domi-nus 'master'
and fiigi-nus 'of beech'). Applied to a- stems, we get forms like Roma-nus and
silva-nus 'forest deity'. At some point these were analyzed as Rom-anus and
silv-anus, because new derivatives were formed with a suffix -anus on stems
without a, for example, mundanus 'of the world' (mund-), urbanus 'of the city'
(urb-), and montanus 'of the mountains' (mont-). The suffix grew also a variant
-iiinus, and this is still productive in English (into which it was borrowed through
a horde of loanwords), for example, Bloomfieldian and Humboldtian.
[5.7 Interplay Between Sound Change and Analogy] Typical for language
change is the constant tug of war between sound change and analogy. Sturtevant
phrased this as a paradox: sound change is regular and causes irregularity;
analogy is irregular and causes regularity. That is, the mainly regular sound
change can pull regular paradigms apart; analogy is generally irregular, in that
it does not occur in every case where it could, but when it does, the result is
greater regularity in morphology. In the case of morphophonemic conditioning
of sound change we have a case of analogy, which is sometimes even regular,
and, of course, sound change can be irregular. The paradox is not absolute, but
still accurate.
As a first example of how sound change destroys paradigmatic unity, let us
look at a Latin instance. For practical simplicity of handling examples, let us
confine ourselves to the nominative and genitive singular cases, because these
reveal the crux of the matter. A Pre-Latin paradigm (nom. sg.) *deiwos (gen. sg.)
*deiwi 'celestial' has a constant stem deiw-, and the case endings -os and -i, a
type that survived into Latin.
1. The diphthong changed into a long close vowel, *ei > *f, which had no
effect on the paradigm as such.
2. Now a *w before *o dropped, making the nominative *dfOS.
3. *DfOS is subject to another well-known Latin change: a long vowel is
shortened before another vowel; thus *deos.
4. o > u in final syllable.
5. *f > i, and the paradigm should end up as deusfdivi (in regularized Latin
orthography).
These five changes are regular sound changes in Latin, and they have produced
an irregular paradigm, where the stem now alternates between de- and div-.
This kind of unique alternation is a situation in which analogy might be expected
to restore balance (regularity), as it in fact did, because deus and divi do not
belong to the same paradigm in historical Latin. Analogy eliminated the
alternation by building complete paradigms to both alternants. The nominative
deus got a new genitive dei, and the genitive divi received a new nominative
divus. Now we have two regular paradigms, deusjdei 'god' and divus/divi 'god,
divine'. This is an eloquent example of Sturtevant's paradox. The situation is
parallel to the regeneration power of the planarian worm. When cut in half,
its front part grows a new rear end, and vice versa (see§ 22.1).
A paradigm need not split in two. Pre-Latin *ekwos 'horse' and *parwos
'little' should give *ekos and *paros (> *ecus, *parus) because of change 2
above, but the corresponding genitives *ekwi and *parwi (here again, of course,
representing the rest of the paradigm) prevailed and grew or maintained new
nominatives equus and parvus. The regular outcome is shown in the adverb
parum 'too little', which was no longer connected with the paradigm of parvus.
Such offshoots provide clear evidence for analogical interference. Another case
is *sekwondos > *sekondos > secundus 'second', developing regularly by the
sound laws after the word had been cut off from the paradigm of sequi 'to
follow ', which retained its [kw] in every position. English sword has also lost
its w in this position, and so should have swore, but it was restored/maintained
after the present swear. In Latin nouns the majority of the oblique stem generally
wins out, but in the third declension noun *wok-s (gen.) *wokw-is 'voice', the
alternation wok-jwokw- is eliminated in favor of the nominative wok-: vox [ks]/
vocis. This is the irregularity of analogy (one cannot predict the direction),
which may be quite regular, since Latin, after all, does not allow for an inter-
consonantal w, *wokws. On the other hand (nom.) *yekor (gen.) *yekwinis 'liver'
has also adopted the nominatival k: iecurjiecinoris, as well as the -or- from the
nominative. This is a clear case where proportional analogy is impossible but
where we have a complex contamination of the two stems.
English shows clearly the irregularity of the direction of analogical leveling
in the strong verb, where Old English had different vowels in the preterite
singular and plural:
INFINITIVE PRET. SG. PRET. PL. P.P.P.
bitan bat biton biten 'bite'

ridan rad ridon riden 'ride'
The corresponding Modern English paradigms, like those of the weak verbs,
have just one form for the preterite. Alternation has been eliminated both ways:
in bite "' bit, the plural vocalism prevails, in ride "' rode, the singular, although
there is also an archaic rid (see§ 10.7).
[5.8] The following Old English paradigms (two representative forms have
been chosen-the minimum number, of course) gave Middle English:
OE ME
nom. sg.
(pl.)
stcef
stavas
sceadu mted
(obi.) sceadwe mtedwe
I staf schade
staves schadwe
mede
medwe
In the OE paradigm of stcef the nominative singular has a closed syllable (i.e.,
it ends in a consonant), but the first syllable is open in the plural (sta.vas ). The
syllable structure is reversed in scea.du (open)jscead.we (closed), and in mted
the root syllable is the same throughout the paradigm, a closed syllable but with
a long vowel. In the last case we have the same vocalic developments as in
htelan and hteljJ, that is, shortening before two consonants (§ 4.8)-mead exactly
like heal jiyj and meadow like health jej. This, of course, is the Modern English
result, but the short /e/ in meadow still shows the fact that the w was contiguous
to din Middle English. In ME staf and schade we have a reverse development,
equally regular: the lengthening of short vowels in open syllables. This effects
the plural of staf and the nominative of schade, giving us stiiL·es and schiide.
With the great vowel shift we get Modern English shapes staff/staves jstref "'
steyvz/ and shade/shadow jseyd "' sredow/. Now regular English sound changes
have produced the above forms as well as mead/meadow. All started from uniform
Old English vocalism and ended up as regular alternations, because such vowel
alternations occur in hundreds of English vocabulary items. But exactly as in
the Latin case of deusfdiws the paired English forms do not belong together
any more in Modern English, except perhaps for staff/staves (to a degree). The
resulting vowel alternations occur in different word classes, for example, adjec-
tive-noun sane/sanity, adjective-verb cleanfcleanse, and noun-verb grass/graze,
glass/glaze, and breath/breathe, but not within the same word. As in Latin the
variants have split into two words, and the missing parts have been supplied
analogically, that is, diagrammatically according to the regular patterns (rules)
of the language: staff/staffs (new), stave (new)fstaues (compare clothfclothes),
mead/meads (new), meadow (new)jmeadows, shade/shades (new), shadow (new)/
shadows (see § 7.9). As in Latin, semantic differentiation accompanies the
formal split; it is, in fact, a prerequisite of the survival of both forms (compare
Indian/Injun, § 2.14). Normally, only the oblique stem survives, for example,
in those words that had the w in Old English: yellow (geolu), fallow (fealu),
callow (calu), and arrow (earh). The oblique stem survived also in thimble
(§§ 4. I I, 4.12); today, when hardly any inflection is left, the nominative singular
has a strong position (e.g., fowozj being replaced by jow6s/ oaths after the
singular oath /6/; see §§ 10. I 6, I I .6). Formal vowel alternation survives in some
nouns only if the short-vowel variant occurs in fossilized derivatives (seam/
seamstress, goose/gosling) or compounds (crane/cranberry, vine/vineyard, house/
husband) which are independent words (not productive outputs of the "normal"
rules of the language). Actually seamstress is now generally jsiymstr<Js/, an
obvious analogical, partially productive form in relation to sempstress. The
original root vocalism is often better preserved in family names as in Webster/
weave and Baxter/bake.
[5.9] We saw above how Estonian k alternates with nothing (at the
beginning of a closed syllable; § 5.3). In intervocalic position this stop is written
withg, and the alternation is exemplified by the inf. piiga-ma next to the 1st pers.
sg. poa-n 'shear, cut (hair)'. Similarly, d alternates with nothing (among other
things), as in laadi-maflae-n 'load (gun)' and haudu-majhau-n 'brood, hatch'.
The alternation here is just one small aspect of the consonant gradation, which
was originally determined by the phonetic shape of the word (closed and open
syllables). This state of affairs is well preserved in Finnish (§§ 10.12, 10.13),
but Estonian has eliminated alternation on a large scale. In some cases the g
(and so on) has been generalized through an entire paradigm or through part
of it (e.g., the present); in others, the lack of the stop (nothing) has been general-
ized. And in part of the vocabulary, alternation remains. This lack of exact goals
is typical of the irregularity of analogical change, and we saw in the kuusk case
that alternation can be extended even to items that did not have it (§ 5.3). Thus
analogy levels out alternations by two means at the same time, either by general-
izing one of the variants or by creating new cases of an existing alternation.
The situation is very similar to the tug of war between the various classes of
English strong verbs and the weak verbs (e.g., doPe/dive). But the old and new
forms can both ultimately survive, if semantic difference is attached to them.
All three Estonian verbs mentioned developed analogical presents without
alternation, the leveling being in favor of the stop alternant. The new analogical
formspiiga-n 'cheat, swindle', laadi-n 'load (freight)', and haudu-n 'be hatched,
stew' coexist with the old ones because of the semantic differentiation, even
though the infinitives remain the same. (Actually the semantic differences are
not that clear for all speakers. There is a strong tendency for the new forms to
be generalized in both meanings.) Compare the English verb hang, which has
tolerated both a strong (hung) and a weak (hanged) inflection because of a
similar semantic difference, as well as the English examples above (i.e., sunk/
sunken, burnt/burned; shade/shadow, and so on).
[5.10 Analogy and Regularity] It is now clear that morphophonemic

conditioning of sound change eliminates paradigmatic alternation by means of
analogy (§ 4.27). It can be written in the form of a sound change when it is
overwhelmingly regular, that is, when it occurs all through the phonology of a
particular morphological or grammatical subsection. In the German case we
saw that related forms that were outside the paradigms did not undergo the
changes (vek, ap). This is exactly parallel to forms like parum, secundus, and
seamstress, which remained true to the sound changes and were left behind
by the analogical levelings (§§ 5.7, 5.8). Both morphophonemic conditioning
of sound change and analogical change were triggered by alternation within
paradigms.
Morphophonemic conditioning of sound change is not necessarily the only
kind of analogy that is regular. The regularity of change is the ultimate result.
While in progress, a change is not notably regular, because it spreads at different
times in different environments and speakers. When analogy levels out all
exceptions to a particular alternation, the result is perfect regularity, and it is
difficult to know whether we are dealing with sound change or analogy. In this
sense morphophonemic conditioning of sound change is both sound change and
analogy. English bite/bit and ridefrode exemplify two-way tendencies within a
category. This is also the case of Estonian consonant alternations, which are
eliminated here, extended there. In Lapp, however, the alternations have been
extended to every word(§§ 10.14, 13.3), and the result is perfect regularity.
[5.11 Relative Chronology in the Operation of Sound Change and Analogy)

Linguists have usually assumed that a sound change takes place in peace, and
when it has sufficiently eroded morphological machinery, analogy comes to the
rescue. Often this is true enough, as in the cases of Latin deusfdivus and English
shade/shadow, and a particularly illustrative example can be quoted from
Spanish. In Old Spanish the sequence dl was metathesized into ld in certain
noninherited Latin words. Thus titulu(m) >tilde, modulu(m) > molde 'mold',
and capitulu(m) > cabilc/o 'chapter (church division)', in which the Latin forms
show the original order of the dental stop plus /, and of course the Latin u was
syncopated before the metathesis. Also, a sequence of the imperative d and a
pronominal I underwent the same metathesis, dad-los > daldos 'give them'
and cantad-la > cantald2 'sing it', and the pronominal n had the same fate,
dad-nos > dandos 'give us'. Such metathesized forms remained current up to
the classical period. This shows clearly that meaning and form are independent
of each other, since the meaning remained the same and was not involved in
the reshuffling of forms. Ultimately, however, the iconic basis of language, a
preference for parallelism (one-to-one relation) between meaning and form,
prevailed. The principle 'same meaning, same shape (imperative -d, pronouns
los, Ia, nos)' extended to the surface disparity -1-d-os, and so on, and such forms
as dadlos were reestablisbed.
Here then, sound change had destroyed the iconic order of sounds and mor-
phemes (syntagmatic arrangements), and analogy restored the earlier fit. In
tilde, cabildo, and so on, no iconic conflicts arose, because the change occurred
in the middle of the linguistic signs, and the result of the sound change remained
intact.
[5.12] Greek has a general sound law whereby intervocalic s drops out.
In most dialects s is the sign for future, thus (with verbs in the 1st pers. sg.),
as is shown on the top of the next page.
The futures in group A are as expected, ass is not intervocalic here. Group B,
however, violates the law VsV > VV; but linguists have assumed that, in fact,
the s was lost in these futures also, giving *luo and *poMo. If these forms had
remained, they would have undergone a change whereby vowels are shortened
before other vowels, and would have ended up homophonous with the presents.
PRESENT FUTURE
trep-6 'turn' trep-s-6 A. root ends in consonant
deik-nu-mi 'point' deik-s-6
lu-6 'loosen' lii-s-6 B. root ends in vowel
poie-6 'do' poM-s-6
men-6 'remain' men-e-6 C. root ends in nasal or liquid
ste/-/6 'send' ste/-e-6
This was the destructive force of regular sound change, and analogy from the
consonant stems had to be invoked to reintroduce the characteristic s of the
future, that is, trep6:treps6 = /uo:X, where X gives liiso (a vowel before this s
is automatically lengthened). But we have no direct evidence of an s-less stage
in group B, and it has been suggested that the facts can equally well be covered
by grammatical conditioning of sound change, that is, "intervocalic s drops,
unless it means 'future"' (actually, some other grammatical markers are also
included: the aorist, the dative plural). This takes care of group B, but group C
shows that everything has not yet been considered. Here, after liquids and
nasals, the future morpheme was not s alone but es, and in this form the s
was, in fact, lost according to the sound law. The situation is the same as in
some of the Baltic Finnic cases (§ 4.24): if a morpheme could afford to lose
part of itself, it did, provided that something remained to mark the function.
In Greek the surviving e distinguishes the future from the p\esent, exactly like
-h < -hen in the Karelian illative. Thus we see that grammatical conditioning
of sound change and analogy can be explanations of one and the same thing;
this was true of morphophonemic conditioning of sound change as well (§ 4.21 f.).
What this teaches us is that analogy need not merely scavenge the debris of
sound change; it can prevent sound change from happening in tight-knit
morphological systems. That is, sometimes morphological iconicity is so strong
that sound change does not enter at all, although it may be quite general in
those areas where morphology is not directly involved.
[5.13] The Greek situation was presented first for historical reasons. It
is interesting to see how scholars have interpreted it and to note that there is a
wide margin for interpretation in historical situations not directly attested. But
similar cases can also be observed while they are happening. In Russian the
change of unstressed ii [;:,] > i after palatal (soft) consonants, for example,
p6jiis > p6jis 'belt', has been a living process for scores of years, although the
change has not yet ousted the earlier pronunciation, and both pronunciations
still occur. In the 1940s the change ii > i did not enter inflectional suffixes at all,
because in these the vowel in question sometimes occurs under stress. Thus
we have, for example,
gen. p61'-ii 'field' vs. zil'j-a 'dwelling'
dat. ust6j-iim 'foundations' kriij-am 'land'
(compare Greek ltiso Greek trepso)
IOO HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
We have a preventive analogy for the sound change ii > i based on the environ-
ment (stress) of the inflectional endings which are not subject to the change.
The net result of this analogy is that the conditions of the change "palatal
consonant plus unstressed ii" do not extend over a morpheme boundary in
front of inflectional suffixes (see § 5.3). This is how a grammatical limitation of
sound change is often analogical in origin, that is, alternation is actually pre-
vented from occurring and not merely leveled out by analogy. Greek s showed
the same situation : it was not dropped in certain grammatical morphemes,
because it was retained in some phonetic environments in any case. The Russian
situation has a further history; now the change/process ii > i has been extended
also to inflectional suffixes.
[5.14 Analogy and the Relation Between Meaning and Form] In the case
of Estonian -n 'I', we apparently have a situation where sound change proceeded
to completion before analogy became operative (§ 4.24). Final -n was lost in
preconsonantal position and preserved before a following vowel. At this stage
the change was a purely phonetic one, and it was only then that analogy entered.
It reestablished the-n in every environment in those dialects where its loss would
result in the same shape as the imperative. In the Southern dialects, where no
homonymy threatened, the sound change just continued, with the -n dropping
everywhere. In the Russian and Greek cases(§§ 5.12, 5.13), the driving force was
the prevention of variation (difference) within one morpheme, and in Estonian,
prevention of the same form from having two different meanings. But this is
actually the same force, prevention/elimination of one-to-many relations between
form and meaning:
meaning 1 meaning 2
~~ etc.
form 1 form 2
That is, both the 1\ (Russian and Greek, etc.) and V (Estonian) configurations
tend to be avoided by the iconic principle whose ideal is 'one meaning, one
form'. Of course, all languages do have such configurations, because semology
is, after all, independent of morphology, but such disparity is the characteristic
breeding ground of analogy. And if analogy comes into operation, it either
eliminates the alternation (i.e., establishes I -relations = one to one) or carries
the alternation into other parts of the vocabulary or morphology. The important
word is if, for it must be emphasized that nothing need happen. For example,
in English the morpheme -s fs "' z "' izj with variation represents the meanings
'3rd pers. sg.', 'possessive', and 'plural '. It can further be a variant of the
morphemes is and has, thereby representing at least two more meanings.
Again, we see how grammatical conditioning of sound change is structurally
parallel to analogy or the iconic tendency in that it also breaks up or forestalls
these one-to-many relations betwe~n form and meaning. We have a V-relation
in those instances where a case form represents also some adverbial element,
and we have at least two meanings for one form. When change does not touch
the adverbs, the meanings get forms of their own (e.g., once vs. one's, § 4.25).
And as for straightening out the 1\-relation, we have seen that morphophonemic
conditioning of sound change is this kind of analogy. If the /\-relation is based
on suppletion, we have simple analogy (e.g., gofwent ~ gofgoed). Sound change
can produce suppletion, for example, Latin oculus/oculi 'eye/eyes' gives French
f£iljyeux [reyjy0]. When morphophonemic rules get restricted (out of produc-
tivity) original alternation can change into a kind of suppletion: sit/seat, heat/
hot, cook/kitchen, tenf-teen, or for some speakers, even cases like opaque/opacity
(§§ 5.8, 6.21, 6.24 7.13, 10.7-10.9, 17.5, 18.17). The stronger the suppletive
element is, the more probable is the occurrence of analogy.
Throughout this chapter we have seen this tendency of 'one meaning, one
form' at work. Thus, in Yiddish (§ 4.27),
rv
'way' 'away' 'way' 'away'
veg-V vek
gave
I
veg
I
vek,
·possVerb'
and, in English(§ 4.25), we had (in certain cases)
yielding
'poss.'
I
'adv.'
s z s(t).
In both cases the end result was two linguistic signs with one-to-one correspond-
ence (!-relation) between form and meaning. Meaning is decisive here; two
meanings develop two linguistic signs. This is the regularity principle of analogy,
which restores what sound change and syntactic combinations had diversified.
Similarly, the irregular alternations gofwent and bad/worse are often straightened
out (by children) as
'go' 'past' 'bad' 'comparative' 'go' 'past' 'bad' 'comp.'
~~I
gowent -d bad worse -er go
I
-d bad
I
-er
(Again, this notation shows the simplification visually.) In these particular
cases the results (goed, badder) have not been generally accepted, because the
frequency of occurrence upholds the tradition, but in countless cases it has, for
example, book/beech~ book/books(§ 5.7). It was recognized early that there is
a strong correlation between analogy and frequency. A typical phrasing of this
principle would be that irregular (strong) forms stand outside the general rules
and have to be specially learned, thus burdening the memory; analogy is,
therefore, successful where memory fails; that is, infrequent forms are prone to
be changed first. This principle is generally valid, however it may be worded.
We have seen that the conflicts between sound change and grammatical analogy
often result in sound changes that are grammatically limited, or sound (::hanges
affecting only certain grammatical categories and not the general sound pattern
of the language. Or, in other words, a sound of certain grammatical/morpho-
logical value may resist sound laws. Grammatical conditioning of sound change
and analogy are very much two sides of the same coin.
[5.15 The Status of Old and Innovating Forms] When changes leave
behind old forms without ousting them completely, there is a universal tendency
for the innovating form to carry the primary semantic functioning of the old
linguistic sign. The old form is pushed aside for some peripheral or secondary
meaning. Most of the cases we have seen are clearly of this type, and it does
not matter whether the driving force is sound change or analogy. Thus:
II
OLD FORM: NEW FORM:
SECONDARY FUNCTION PRIMARY FUNCTION
adverb riiiijgin 'asunder' gen. riiiijgi 'hole' Lapp (§ 4.24)
once gen. one's English (§ 4.25)
vek 'away' nom. veg, vek 'way' German (§ 4.27)
parum 'too little' ace. parvum 'small' Latin (§ 5. 7)
compound cran(berry) crane English (§ 5.8)
hus(band), hus(sy) house English (§ 5.8)
shep(herd) sheep English (see § 4.8)
maan(tee) 'highway' gen. maa 'earth' Estonian (§ 4.24)
plural brethren brothers English (§ 5.2)
kine cows English (§ 5.4)
In every case the second column shows the regular, productive, stylistically
or syntactically unrestricted (unmarked) form. The situation is different when a
paradigm splits in two, because then there is a possibility that functions which
earlier shared a form can become independent signs (e.g., deusfdivus, shade/
shadow, and so on), but even here one offshoot may become stylistically re-
stricted, for example, mead/meadow, where the innovating oblique-stem form
meadow carries the "normal" functions of the word.
[5.16 Analogy and Syntax] We have seen how analogy works both in
phonology and morphology under semantic constraints. But syntax also has
been clearly involved both in sound change and analogy, for example, in the
form of adverbs and predicatives, and both mechanisms also change syntax.
Often they do this together. Greek had, for instance, the following forms in its
verbal paradigms:
1ST SG. 3RD SG. INFINITIVE

'want' thel-6 thel-ei thel-ein
'write' graph-6 graph-ei graph-ein
The endings have been separated from the root by the hyphen. The infinitive
occurred in phrases like theli5 graphein 'I want to write' and thelei graphein 'he
wants to write'. Then the final -n of the infinitive dropped and its outer shape
became identical with the third singular: thelo *graphei, thelei graphei. The
former expression is "formally poor" for the meaning 'I want to write', because
it can also be interpreted 'I want, he writes' (V-relation). And the same applies
to all the other persons as well, except for the third singular thelei graphei. At
some point this sequence was reinterpreted as the 3rd sg. twice 'he wants, he
writes' with the same 'he', that is, 'he wants to write' in a new form. As the
reinterpretation of formation it would not show overtly here; this was an induc-
tive change, which did not alter the outer shape produced by the sound change.
The reinterpretation surfaced in the other persons; for example, thelei graphei =
the/a X, where the end result is thelo graphO 'I want to write' (formally also the
1st sg. twice). This deductive analogy restores the diagrammatic relation between
person and the corresponding form. Ultimately, the infinitive in Greek was lost
altogether. (The change shows also that infinitives are indeed underlying
sentences, or finite verbs; when sound change interfered with them they easily
reverted back to their basic form. We ignore here the subsequent modification
whereby the particle 'that' became obligatory, thus in Modern Greek: the/o na
grapho [literally] 'I want that I write'.)
[5.17) Finnish once had an accusative in -m in the singular, whereas in

the plural the accusative was homophonous to the nominative. A selection of
the paradigm would be (with modern orthography)
NOM. ACC. GEN.

sg. poika poja-m poja-n 'b ,
pl. poja-t poja-t poz.k.
-zen oy
Also the 1st sg. ending was -m. A sentence like 'I see the boy go' went niie-m
poja-m menevii-m (written here in a hybrid orthography where only the endings
reflect the earlier sounds). The last word menevii(m) is a participle of the verb
'to go', and because it is an attribute to pojam, it agrees in case and number
with it; that is, 'I see the boy, the going one' = 'I see the boy going'. The
corresponding plural object can be formed with cases given: niie-m poja-t
menevii-t 'I see the boys go'. A sound change -m > -n produced new endings: niien
pojan meneviin. The ace. sg. became homophonous with the gen. sg. (there was
no such merger in the verbal 1st sg. ending). As in the Greek example, sound
change made two forms identical, here pojan and meneviin (both ace. and gen.).
Note that, to start with, pojan is the head and meneviin an adjective attribute to
it. At some point the form pojan was reinterpreted as a genitive, and conse-
quently as an attribute to the following meneviin, which therewith became the
head to the genitive attribute. Again, such reinterpretation is not reflected in the
forms themselves; they remainpojan meneviin (compare theleigrdphei), although
the literal analysis is now '(the) going of the boy'. The new analysis is proved
by the plural, because there the accusative and the genitive are different, and the
original, unambiguous phrase has been replaced by the equally unambiguous
naen poikien meneviin 'I see the boys go'. Meneviin is now, unmistakably, an
uninflected head with the attribute poikien in the genitive plural (see § 9.16f.).
[5.18 Analogy and Speech Production] In the survey of the various types
of analogical changes, two ways of classifying them were occasionally referred
to: leveling and extension. When differences between two (related) forms are
reduced or eliminated, we have leveling. When a form or an alternation is
carried into a new environment, we have extension. All the examples we have
seen represent one of the cases or both. For example, the differences between
the originally unrelated linguistic signs ear and irrigate were partially leveled
by a new semantic identification and recutting irr-igate. The part -igate was then
subsequently extended to nosigate. The morphemes -ism and -able were borrowed
into English as parts of hundreds of loanwords (e.g., humanism and usable).
These endings have been extended to native stems or roots (e.g., token-ism and
think-able). Extension is similar to borrowing in that a form is lifted from one
environment into another, though, in borrowing, the source environment is
in a different language, dialect, or even idiolect, whereas, in extension, it is
within the same grammar in another grammatical environment or in another
part of the vocabulary (lexicon). The parallelism with borrowing has even led
to calling extension borrowing from within (the same grammar).
New analogical (deductive) forms are, by necessity, tied to speech production;
that is, a speaker must utter them according to his grammatical machinery. The
creation of such forms is independent of their subsequent fate, because they may
or may not become the new norms. One of the most mystifying characteristics
of human language is its productivity (§ 1.28). This is connected with man's
innate ability to learn a language. Such a capacity manifests itself very early
in the child's apprenticeship in speaking, as he can and does easily go beyond
the sentences he has heard. Each utterance is either a parroting or a new creation.
From the data he has been exposed to, the child is able to abstract regular
patterns or rules; he then extends his use of these into areas that are novel to
him, and maybe even to other speakers. Thus one aspect of extension of forms
or patterns is clearly a function of the use of the grammar, that is, speech
production.
Grammar is somehow internalized in the brain and is not directly observable
except for its product, the actual utterances. Of course it is a two-way affair, as
the regular patterns have to be abstracted from the utterances. But once they
have been established, they need not be reinforced by concrete instances. If
we heard a new English adjective glump, we would be automatically able to
form the comparative and superlative glumper, glumpest without referring to
another concrete instance like damper, dampest. If it were a noun, its plural
would be glumps, if a personal name, a genitive Glump's would follow. And a
verb would go he glumps, he glumped, and so on. These forms have now been
created by frequent productive patterns. Such patterns tend to prevail over
unproductive types. Instead of the unique good/better, the speaker may lapse
into a comparative gooder, or instead of an irregular weak brought, he may come
out with bringed. Adults usually quickly correct themselves, whereas children
tend to make an effort to stay with these. Only such irregularities as good/better
and badfworse have to be learned form by form, otherwise the patterns are
enough. Thus in highly inflected languages, speakers do not in every case store
hundreds of different forms for each word but create any form they need
according to the patterns at their disposal (see§ 18.17). Many forms are created
afresh for each occurrence rather than repeated from memory. This is even more
true in syntax than in morphology, because we speak and hear more different
sentences than different words. Language is one manifestation of the innate
faculty of analogizing, shown clearly by children even before they have acquired
language.
[5.19] As was already mentioned, grammatical patterns are not directly

observable; only the surface forms produced by them are. To talk about formal
systems like the grammatical speech-production mechanism, one has to use
analogy (see§ 5.1). Analogy is a type of reasoning that plays an important part
in all scientific thought. An analogy is a resemblance between the relationship
of things rather than between the things themselves (a relation of similarity;
§§ 1.13, 1.14, 5.1). Analogy is particularly valuable in suggesting clues and
hypotheses, and in helping us comprehend and treat phenomena and occurrences
we cannot see. Grammar is exactly such a phenomenon. Proportional analogy
supplies a handy model for the regular patterns. Careful linguists have always
made it clear that speakers themselves need not use the proportion; rather, it
is a linguist's way of describing the action of the speaker. Further, the proportion
itself is, in any case, just a crude shorthand notation for what has gone on in
the process of speech production. When the speakers themselves give a propor-
tion like sing:sang = swing:swang (§ 5.1), they imply that the same process
which gives sing/sang could (and can) also produce swingfswang. One should
note that for all its limitations, proportional analogy is the only model that is
spontaneously formulated by speakers themselves and thus has greater psycho-
logical reality than any other model-even if some other model might be
expressive of some deeper psychological reality of which the speakers are
unaware. It is easy to give a proportion when we wish to exemplify a productive
process, but it does not mean that one needs a concrete instance like pen:pens
every time a new plural is formed, as in book: books (§ 5.2). The proportion
means only that whatever pattern or process produced pens is also responsible
for books. That is, we do not suppose that the actually occurring surface shapes
pen, pens, and book are creators of books, but that the invisible underlying rela-
tions are the same grammatical machinery that has produced many other such
forms.
I06 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
[5.20] Because the productivity of language can be described analogically,

linguists speak of analogic creation, or simply creation. The relational side of
proportional analogy has invoked another name, relative analogy. Productivity
involves extension of items in connection with the regular patterns of the
grammar, and this is in effect creation, indispensable in speech activity (which
might be called reified grammar). We have spoken so far of regular patterns or
processes, and analogy, in fact, means regularity(§ 5.1), that is, rulegovernedness
(Latin regula-+ English rule). It has already been mentioned that the construc-
tional rules of a language handle symbols exactly as an algebra(§§ 1.13, 1.14).
We have come full circle now, for analogy is one form of iconicity, and so are
the rules of a language. Much work has been done in making hypotheses about
language, and we now know more about the possibilities of writing grammars
and their rules. This knowledge is reflected in terminology, too, in that one now
speaks of rules rather than patterns, though 'pattern' can still mean a collection
of rules. Because the term 'analogy' was meant to cover patterns, alias rules, it
has become superfluous for many linguists. The underlying notions of produc-
tivity or creation have been raised into a more central position, and, even here,
there is a change of vocabulary: 'create' has been replaced by the almost perfectly
synonymous 'generate', since both terms mean basically 'produce, bring into
being, originate'. The connotations are now different and depend on the different
theoretical frameworks, but the original substance is very much the same. If by
analogy and creation, unobserved grammatical processes used to be described
indirectly (with the use of surface forms), today one tries to go directly to the
processes themselves, with rules and generation (generativeness). This is the
crux of the different connotations; difference in emphasis has created different
terminology as well. Today, grammars and linguistics are more explicitly
generative, even those varieties not directly connected with the generative-
transformational school.
In Chapter 6, we shall look at change through linguistic rules. Let us note here
that the terms 'analogy, extension, regularity, productivity, creation, generation,
and iconicity' overlap to a great degree. Different scholars give to these terms
slightly different meanings, but overlapping is still pervasive. Note that iconicity
is a more general concept than proportional analogy or rules. Various nonpro-
portional cases show that the driving force is the tendency of 'like meaning,
like form'. The driving force of iconicity resides in the linguistic sign as well as
in the rules of the grammar. The importance of meaning is obvious, because
grammars do not exist per se, but to convey meaning.
[5.21] Finally, a short historical note is in order. Almost a century ago,

there was controversy about the existence of analogy, and the situation was very
much the same as today. It was not the phenomenon, but the term 'analogy',
that was objectionable to many. The objections gradually provoked explicit
psychological notions as better explanations for this phenomenon. Even the
Neogrammarians stated clearly that analogy was due to a psychological process,
which took place prior to the materialization of the sound by the vocal organs.
The proportions were supposed to mirror this process only retroactively, of

course. There was no obvious terminology available for speaking about what
went on in the brain, and linguists had to resort to hinting or alluding to various
psychological associations. An important concept in this connection was Sprach-
gefiihl, the language user's implicit knowledge of his language, also referred to
as 'the inner language', in contrast to the actual surface form which had to be
used in the proportions as substitutes or mirrors of it. One claim was that there
is no analogy, because Sprachgefiihl and memory (see § 5.14) are enough to
explain these phenomena. Indeed; but proportional analogy was an attempt to
make the process explicit. Today, however, the somewhat vague notion of
Sprachgefiihl has been developed into a more explicit notion of the speaker's
competence. This is described largely through rules, and we have come back to
what was said earlier (e.g., § 5.20). All these ways of looking at the problem
revolve around the same substance. One can very roughly characterize the
situation by noting that concentration on surface forms in linguistic description
dominated American linguistics from the 1920s through the 1950s; this theoret-
ical stance derived from the point of view which, among other things, preferred
the use of analogy in talking about the invisible. Now linguistics has turned
back to Sprachgefiihl as a direct object of study. But the notion of analogy
(i.e., regularity) is essential for both approaches, no matter what formal mecha-
nism of description we use (§ 5.1) nor what we call it. Analogy is indispensable
in scientific discourse-though this does not mean that it would automatically
lead to correct results.
The higher, more general principle of 'one meaning, one form' is as old as
European linguistics. It has been referred to, among other things, as the principle
of optimality (Humboldt), or univocability (Vendryes), and as the canon of
singularity (Ogden and Richards). M. Breal named the two underlying forces
separately: the law of specialization (/\ > I) and the law of differentiation
(/\ > 1, 1). The principle operates in, for example, nonproportional analogy,
contamination, and folk etymology, where proportional analogy or rules are
inadequate. It has always been known that this principle is a tendency only,
like so much in human behavior and biology that is not susceptible to rigorous
formulation . No one has ever implied that it actually would lead language to a
point where every meaning would have its own form, or total one-to-one
correlation between form and meaning. The 'one meaning, one form' principle
was also connected early with psychological factors, which "aim to eliminate
purposeless variety" (Wheeler); we have seen how both leveling and extension
comply with this. In the case of leveling the principle is obvious, but in extension
the purpose is less so; it can be interpreted as the spelling out of a formal
distinction eliminated through the loss of an earlier marker (§§ 5.10, 10.14,
13.3), so that the variety is no longer purposeless. In accordance with this
terminology, the Pre-English umlaut alternation in *miisf*mys-i was purposeless,
but was no longer so once it carried the singular/plural distinction in Old English
miisfmys. In German, umlaut plurals have been extended to a substantial part
of the nouns; that is, this variety is made "purposeful" use of. In Modern
English, however, the umlaut plurals have become a tiny minority in relation
to the s-plurals. They are purposeless in this sense, and a natural target for
analogical realignment to the s-class (§ 5.14).
REFERENCES
General: Wheeler 1887, Hermann 1931, Trnka 1968, Kurylowicz 1945-1949,

Manczak 1958, Hoenigswald 1955, Leed 1970; 5.1 Robins 1967, Dinneen 1968,
Lyons 1968, Leed 1970; 5.2 Jespersen 1964, Hermann 1931, Sturtevant 1947; 5.3
Wartburg 1969; 5.4 Thumb and Marbe 1901, Esper 1966; 5.5 Sturtevant 1947;
5.10 Sturtevant 1947, Kiparsky 1965, Bolinger 1968; 5.11 Malmberg 1963b;
5.12 Sturtevant 1947; 5.13 Jakobson 1949; 5.14 Breal 1964, Vendryes 1925;
5.15 Kurylowicz 1945-1949; 5.16 Havers 1931, Wartburg 1969, Bolinger 1968;
5.17 E. Itkonen 1966; 5.18 Lindroth 1937, Sturtevant 1947, R. Hall 1964,
Bolinger 1968; 5.19 Beveridge 1950; 5.21 Wheeler 1887, Breal 1964, Vendryes
1925, Ogden and Richards 1923.
CHAPTER 6
RULE CHANGE
Sound change and analogy are restated under one unified

convention of notation which emphasizes the inner invisible
parts of language and grammar. Such a notation deals with
before-ajier relations and may skip the actual history
altogether, as well as psychological reality.
(6.1 Relative Chronology] We know that every language is a product of

history, an end point in a series of changes of the kind that we have seen in the
two preceding chapters. All changes occur in absolute historical order, whether
we can observe them or not. Thus any two changes in a language have occurred
one after the other, in partial overlap (i.e., one change begins before another
has ended), or simultaneously (complete overlap). Although change can perhaps
be abrupt in the grammar of the innovator (how abrupt it is depends on the
scoring mechanism adopted), it is often very slow in getting established as a
new norm in the speech community; and thus partial overlap occurs easily.
When the output of one change is the input of another, we can establish relative
chronology between them, even when we cannot tell their exact dates. The
establishment of relative chronology between changes has been one of the prime
goals of historical linguistics as well as of internal reconstruction (Chapter 12).
Of course, when there is no such interference between two changes, relative
order cannot be established without direct historical attestation. For example,
if we knew only Old English and Modern English (and nothing in between), we
could not establish the relative chronology of the cpanges (1) dental t} > alveolar
d (§ 4.1) and (2) y > (i >) ai (§§ 4.5, 4.22), because they take place in different
parts of the phonology. We would not have record of any intermediate stages
either, but our experience would certainly make us doubt a direct leap from ji
to ai. As it happens, we know roughly how the process went(§ 4.8). Similarly,
even if we knew only Latin and Modern French, we would still have to assume
the intermediary stages of k > ts > sand k > ts > s (§§ 4.4, 4.15, 5.3) on the
basis of our knowledge acquired elsewhere (from other languages). Thus our
historical presentations often skip intermediate stages, and contain free order
between changes, owing to historical ignorance. The actual historical sequence
is necessarily absolute; our presentation, largely random.
[6.2] In favorable cases we have enough interference to posit relative

chronology. Before the English vowel shift occurred, two other changes had
to have taken place: shortening of certain long vowels (§ 4.8) and lengthening
109
110 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS; How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
of certain short vowels(§ 5.8). These two changes are independent of each other,
because they apply to mutually exclusive environments, that is, long and short
vowels, respectively; but they interfere with the vowel shift, because the one
takes away long vowels that would have undergone the shift if they had remained
long, and the other provides new long vowel~ that subsequently do shift. The
relative chronology here is only partial, in that both the shortening and the
lengthening have to occur before the shift, but whether they themselves occurred
simultaneously or sequentially is unknown. (Direct historical attestation often
mixes with relative inferences; for example, we know that umlaut occurred
before shortening and lengthening.) This is summed up in Figure 6-1 :A. In
other words, both the shortening and lengthening occupy the same slot in the
relative chronology, although, in absolute historical chronology, they could have
been centuries apart. But that does not matter; only the interference with the
vowel shift is of interest. In the case of the shortening, this interference is called
subtractive, because it takes material away from the domain of the vowel shift;
in the second case, it is additive (Chafe), ~ecause the change adds new material
to the vowel shift (the terms 'bleeding' and 'feeding' are also used [Kiparsky]).
In Rotuman, we saw the same relationship between the raising umlaut and the
fronting umlaut. The former had to occur first to provide, for example, a closed
o, which then gave othrough the latter. Fronting umlaut itself is complementary
to the other two changes, metathesis and shortening, and all three thus occupy
the same position in the relative chronology, as shown in Figure 6-1 :B. Raising
umlaut is seen to be additive to the three other changes. In the passage from
Latin to French, we must first have the change k > ts (kantiire > tsanter),
and only then w > ftJ (kwando > kand), whereas the change ts > s is free in
regard to w > ftJ (but, of course, it must occur after the first change that feeds
into it, § 4.4). If w had been lost first, we would have had the sequence kwando >
kand > *tsand > */sa/, which is obviously contradicted by the attested form
/ka/ quand 'when'.
A. English vowel changes
~I
I. umlaut
2. shortening 3. lengthening
(-) (+)
4. vowel shift/diphthongization
B. Rotuman vowel changes

1. raising umlaut
~ j 2. fronting umlaut
and vowel drop
I 3. metathesis
~------------~--------------~------------~
I 4. vowel
shortening
FIGURE 6-1. The relative chronology of these English and Rotuman vowel
changes is inferred, except for the English box 1, whose relative chronology
is guaranteed by written records.
RULE CHANGE III
A B c D E
1. dh > 0 t > p t > p, 0 t > 0
2. t>p d>t t > p
3. p>O p>O
4. d>t dh > 0 p>O
FIGURE 6-2. Possible relative chronologies of Grimm's and Verner's laws.
[6.3] When describing shifts one usually takes one change at a time.
Grimm's and Verner's laws(§§ 4.9, 4.10) thus require one of the relative chronolo-
gies in Figure 6-2. Possibility C lists p > oas the latest change, and what precedes
can follow either the order of A or B. Thus altogether four alternatives have been
tabulated in A-C, and D and E add further possibilities (these are not exhaustive).
This mirrors the indeterminacy or randomness which is characteristic of our
retrieval of history, but note that there is still a fair amount of relative chronology
in the arrangements. Change d > t must occur after t > p, because otherwise
it would add to the latter, which in its turn does, in fact, add to Verner's law
p > oand can occur before it, or simultaneously with it (D), and, indeed, even
E is a possibility. Change dh > o is free in respect to others, as long as we
interpret o as phonetically different from the starting point d. If, however, we
operated with dh > d, it would have to occur after d > t, because otherwise it
would add to the latter; that is, we would have basically (1) t > p, (2) d > t,
(3) dh > d, and (4) jJ > d, where the last two changes could be also reversed.
In this case, the relative chronology would be rather definite or strict.
Another way of presenting consonant shifts would be simultaneous chronology,
which gives also the desired result. The problem is, however, that such changes
have not been unambiguously attested in observable cases, especially when more
than two terms are involved in the shift. Thus it is very unlikely that in historical
fact the Indo-European consonantism was transformed into the Germanic at
one stroke:
Proto-Indo-Europeanl:
Jdh
~~ 0)
Germanic
(Of course, it is always possible to describe shifts at one stroke on paper.) Latin
medial stops on the whole develop as follows into Spanish: (1) d > @ (cadere >
caer 'to fall'), (2) t > d (tatum > todo 'all'), and (3) tt > t (gutta > gota
'drop'); the reverse order would give@ for everything. Shifts of this kind are
common in the languages of the world. Here one could devise, for example, a
feature 'closure' plus various degrees of it; writing one degree of 'closure'
with each dash, we have the following in Latin: d = [- ], t = [ = ], and tt =
[= ]. The Spanish shift can now be described in one step-loss of one degree
of closure-and the outcome is right.
II2 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
[6.4] Even though it is quite possible to use such tricks for presenting
shifts as simultaneous jumps, their value as historical indices is highly question-
able. We have presented the shifts above as chain reactions, that is, one sound
moves away and another takes its place. The question has also been raised
whether the shift can be caused as well by one sound invading the allophonic
range of another, thus pushing it out of its earlier place. These two ways of
looking at the shifts are known as pull chain and push chain changes, and in
general it seems that the former has more support in linguistic literature, although
the latter cannot be ruled out(§§ 9.3, 9.6, 9.7). It is interesting to note that push
chains would give a relative chronology with considerable overlapping between
the steps (see also§ 9.16).
A case of shift where two steps must be simultaneous is a switch between two
sounds, a change known also as a flip:fiop . Until quite recently, historical lin-
guists considered this kind of change impossible, and it is still controversial;
but evidence for it is believed to be accumulating. Whether this evidence repre-
sents the facts correctly cannot always be determined, which is a general defi-
ciency in historical explanation (compare the court procedure in which the
evidence may be quite clear, but the facts are not). However, a switch seems to
have taken place in the southwestern United States (e.g., Utah), where the vowels
in words like card and cord have switched places (also far/for, ardor/order).
Here the change is so recent that it seems to be true without intervening stages.
Often, of course, we simply do not have the total historical knowledge of a
shift, and even though the end points seem to point to a switch, it need not be
historically true. More than likely it never (or very seldom) is.
[6.5 Synchronic Order] Sound changes take place in exact historical

order, although we cannot often tell what the order was at all, or we can only
posit partial relative chronology. Another area of language where we have a
similar hierarchy is language acquisition by children. After a babbling period
during which babies of any speech community produce any sound possible,
the child loses such articulatory facility and starts from scratch. This is the
threshold for learning the phonology of the language to which the child is
exposed. Independent of the particular language, the order in which the child
tends to learn sound distinctions is about the same. First comes the distinction
between labial nasals and stops (m-p), then labials and dentals (p-t), to which
the velars are added later (k). Similarly, among vowels the axis dark-bright (u-i)
is basic to openness (a). Stops are learned before spirants and affricates, front
rounded vowels after other vowels, and so on. Such universal facts must be
connected with man's innate capacity to learn a language (§ 9.14), but what
makes them really important are certain speech disturbances. Such empirical
data are important evidence for the theory of markedness(§ 6.20) in generative
grammar. Several types of aphasia dismember language in the opposite order
from which it was learned. This seems to show clearly that there is relative
depth in the brain, because those items which were put in last are lost first.
In the same fashion, a bilingual may lose his more recently acquired language
RULE CHANGE 113
through aphasia but retain the first one. We have the same antonymy here as
between historical and comparative linguistics, because comparative linguistics
tries as best it can to unwrap the historical changes that have piled up. There is a
certain parallelism between phylogeny (evolutionary development) and ontogeny
(passage of time in which the inherent potentialities of an individual can be
realized). Ontogeny would be reflected in language acquisition, and the conse-
quent relative depth of the components of grammar (§ 6.6). The universal
features of sound systems correspond rather well with the order of acquisition;
that is, languages that have affricates also have stops, languages that have voice-
less or nasal vowels also have oral voiced vowels, and so on. Also, anything that
a child tries to do to his language while learning (mainly analogical formations)
can also be taken as a possible sound change. In this connection it is interesting
to note that a little American girl who was exposed only to Finnish at home
tried to introduce a switching metathesis into the sequence of certain consonants.
Thus k-p > p-k (e.g., piike- for kiipeii- 'climb') and p-k > k-p (koipa for
poika 'boy' and kyyppi for pyykki 'laundry'); k-t > t-k (teikki for keittio
'kitchen') and t-k > k-t (veikitta for veitikka 'little rascal'); ks > sk (yski
for yksi 'one') and sk > ks (yksii for yskii 'cough'). This seemed to be rather
consistent between the ages of two and four (but may quite well have been more
apparent than real). As in most such cases, her parents were able to wipe it out;
but it still seems to support the reality and possibility of a switch, even though
it was abortive here. It looks as if she had perceived vowels and consonants
from different ends.
[6.6) It was already noted how change is dependent on the particular form
of grammar the linguist adopts (§ 1.9), and we saw an example of this in the
Spanish consonant shift(§ 6.3). We had either a sequence of steps, or with the
feature closure (in various degrees) we could describe the whole shift in one
stroke. In Chapter 4 we saw that most historical changes leave behind alterna-
tions that stay in the grammar indefinitely. But for this reason and because the
brain seems to be capable of hierarchical ordering (language acquisition/aphasia),
the practice has become prevalent of presenting phonological derivations from
the underlying invariant morpho phonemes with similar ordering. In other words,
the historical sequence of changes is supposed to be reflected, to a degree, in the
synchronic order of application of phonological rules. This synchronic order
("brain order") used to be called descriptive order in contrast to historical
order or relative chronology. Historical order thus tells us about the relative
history of how the language came to be as it is at the time of attestation (or
now), and descriptive order reflects what-perhaps-goes on in the brain of the
speaker every time he utters something. The former is a fact, unknown to most
speakers, of course, whereas the latter is a hypothesis; it is easily forgotten,
however, that it is a hypothesis and is often taken as a fact. The parallelism
between the history of a grammar and the present functioning of grammar is
attractive and reminds us of the similarities between phylogeny and ontogeny,
but here also the similarity is not absolute. As in culture, in general, all of
history cannot function forever, although a substantial part can, in some form
or other.
Let us return to the partial paradigm of Finnish vesi 'water', vede-n 'of
water', and vete-nii 'as water' (§ 4.29). The underlying invariant shape is vete,
to which the speakers apply the following rules to get the actually occurring
surface forms: (1) e--+ i in word-final position, (2) t--+ s before i, and (3) t--+ d
in closed syllable. Again, the arrow indicates a synchronic process. This rule
order could be the same as the historical order of the corresponding sound
changes. The same is true of the crucial ordering of raising umlaut first before
the other changes in Rotuman (§ 6.2). But we shall see how the synchronic
reflex of a change need not repeat history this well. This kind of a description
of phonology has led to new terminology, so that sound changes, too, are called
'rules', and relative chronology becomes' ordering of rules'. The term' rule' itself,
however, is rather old, although it was used only sporadically some hundred
years ago.
[6.7 Form of Rules] To be able to observe and describe rule change, one
must give the rules a definite form; and as has been stressed, this form has an
effect on the structure of the change itself (see§§ 1.1, 1.9). The general form of
a synchronic rule is sound a becomes sound b in environment c, that is a --+ bf-c.
The environment can be anything and need not be a segment following a, as
this general structure would seem to indicate. Such a rule can be read ac--+ be;
or if the environment flanks a, for example, ... .fd-c, we get dac--+ dbc. Sound
a is the input to the rule that operates in environment c, and the output is b.
Sections a and c belong together by virtue of the fact that they are the targets
that the rule seeks out to operate on, and b is the output. Thus a + c represents
a hierarchical upper level with respect to b, and it has been useful to have
separate names for this dichotomy, structural description (a + c) and structural
change (b) (Kiparsky). How a and care, in fact, related will be further clarified
by an example.
An English speaker must have a systematic way of distinguishing items like
chief/chiefs, and faith/faiths from pairs like knife/knives, and sheath/sheaths.
That is, in some words, spirants get voiced in the plural and, in others, they do
not. Thus the voicing rule must be able to discriminate between such items.
This must be done somewhere in the structural description. Traditionally, one
established different kinds of spirants, those that underwent voicing and those
that did not. For example, lf1l and l61l undergo voicing and lf2l and l62l do
not; in other words, the subscript 2 subtracts the spirants from the voicing
rule. Or we can put the conditioning into the environment by labeling those
words that do not voice by a feature like [-native]. Now voiceless spirant (a)--+
voiced spirant (b)/-[ +native] (c). By manipulating either a (units) or c (environ-
ment, with classificatory features) we get the same desired result. This shows
clearly the interdependency of units and features, and especially units and rules.
Both have to be adjusted to each other, and they are complementary to each
other (§ 1.9). Another way of blocking the voicing in words like chief and faith
RULE CHANGE 115
is to label them directly, with [-voicing rule], whereby the rule jumps over such
items. What was paraphrased here is, of course, morphophonemic analysis
(see§ 10.16), and we can leave it at this point. It showed, however, that different
paths can lead to the same results. After all, we do not really know what goes
on in the speaker's head, but we do know that he is able to handle words like
chiefvs. sheath correctly (i.e., differently).
[6.8] Because the rules must be able to describe social variation (Chapter
3), they can contain considerable depth, for example,
a~ b/-educated formal style

b' /-young speakers
b" /-women's speech
etc.
where the grammatical environments have been omitted altogether; and they,
of course, would include many more possibilities. In other words, the rules
have to spell out the correspondences to be found in a speech community
(§§ 3.2, 3.3). A grammar that does not include such information is not a real
grammar of a speech community.
Then there is the question whether different outputs and grammatical environ-
ments like
a~bf-c (or with combinations like b-e', b"-c', b'-c, etc.,
b'f-c' if we let the b's represent social variation and c's
b"f-c" grammatical environments)
represent one rule with three subrules (the rows) or whether they are different
rules a~ bf-c, a~ x/-z, and a~ m/-n, and so on. Actually, it all depends
on the particular situation and linguist. In the case of the social variables we
would seem to have just one rule. Whichever interpretation one chooses will,
of course, be reflected in the description of the changes.
[6.9] It must be noted further that the parts a, b, and c of a rule must often
be decomposed into the relevant distinctive features, to get the maximal lin-
guistic generalizations (§ 4.20). Here again the exact shape of the rules depends
on the features used. Thus, using normal articulatory features, part of Grimm's
law would look like
stop ] [spirant ] /[#]- (word initially)
l)
[ voiceless ~ voiceless [accent]- (after accent)
([
spirant
dental [ VOICe
j
spi.rant] [no. accent]-[voice]
VOICe
voiceless
Grimm's law is, of course, a historical change; but if the voiceless stops shifted
first, this would have been a synchronic rule as well, because such stops would
II6 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE'!
remain unshifted when second in a voiceless cluster. This particular formulation
takes Verner's law simultaneously with Grimm's law. Since the Indo-European
s also takes part in the former, it has been written in the rule separately. If we
ignore for the moment the so-called laryngeals (§§ 12.3-12.5), sand the voiceless
stops could be combined as [obstruent, voiceless]. Of course, the output of
the first subrule could be a later input for a voicing rule (§§ 6.3, 11.20).
[6.10] In Chapter 4 we saw historical changes written in a notation

emphasizing the unity of structural description. When the sound (morpho-
phoneme) was its own environment in some other grammatical category or
form, we wrote the environment as alternating with the input proper. This is
morphophonemic conditioning(§ 4.27f.), for example,
German d or Estonian s {:}

~ ~ ~
t > d ks > s k > 0/-s
This notation has a utilitarian exactness and flexibility, because what is easily
written as a simple alternation can be a many-sided, complex, paradigmatic
situation. The complete grammar can act in the environment (c); we saw this
in the Finnish assibilation (§§ 4.29, 6.6), which was more complex than presented
above in this chapter, namely,
e e
~ ~
t > sf-i ti > si
By replacing > with -+ we get the corresponding synchronic rule. (It must be
again emphasized that this is characteristic of what linguists try to do with
their notation. The actual history shows quite different things. We have been
looking only at stem-final syllables in inflection. Elsewhere the change *ti > si
has indeed happened: *tina> sinii 'thou' [compare te 'ye'], silta 'bridge'
[borrowed from Baltic, compare Lithuanian ti!tas], morsian 'bride' [compare
Lithuanian marti; § 8.2], even in derivation: pit-kii 'long'-pite-mpi 'longer'-
pis-in 'longest' [compare§§ 1.14, 19.4 B]. All this shows that rule manipulation
can obscure the real history. Words that do not assibilate in a stem-final syllable
are somehow late [neiti § 11.18], for example, analogical offshoots like koti/
kodin/kotina 'home' [from kota 'hut'; compare§ 13.3], or loans [with original
spirants]: iiiti 'mother' [§ 8.2, compare § 4.29]. As in the case of Lachmann's
law [§ 4.28], the total evidence shows that such rules are largely achronological
restatements [of analogy and borrowing; compare§ 10.17].)
We have seen that information about the environment can be written in either
of the parts of structural description (a or c), but actually some of it can as well
be included next to the output (b) to specify, for example, social variation. This
would leave part c free for phonetic and grammatical environments, for example,
a-+ b( = f [style, age, etc.])/-c, that is, a becomes b, which is a function of
style (b'), age (b"), and so on, in the (grammatical) environment c. No matter
RULE CHANGE 117
how much we have to decompose any of the parts of the rule for our purposes,
its basic structure is always a-+ bj-c, a structure that is already familiar from
sound change (Chapter 4).
Having thus delineated the form of synchronic phonological rules, we can
go on to observe what happens to them through historical change. It is useful
to keep in mind that we took a similar position with regard to phonemes
(§ 4.12). Phonemic changes were not agents but results of sound change, given a
certain theoretical position on sound units (i.e., the phonemic principle,§§ 10.1-
10.5). Given a similar position on the structure of rules and their application,
we get a new vantage point for observing change.
[6.11 Change of Rules] In Chapter 4 we saw that most of the time sound
change did not disrupt the underlying invariant morphophonemes, although the
actual phonetics could change drastically. A perfect example is the Rotuman
case, which retained the five vowel morphophonemes all through the various
reshuffiings (Figure 4-2). The underlying structure of morphemes tends to
remain the same, although new paint jobs here and there modify the appearance.
Sound changes just add new layers of paint on top of the earlier ones. Rules
are accordingly modified only in that the final outputs (b) are different, or that
their number increases. When the earlier English realization rule of the dentals
(e.g., d-+ [dental ~W ... [everywhere]) was affected by the sound change t} >
alveolar d, the new rule came to be: d-+ [alveolar d]/ ... (§ 4.1). Such a rule
change is rather trivial, of course, but a sound change did, in fact, modify a
rule; we shall see more drastic changes below. As for additions of rules, all
those Rotuman changes added quite a few, the exact number depending on how
we write them (§ 4.6). Earliest German had a rule whereby voiced stops were
brought out as voiced stops, that is, a rule of the above English type: d-+ [d ]/ ....
Then a sound change devoiced syllable-final voiced stops, for example, [d.] >
[t.]. This meant an addition of a rule like d-+ [t]/-[.] to the phonology, and
the result of both the sound change and the interdependent rule change is, for
example, buntfbunde 'league'. Here dentals are just standing in for the real
change [voice]-+ [voiceless]/-[.] (or [voice]-+ 0, if loss of voicing would
automatically mean its opposite, voicelessness). These two simple cases show
that when a sound changes in all its environments the corresponding rule is
also modified; and when a sound splits, corresponding rules are created. Thus
the number of rules increases (see § 4.12). Rules increase to handle the more
complex relations between the surface sound units and their greater number.
The two cases show also that the historical change had a direct reflex on the rule;
in short, that history and synchrony were practically identical, whatever
theoretical philosophical considerations there might be.
[6.12) The Pre-English umlaut that fronted back vowels created alternation
and added its reflex as a synchronic rule [back]--+ [front]/-[high, front], for
example, *mus-i--+ *mys-i (§ 4.5). Again synchrony repeats history directly.
When the environment was lost, that is, [high, front] > 0, the change was to
have a repercussion in the rule, because the information on where the rule
must operate was wiped out. But since this was a mere phonetic change, the
rest of the grammar retained the syntactic and semantic relations as they had
been before, and the umlaut vowels were by necessity related to these facts. The
phonetic environment was at some point replaced by a grammatical one, that
is, [back]~ [front]/-[PLURAL, CAUSATIVE, and -p-NOUN], or the like. Not all
plurals had umlaut-only those that had *-i earlier; that is, such items had to be
specially learned, as before. The rule has now been modified. Its environment
needs a more complex specification in terms of the total grammar and not only
phonology. The umlaut rule in English has basically retained this structure,
although many other rules have piled up subsequently (unrounding, shortening,
vowel shift, §§ 4.5, 4.8, 6.2).
[6.13] Oldest English had only voiceless spirants; that is, all spirants were
realized as phonetically voiceless in every environment (e.g., f ~ [f]/ ... ;
§ 4.2). A change
spirant
. ] > [spirant]/[
. . ]- [voice
vmce . ]
[ VOICe 1ess VOICe
added its replica at the end of the already existing rules (replace > by~).
Borrowings from Kentish and French established initial voiced spirants, and
long consonants (and thus also voiceless spirants) were shortened. The balance
between units and rules was upset. For synchronic purposes, rules have a reason
only if they handle alternation. Now, some of those words that had had a short
intervocalic spirant, for example, always showed voice only, as did the loans.
There seemed to be no reason to carry this voicing rule in these words any
longer. It could be dropped by changing the underlying units into voiced ones,
for example, !vi in over. Such partial unit merger, of course, brings another
rule with it of the straightforward type !vi~ [v]/ ... which does not create or
carry alternation. Typical, in this case, is that when a rule is lost the underlying
units get rearranged. This process is called restructuring; that is, the end result
is that, for example, the old lofer! was restructured into lover!. The voicing
rule and old lfl remained, of course, in those items that preserved alternation
between /v/ and /f/ ([v] and [f)). This is one more example of the interrelations
between units and rules and how they adapt to each other as part of the tendency
toward 'one meaning, one form '. This tendency is hostile to alternation and
thus also to rules that carry alternation. Such rules are usually dropped, and
when rules drop, underlying units are also overhauled. We can continue with
this example, the material for which has already been given. By 1200, short
vowels had been lengthened in open syllables, and then a in final syllable
dropped. As in the umlaut case, a was the phonetic environment that induced
voicing for those spirants that were voiceless in other environments. And,
again, the conditioning of the new voicing rule had to refer to the grammatical
environments: voiceless spirant~ voiced spirant/-[ VERB, PLURAL] (e.g., bathe,
staves). Note that the voicing rule now always occurs with the lengthening
RULE CHANGE 119
rule (unless, of course, the base form already has a long vowel), and it might be
possible to combine them, for example, ~voiced spirant with preceding length •
or the like. Further, one could take the voiced variants as the basic units and
reverse the rule with the units, giving a devoicing in the environments [NOUN]
and [SINGULAR], because words where this occurs have to be especially learned
anyway. Now we see that the voicing rule starts to become historically dead,
although, of course, ultimately triggered by history. Synchronic rules can skip
historical stages or combine them into one. In cases like staff/staves the rule
has been dropped with concomitant restructuring of the earlier form lstafl into
ME lstafl and lstavl. Again the drop ensures invariance of morphemes. Perhaps
for many Modern English speakers this has happened also for lglresl and lgleyzl
or lgrresl and !greyz!, where the vowels also alternate and the verbs have a
technical meaning. The rule apparently still works fine in items like wreath/
wreathe. It is equally clear that alternation has been eliminated in cases like
who!efhal!owfheal, where indeed the meanings have also separated (§ 4.8). The
sequence of changes within the rule is, in a way, a kaleidoscopic process. In
these cases, the environmental part (c) of the rule shifts from phonetic to gram-
matical reference, and from there it jumps to the units (a), and the jump elimi-
nates the rule. This is another indication of the complementary nature of units
and rules, or a and c. Rules keep variants together within one morphophoneme.
When the variants are scattered enough they become independent, and unity
is achieved within each linguistic sign by dropping the rule. Paradoxically enough,
regularity is established by dropping the rule, but this is true only of unproductive
infrequent rules. The voicing rule started out as a most productive rule and is
now merely a relic. The reason is the grammar's adaptation to historical change.
[6.14] When a change affects one member of a variation by making it

identical with the other, the result is, of course, loss of the corresponding alterna-
tion rule, with concomitant restructuring. We have already seen cases of this in
the morphophonemically conditioned sound changes (§ 4.27). After German had
added syllable-final devoicing, we had alternations d "' t, g "' k, and b "' p.
The voiceless variants are the outputs of the devoicing rule. Now when the
"sound change" converts all such voiceless stops which alternate with voiced
ones back to voicing, the devoicing rule loses its motivation and drops. At the
same time, items that are no longer semantically connected with the living
alternation paradigm restructure their voiceless stops into underlying voiceless
stops, for example, !veg! splits into !vegl 'road' and !vek! 'away'. Now, an
underlying !d l is also realized as /d/ = [d]. In this German case, the sound
change eliminated the derived variants with the restructuring of the units in
unmotivated derivations. If change eliminates a variant that is the base of phono-
logical derivation, the derivation rule has no motivation either and drops with
the underlying unit. Thus in Baltic Finnic, a k drops out before an s followed
by a boundary # or a consonant, for example, Finnish teoks ~ teos 'piece of
work', where it is still a living rule (before a vowel, ks remains: teoksen 'of a
work'). The example does not reveal the total structure, because other rules
have already operated on these forms; we are looking only at the k "' 0 alterna-
tion before s. We have already seen that Estonian loses a k which alternates
with zero(§§ 4.27, 6.10); k is lost from this item completely, and the underlying
form becomes teos- in contradistinction to the Finnish teoks- (ultimately some-
thing like jteko-kse- j and jteko-se- j, but this is irrelevant here). The Finnish
synchronic rules reflect history, Estonian no longer does at this point. Since this
change happened only in a clearly specified environment, an underlying jkj
remains in the language elsewhere (some dialects do retain -ks-). But both the
German and the Estonian cases show how a "sound change" leads to the drop
of a synchronic rule with concomitant restructuring.
[6.15] After the addition of the devoicing rule, German jdingJ 'thing'
was realized as dil;k, gen. dil;g-as. Then g is dropped after fJ, and the paradigm
goes dil]k/dil;as. This is the correct historical sequence and still the synchronic
state of affairs in the Northern dialects (note the similarity to the Finnish 0 "' k
alternation in teosfteoksen). In the standard dialect, a k that alternates with
nothing drops out, giving dif)/dif)aS (compare now the same kind of morpho-
phonemic change in Estonian yielding teosfteose). We can interpret this situation
so that jgj was now dropped after jnj, which itself became an independent !IJ!
in this position (i.e., the restructuring of jdingJ into Jdi1JJ); this item now skips
the devoicing rule completely, because there is no longer any stop to undergo
it. This is no doubt the correct synchronic state of affairs for most "innocent"
standard German speakers, exactly as there is no k for the Estonian speakers
in teos either. The problem is that linguists are not innocent speakers; they know
too much (see§ 18.17). Even without referring to the actual history, they would
notice that IIJ I has a very precarious domain in German, because normally [IJ]
occurs only before velars, for example, daf)k 'thank' +-Jdank J. They would
try to write rules which keep a velar stop there long enough to get JnJ __,.. [IJ]
and then drop it. The only free velar available in this position is g, so we would
come back to the underlying JdingJ purely on the basis of filling a gap in the
patterning. Thus we apply our rules in the order
1. n __,.. f)/-[velar, stop] (daf)k, dif)g)
2. g __,.. 0/f)- (dif))
3. devoicing (fo·p, bunt 'league', ta·k)
The order of the drop of g and devoicing is exactly the reverse of the historical
order (relative chronology), which was retained as such in the Northern syn-
chronic order:
1. devoicing (dif)k, fo·p, bunt)
2. drop of g (dif)as)
3. drop of k (when "' fJ) (dif)) [does not apply in the North]
A historical change of dropping a k when it alternated with nothing triggered
a reordering of rules. Here history and synchrony differ widely. Note again that
whatever we are not willing to do with separate units has to be done with rules.
RULE CHANGE 121
We do not know when speakers shift from rules to units, but it is clear that
they do it earlier than linguists. Reordering is largely due to the linguist's
reluctance to modify the underlying forms and, as we shall see, the reluctance
to modify the rules. Most cases of such reordering can be handled with loss
and concomitant restructuring or by modifying the environmental part of the
rule. The only mechanism that seems to be historically real is the addition of
rules (e.g., sound change, analogy); loss and reordering are effects in the
particular notation used (see § 22.9).
[6.16] We have already referred briefly to the Russian alternation of

k "' c"' c (§ 5.3). Slavic underwent two main palatalizations; in the first one,
velar stops became fronto-palatal (hushing) affricates before front vowels, thus
*vluke > vllce 'wolf' (vocative). Then the back diphthong *ai was monoph-
thongized into e or i, producing new front vowels which subsequently caused a
second palatalization. Thus (nom. pl.) *vlukai > *vliki, but this time the
palatalization gives apico-dental (hissing) affricates, *vliki > vllci. The nomina-
tive retains its k because no front vowels occur there, vluku. The final outputs here
are Old Church Slavic (compare Old Russian [nom. sg.] volk, [voc. sg.] voice,
and [nom. pl.] volci), and the relative chronology is quite clear:
I. First palatalization
2. Monophthongization
3. Second palatalization
Synchronically, however, it is simplest to apply the monophthongization first
and then to combine the palatalizations as subrules of one rule:
k-> cf-+{~}+
cf-( +)[front vowel]
kf- (elsewhere)
The environments (all of which are not exemplified here) can now be specified
with morpheme boundaries ( + ). The second palatalization takes place first in
the environments where front vowels i and eare the sole markers of a morpheme,
the first palatalization follows in other environments with front vowels, and,
finally, we get the constant subrule k-> kf in other environments. When subrules
are ordered, they specify less general cases first and give the most constant
part last. The subrules then show strict descriptive order. With the notion
of the generality of the constant rule among ordered subrules, descriptive order
is by expectation very different from relative chronology, as it is here. In the
case where all the realizations are phonetically different, for example, p t k
from the Greek labiovelar lkwl, the most general one is the one with widest
coverage (here p ).
[6.17] In Finnish, long mid vowels diphthongize, thus tee (still the
Estonian form, §§4.24, 5.15) >tie 'road'. Then comes consonant gradation,
whereby stops at the beginning of closed syllables give corresponding voiced

spirants, as in teke-q > *teyeq 'do!', and the spirant ultimately drops out in
this environment, teeq! (§§ 4.16, 10.12, 10.13, 18.13). In other words, underlying
contiguous lee! give ie, whereas an underlying sequence Jekel shows up as ee;
the underlying k blocks the diphthongization. Standard Finnish has the same
synchronic order:
1. diphthongization: tee-+ tie
2. consonant gradation: tekeq -+ teeq
Note that the synchronic rules may now quite well skip the intervening *y, at
least in this situation. In the Eastern dialects, there is another diphthongization,
so that teeq > tieq. Synchronically, however, both diphthongizations can be
combined by reversing the above order into
1. consonant gradation: tekeq-+ teeq
2. diphthongization: teeq-+ tieq, tee-+ tie
Structurally, this situation is exactly identical to the German Ding-case(§ 6.15):
in those dialects where an additional change modified the output of the earlier
shared rules, the new relation between the dialects could be described by
reordering. Description by this procedure has become popular in dialectology.
In the German case, there was another possibility of explanation, however:
loss of a rule with concomitant restructuring. In the Finnish case, there is no
such possibility. Clearly it could combine the diphthongizations, because in both
cases an e gives i. But we have already seen this situation in the paradigm
of vesi 'water' (§§ 4.29, 6.6). Synchronically, it is better to try to connect the
diphthongization to the raising. In Standard Finnish, we would now have
1. e-+il-{~} (vete-+ veti [-+ vesi], tee-+ tie)

ef- (elsewhere)
2. k-+ 0/V-VC (tekeq-+ teeq)
k/- (elsewhere)
These rules have been simplified to include only what is needed for the present
example. Now we can describe the tieq-dialects as having added one more
subrule for the realization of lei, which is intuitively much better-since this is
what happened-and the k-rule does not enter here at all:
e-+ if-{~ l (tekeq-+ tikeq [-+ tieq])

keC s~ [+- "N.B.]
ef- (elsewhere) '
Synchronically, this rule should not interfere with con.,-onant gradation, because
the latter takes place within open or closed syllables, and the e-rule does not
interfere with that. Now the situation is parallel to the one in Old Church Slavic
RULE CHANGE 123
in that a small portion of the environment of the constant subrule is lifted up

among the cases that have to be specified first. The subrule is, in other words,
expanded into the environment k in the beginning of closed syllable followed by
e, which was earlier in the domain of the constant subrule. The rule says now:
in looking for the following vowel, ignore lkl in this position. One can also
devise rules that are not ordered, but the subrules always have to be (§ 9.19).
This discussion has shown that there is considerable margin in interpreting
rule changes, and many of the matters connected with them are still unknown
or controversial. One thing is clear, however. The linguist's account and
explanation of them depend on the particular structure of the rules that his
theoretical preferences lead him to accept (§ 1.9).
[6.18 Classification of Rule Changes] At the end of the previous chapter

it was pointed out that new ways of looking at things and attempts at new
explanations of phenomena often lead to new terminology. This is a common
occurrence in the sciences generally. This chapter has provided new mechanisms
whereby both sound change and analogy can be described very much on the
same terms. We saw indications of this earlier, for example, in morphophonemic
conditioning of sound change, which, like regular sound change in its regularity
aspect, was analogy as well (§ 5.1). Analogy represented the grammatical
machinery, and grammar could also condition sound change. Rules must be
set up wherever there is alternation; and when alternation is modified, so are
the rules. In a way, Chapters 4 and 5 were like observing a piano keyboard
and its relationships from the outside. In this chapter we have looked inside
the piano to see how it works.
In transformational grammar, classification of rule changes is connected
with the notions of competence and performance. Competence is the speaker's
internalized grammar, and the linguist's grammar is a model (icon) of that
competence. Grammar and actual competence do not necessarily match.
Performance is language in connection with actual speech activity, the use of
the competence, the individual concrete utterances. The realization of this
dichotomy between the underlying productive mechanism and the actually
observable product is well over a century old, although the terminology has
varied with the exact details of definition. The dichotomy deep structure versus
surface structure falls roughly within competence. The notions are useful as
relative terms, because, whereas the surface is clearly observable, the deeper part
of the structure must be somewhere in the brain and, therefore, not directly
accessible. The problem is further complicated by the fact that language is like
the color spectrum, without clear break-off points (Figure 1-1); but break-off
points are posited by the linguist for purposes of description (e.g., Figure 1-2).
We do not know where competence ends and performance begins and cannot,
therefore, give priority to one or the other. Similarly, it is arbitrary to draw a
line between deep and surface structure.
We saw that in the structuralist classification of sound changes only those
that affected the number or distribution of units were counted (§§ 4.1, 4.12),
whereas articulatory changes were not, even though they triggered the structural
ones. Structural classification of analogy also embodied changes in distribution,
that is, leveling and extension, as well as analogies that were parallel to the
articulatory grouping: proportional and nonproportional (contamination, folk
etymology, and so on). Transformational grammar and related positions take a
similar stand in looking at changes, because only those changes are counted that
affect competence. Thus changes are of two kinds, those that affect performance
(not counted), and those that touch competence. This division is even more
arbitrary than the phoneme classification, because the two areas cannot be
divided. However, in science it has usually turned out to be more useful to have
some classification than none. After English d had become alveolar, the corre-
sponding feature [dental] was replaced by [alveolar] in the rule; this fact was
now part of "proper" English. A rule was modified, but since it changed a
surface feature into another surface feature without otherwise affecting the
grammar, it is not counted as change. This is exactly parallel to the position of
not counting allophonic changes.
[6.19] Now, relevant change itself is classified under two headings:

primary change, which affects the rules and represents an innovation; and
restructuring, which changes the units or underlying representations (sequences
of units, i.e., distribution of units). When restructuring means split, and not
change in distribution, one member of the split is the innovation, the other a
relic. We saw examples of this in grammatical and morphophonemic conditkm-
ing of sound change (see also§ 5.15). Restructuring is then the exact counterpart
of change in number or distribution of units. Allophonic changes are often
antecedents of phonemic changes, and we saw above that the rule changes
(which handle variation changes) are intimately bound with restructuring. When
phonetic change creates (allophonic) variation, a rule is established to describe
it, because rules handle systematic variation. When analogy (that is, tendency
toward regularity) eliminates variation, the rule is of course lost, or otherwise
modified, and at the same time relics create restructuring. Rule addition is
chiefly connected with sound change; rule loss and reordering, with analogy.
In fact, the former are basically restatements of the latter. At the end of Chapter
5 we saw that analogy was one way of speaking about the creative aspect of
language, the total grammatical machinery, in other words, the rules. And
analogy, of course, originally meant 'regularity', that is, 'rule-governedness'.
Rule loss turned out to be the same as paradigmatic leveling in the German
revoicing example (that is, morphophonemic conditioning of sound change),
and the same with the split of staff vs. stave, and so on, that is, 1\ > I, I (see
§ 5.14 for notation). Modern Russian has dropped the historical palatalizations
from the word for 'wolf', volkfvolk'efvolk'i, and the Old Russian multiplicity
has given unity, 1\ > I (we have already seen how analogy gives palatal Jk'/
before front vowels; § 5.3). The reordering of the German drop of g after '1
(di!J) is also paradigmatic leveling, 1\ > I (Chapters 6 and 15). Reordering of
the Finnish diphthongization and consonant gradation, on the other hand,
RULE CHANGE 125
did not involve leveling but extension of the diphthong ie into words that did
not have it before (tieq; § 6.17). In the Finnish case, a new environment is added
(fed) into the diphthongization; in the German case, an environment is subtracted
(bled) from the final devoicing and no alternation could result, although it was
there before.
Modification of the structural analysis of a rule (a + c) results in extension
of the rule, and shows again its unity. Thus, if a rule like
stop
[ voiceless
] ~ [spirant ]j
voiceless -
(p t k ~ f () x)
in a language that has voiced and voiceless stops drops the feature [voiceless],
the rule becomes more general. Fewer features need be specified, for example,
[stop]~ [spirant]/-(c), and the result is an extension of the domain of the rule,
because all stops undergo it: p t k b d g ~ f () x .P o y.
[6.20 Marking and Rule Change] Every language has both symbolic and
iconic/indexical elements. The lexicon is largely connected with the former, the
rules with the latter (see§ 1.14). Not everything in a language can be generated
with the regular rules; some things have to be learned as separate units. Thus
there is a clear difference between compounds like dog meat, which can be
accounted for in terms of a productive pattern, and nutmeat and sweetmeat,
which cannot. Because of semantic change, the compounding rule has been
dropped from the latter, making "the old compound a new single linguistic sign
which has to be learned as a unit (restructuring!). All languages show similar
"relics." All languages are composites of tradition (conventional symbolic
elements) and creation, and only the latter can be handled easily with rules. Of
course, every child learns the creation or rule aspect together with the unproduc-
tive conventions. Such unproductive relic mechanisms have to be especially
marked, which is another way of saying that they have to be learned separately,
that is, that they cannot be generated with the usual rules.
On all levels of grammar, one makes the distinction marked vs. unmarked,
when there is an opposition. For example, in English, the singular/plural
contrast is normally marked by some overt plural marker, as in boy: boy-s,
cat: cat-s, and so on. Within the plural itself, some patterns are further marked
formally against the regular-s, for example, mouse: mice, ox: oxen, and so on.
It is always the more general, less restricted member (in the case of two) which
is the unmarked one. Marking, however, need not be overt at all. Figure 1-5
contains semantically unmarked terms in the first column, for example, horse,
against words marked for sex (stallion, mare) and young age (foal). Horse is
clearly the most general term, because it can be used for the others if the marking
is eliminated, that is, if the situation does not warrant such detail.
If a language has many declensional and conjugational patterns, all words
have to be marked for one, and it might be difficult to have an unmarked type
at all (e.g., Latin and German). Lexical marking like that belongs to the diction-
ary; it acts as the address, which takes the word to the appropriate rules in each
case. In other words, the marking is a catalyst that triggers the rule. 'Irregular'
or 'strong' forms are the traditional terms for formally marked items in mor-
phology, and they mean exception from the most general rules. The English
verbal inflection includes the unmarked weak conjugation, the marked weak
irregular, and the various strong ones. Thus bring would have to be marked
[+weak irregular], although, from its phonetic shape, it might seem to belong
to the swim-type (see §§ 5.2, 5.19, 10.8), which we can call here the [+ablaut]
group. And, indeed, children try to introduce ablaut bring/brang into this verb.
In other words, the analogical shifts between classes can be spelled out with
features. The motivation is apparently the formal presence of a nasal in bring;
that is, like forms should have like treatment in the grammar. If, however,
marking is dropped altogether, the verb shifts to the unmarked class, as in
bringfbringed. The dropping of marking eliminates irregular forms by assigning
them to the productive types. Marking is no more than a restatement of tradi-
tional analogy, because marking notation does not add to our understanding
of such shifts; for example, it gives no insight into the reason why dreamed and
kneeled were reassigned to the pattern of dealt, so that we get dreamt, knelt.
This is a complication in the grammar, and a similar, more recent one is dove
for dived. On the other hand, languages seem not to go one way only, that is,
become simpler and simpler all the time. Thus the plural formation of OE cu
'cow' was marked as something like [+umlaut], giving cji. Later, apparently,
the semantic antonym ox influenced the feminine, and another overt marker
was piled onto the word, [ +n-pl.] = kine. Note that the mere additional
marking [ + n-pl.] does not "explain" the reason behind it, which is more to be
found in iconicity in the forms of this bovine set (§ 5.4). Now, when all the
marking has been dropped, the outcome is cows, according to the regular
pattern.
(6.21] Marking with respect to a rule can be positive or negative; that is,
some items are marked as subject to a rule, others as exceptions to a rule.
Morphemes that satisfy the environment of a rule without undergoing it are
marked negatively with respect to that rule. Loans often establish this situation;
for example, when French loans like chief, faith, and so on, were adopted into
English, they had to be marked [-voicing] for the plural formation. Similarly,
recent loans in Finnish are marked [-consonant gradation] (§§ 10.16, 10.17),
one such word being auto 'car', (gen.) auto-n. On the other hand, morphemes
subject to a rule that is not predictable from their shape are marked positively
for the rule. Thus, already in Old English, words like miis 'mouse' and hOc
'book' were marked [+umlaut], which ensured the corresponding plurals mjis
and bee. Elimination of negative marking expands the domain of the corre-
sponding rule, because exceptions to it diminish. Similarly, elimination of
positive marking restricts the domain of a rule, because all items positively
marked for a rule are exceptions in the total grammar. Marking is, as has been
said before, something that has to be learned by special effort, and children
in particular, while learning the language, try to omit it. Thus Finnish children
RULE CHANGE 127
omit the [-consonant gradation] marking, whereby the outcome is autofaudon,

and English-speaking children, the [+umlaut] with the results mouses, foots,
and so on. Many of these have been accepted in English, for example, beech~
books. Usually, in such frequent words, the speech community is able to drill
the "correct" marking in after a while. But both the extension of a rule and
the restriction of a rule are based on the same mechanism: loss of marking. And
loss of marking means automatic simplification in the lexicon, because exceptions
to the general rules diminish in number.
Let us return to the case of sheath/sheaths ;e "' 5/ vs. faith/faiths /9 "' 9/.
The opposition here has always been [+voicing rule] vs. [-voicing]. When
the loans started being adopted, it was the negative value that was marked (and
hence the exception). After enough of these exceptions had been accumulated,
they became the regularity, and this made the positive value the marked one.
Today one has to list sheath as [+voicing], and, indeed, this is shown by the
further restriction of the rule when the marking is dropped in words like oath,
pl. fow9s/ (see §§ 10.16, 11.6).
The tradition versus creation dichotomy manifests itself among the rules
as unproductivity versus productivity. The unmarked morphemes are subject
to the productive rules, and the marked forms undergo unproductive rules if
they are positively marked (catfcat-s vs. jinnifjinn, a unique plural in English
borrowed from Arabic). In negative marking, the matter is more complicated
in that if neologisms are exempt from a rule, the rule is no longer productive,
but rather the exception is. But if their number is small, their impact in the total
grammar does not look like productivity. In a strict sense, the phonological
rules which apply in every word of a language are productive, and loan words,
for example, are generally adapted to them fast (loan substitution;§ 8.4). When
such a phonological rule no longer refers to the relations within the phonological
system but to the distributive regularities (alternations) of specific morphemes,
it has become a morphophonemic rule. The border between these two need
not be clear cut; for example, in our Rotuman selections it would seem that the
rules remain strictly phonological. However, it was mentioned that the changes
did not take place in certain forms (e.g., many pronouns) and, in this sense, the
rules are morphophonemic. We have, indeed, seen in many cases how a strictly
phonological rule becomes morphophonemic (e.g., umlaut). Morphophonemic
rules, on the whole, get more and more restricted (e.g., English umlaut plurals,
voicing plurals, strong verbs), and may disappear altogether (e.g., consonant
gradation in Veps, one of the Baltic Finnic dialects). The other possibility is
that the rule is extended into every word of the language (e.g., consonant
gradation in most Lapp languages) (see § 5.21). Morphophonemic rules may
be dropped with a concomitant change in morphology (i.e., in the snape of the
morphemes, as we have seen above).
[6.22 Cause and Effect] Even if we have a certain scoring board for
recognizing and counting changes, something like what we have observed in
this chapter, the question of cause and effect is still open. The point of view
that changes would first occur in the program, in competence, and only later
would change the utterance without having anything to do with performance is
clearly inadequate, although popular. This notion is a result of the scoring
mechanism for changes. Language is learned and hearers interpret utterances
largely from performance, that is, real concrete speech situations. Causes have
to be sought in the totality of language and the relation of its use with the
total culture and individual speech acts. If the surface forms are ambiguous, in
the sense that they can be produced in two different ways, we have a potential
source for reinterpretation, which may change the competence. Most changes
seem to be triggered by performance; only grammatical conditioning of sound
change and related phenomena are aided from higher up (in a hierarchy as in
Figure 1-2). And, indeed, one cannot separate performance from competence.
We have seen how ambiguous surface forms have been inductively reinterpreted.
This has changed the program, because the reanalysis comes to light deductively
in the outputs of this modified program(~~ 5.5, 5.6). Thus changes can originate
from both ends, which is indeed logical, because language is used from both
ends; that is, there are both hearers and speakers (Figures 1-1 and 1-2). Language
is a system that tries to keep an optimum balance between form and meaning.
Languages are there to be used; if a language is no longer used, it ceases to
change. Hence usage and the actual situation must play a role in the changes,
wherever the first impetus originates (see§ 9.16f.).
We have not yet mentioned changes in the social registers of the linguistic
rules, although linguistic rules are always society oriented (Chapter 3, § 6.8).
Age characteristics change when people grow up or die, or when a social group
emigrates as a whole. We have first the particular social or historical change in
the community, which has a reflex in the rules of the total grammar of the
community. It would be ridiculous to maintain that the rules changed first,
thereby killing off old people and exiling particular sects. In cases of this kind
we see clearly how rules are changed from the outside, by history in general,
and this is perhaps true in most cases.
Proto-Indo-European had no infinitive in its verbal paradigm, but most of
its daughter languages grew one. Thus we can describe the situation as the
addition of an infinitivization rule. In Greek, if the second half of the sentences
'he wants, he writes' is the object of the first, and he has the same referent in
both cases, a rule operates that deletes the second he and replaces the present
with the infinitive (which is the most unmarked neutral verbal form), for example,
thelei grdphein 'he wants to write'. Because infinitives are derived from underly-
ing full sentences, it is clear that we need this rule, and, historically, it was added
in Greek (see § 5.16). The same rule applies to the/a grdphein 'I want to write',
and so on, where there is more formal divergence between the verbs on the
surface. We could say that Modern Greek lost the infinitivization rule again
when the sentences come out as thelei (nd) grdphei, the!O (na) grdpho. But the
situation is not this simple, as we have seen. The motivation for the loss was
that sound change had eroded the output of the infinitivization rule, and this
triggered a reinterpretation of the surface ambiguity. The same is true of the
RULE CHANGE 129
Finnish head and attribute switch(§ 5.17), which as a change in a purely syntactic
rule would have hardly any motivation.
It is relatively easy to devise rules for mapping the transition from what was
earlier to what comes after-to say, for example, that Greek dropped its
infinitive rule and the rest followed. As we have seen, the historical changes are,
to a great degree, independent from the synchronic rules. What the rule changes
always describe, then, is the before-after relationship. They give a mechanism
for description, not a historical explanation, except in accidental cases. This
fact is often forgotten. Phonemic changes follow suit, because they, also, could
occur only between two stages (before-after), whereas phonetic change occurred
within the same system. If we count changes in competence only, we jump from
what was before to what comes after when we have a new grammar. And the
similarity between tallying phoneme changes and rule changes is no wonder,
since both use such rigid scoring rules. Moreover, the proportional formula is
heavily before-after oriented, because here one actually writes both parts in
the formula. All this is indication again of the basic unity of structural change,
whether presented as phonemic, analogical, or rule change. Every such concept
exemplifies a form of structural change.
The difference between gradual change through time and the linguist's
statements on before-after relations leads easily to misunderstanding. For
example, phonetic change is primarily gradual (see § 4.21), but the linguist's
phonological notations allow mostly for abrupt leaps. It is hasty to say, therefore,
that all change is abrupt, because that is a consequence of the notation. The
mistake is generally twofold. If, for example, a phonological notation is binary,
all features must manifest either as [+]or [-],and any change described through
this will look abrupt. This mistake is a deductive one. On the other hand, if
some changes are abrupt (e.g., metathesis), it is inductively wrong to argue that
all other changes must be the same. It is of utmost importance to distinguish
between the actual change and the before-after relations manifested in our nota-
tion and rules. The latter can be called diachronic correspondences; they need
not reflect the actual history at all, but they are always "abrupt" (see§ 9.14).
(6.23 Simplification] The main characteristics of analogy have always

been regularization, simplification, generalization, and that is what, in fact,
the Greek term originally meant. A claim has arisen that there is no such thing
as analogy, which is at best too vague to be useful; instead, we need only the
grammar (with its rules) and simplification. It is true that analogy is a wide term,
indeed, and we have seen that it did, in fact, cover all of grammar and its regulari-
ties(§§ 5.18-5.21); for example, rules and marking are the more sophisticated
counterparts of Sprachgefiihl and memory (marked forms have to be especially
learned). The notion of simplification is a direct development of analogy in
certain aspects. The terms do not match perfectly, but even analogy was a
different concept for different linguists. At this state of the art, it is also not so
clear where simplification ends and other mechanisms begin, but, basically,
simplification overlaps with analogy. Simplification has a different theoretical
connotation, however, and this tends to obscure the substance. The various
types of "primary change" affecting the rules (addition, loss, reordering, and
modification) are often cases of simplification. But so is restructuring. Both
have their ultimate motivation in the principle ' one meaning, one form', which
eliminates diversity between form and meaning. We have seen this before:
subtractive reordering 1\ > I restructuring and loss of rule 1\ > II
Here the diagrams represent just the links between form and meaning, although
end points have been spelled out before (§§ 5. 14, 6.19). Subtractive reordering
means leveling, whereas additive reordering extends alternations. The first case
in the above diagram is the counterpart of merger, the second a split. This is
exactly the kind of simplification in the sign system that happened through
analogy. It should be noted that when restructuring does not split the paradigm
in two we have just 1\ > I, the same leveling of alternation as with subtractive
reordering. In other words, we have come back to the effects of morphophonemic
conditioning of sound change (analogy). When the base variant of the alterna-
tion is affected, we get leveling 1\ > I, whereas when the derived variant
returns back to its base, we have 1\ > I and I, if relics cut loose and establish a
split. In every case we have 1\ -relations before and !-relations afterward. Sound
change is largely responsible for changing the one-to-one relations into one-to-
many relations; analogy (alias simplification) tends to restore !-relations. When
alternation is extended to every word (e.g., Lapp consonant gradation), the net
result is still unity for diversity: /\, I > 1\.
[6.24 Rules and Surface Forms] The question of the form of rules (and
their change) is still very much an open one. This chapter has delineated a
central position from which further investigation has to take off. Emphasis
was put on the obvious connections with the traditional analogy whose mecha-
nisms the rules make more precise, although not their motivation. Rules themselves
are posited on the basis of the (morphophonemic) alternations, or in syntax with
similar formal correspondences that show semantic similarity or identity
(transformational relations). The rules are there to bring out the actually
occurring surface forms. Thus the ultimate justification of rules includes very
much the same kind of surface linguistics as analogy, especially proportional
analogy (see § 5.1 ). Rules represent another hypothesis about the inner form of
grammar based on the actual surface alternations. In other words, rules belong
as much to competence as to performance, and after all, no boundary can
be drawn between the two. The material in this chapter, as in Chapter 5, has
shown the underlying unity of the attempt to elucidate the unknown. The rules
are also hypotheses and can quite well be wrong, exactly like, for example,
proportional analogy. Indeed, the number of mistakes made in the writing of
rules is perhaps as high as those made in applying other forms of analogy
earlier. The errors are chiefly seen in the general tendency to write rules for
unproductive fossilized connections of the type drink/drench, bake/batch,
hallowjwho!e, and so on. In short, regularity has been pushed into the irregular
RULE CHANGE 131
parts of grammar that are unproductive (i.e., symbolic rather than iconic
aspects).
[6.25 Conclusion] In spite of the emphasis throughout this chapter on

the limits of rule manipulation as a historical process, a further warning must be
added because of the importance of the issue. Rule change is not a primary change
mechanism, but an effect (on a notation of the "right" kind) resulting from
sound change, analogy, and so on(§ 6.22). The form of rules(§§ 6.7, 6.10) was
originally derived from sound change (Chapter 4, § 6.6) and such rules were
expanded in synchronic description. From there they were illegitimately taken
back into diachrony. It was sound change (history) that gave a useful model
for phonological rules, not the other way around. If the trend-like character
of sound change (and the existence of analogy; see§ 6.23) is ignored, maximal
simplicity through ordered sets of rules is unattainable for sound changes as
historical events. On the other hand, if synchronic simplicity is our prime aim,
ordering may not produce it at all (compare § 18.17). A theory that combines
the mechanisms of classical sound change(§§ 4.1-4.20) and analogy (Chapter 5)
into one type (Chapter 6) is deficient in many ways: It tends to become a game
on paper, and it may destroy the systematic relations within a language. It
provides no motivation or explanation for most changes, that is, such a theory
is in essence antimentalistic (compare Chapter 9). It ignores simplicity and
psychological reality (§§ 3.3, 5.2) and does not give a useful mechanism for
treating distinctive features in an obvious way (see end of§ 5.3). It lacks the
indeterminacy of a natural language and thus fails to account for the multi-
plicity of historical changes (see Chapters 7 and 8), as well as social variation
and competing forms (Chapter 3). It further destroys relative chronology by
ignoring shared innovations and the "secondary" nature of analogy, which
provides essential service in various seriation methods (see§§ 14.5-14.7). Thus
we are hampered in retrieving drift or reconstructing language splits (Chapter
15). Now, after all, our look inside the piano was just that(§ 6.18); we saw
certain movement, but the real impetus came from the outside (see§ 9.16f.).
Only phonological rules were discussed, because they provide some ground
to stand on. This is not true of syntax or grammar in general (see § 19.5),
although marking conventions illuminated the borderline between grammar and
lexicon (§§ 6.20, 6.21).
REFERENCES
General. Halle 1962, Saporta 1965, Kiparsky 1965, 1968a, Sigurd 1966, Chafe
1968, Chomsky and Halle 1968, Postal 1968, Weinreich and Labov and Herzog
1968, Wang 1969, King 1969b, Leed 1970, Newton 1971; 6.1 Bremer 1894,
Gotze 1923, Hermann 1907, Hoenigswald 1960a, Horejsi 1964, Chen and
Hsieh 1971; 6.3 Voyles 1967, W. Bennett 1968; 6.4 Martinet 1958, 1964, King
1969a, Kiparsky 1965; 6.5 Jakobson 1968, Fudge 1969, Stampe 1969; 6.6
132 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: 1-low DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
Lenneberg 1967, Luria 1967, Oldfield and Marshall (eds.) 1968, Martinet (ed.)
1968, Whitaker 1969, Graur (ed.) 3.201-321, 683-779; 6.7 Kiparsky 1965,
Chomsky and Halle 1968; 6.8 Fischer 1958, Weinreich and Labov and Herzog
1968; 6.10 Weinreich and Labov and Herzog 1968; 6.12 Leed 1970; 6.13
Huntley 1968, Leed 1970; 6.15 Saporta 1965, Vennemann 1970ab; 6.16 Zeps
1967, D. Cohen 1969; 6.17 Anttila 1969a; 6.18 Andersen 1969, Vachek 1968,
Postal 1968, King 1969b; 6.19 Schuchardt 1928, Kiparsky 1965; 6.20 Lyons
1968, Maher 1969c; 6.21 Andersen 1969, Maher 1969c; 6.22 Grace 1969, T.
ltkonen 1970, Andersen 1972; 6.25 Leed 1970, Newton 1971.
CHAPTER 7
SEMANTIC CHANGE
Semantic change highlights the iconic and indexical forces

of change. More than the mechanisms seen so far, it
stresses the importance of the cultural and social setting
for change. And, finally, semantic change shows the mental
or psychological factors of change in their purest form.
[7.1 Changes in the Linguistic Sign] Although semantics has been a

target of scholarly investigation since the activities of Ancient Greek philos-
ophers, we still do not have adequate ways of talking about it. As for semantic
change, we still rely basically on the terminology of Greek literary rhetoric.
We know much more about phonology in relation to phonetics than about
linguistic semology in relation to semantics in general. Semological structures
have emerged most clearly in areas where the referents also show measurable
structure (e.g., color terms and kinship terminology). The very reason for
language is semantic, that is, communication or the carrying of messages; the
general buildup of language shows this clearly (Figures 1-1 and 1-2). Semantics
is the "deepest" level of grammar, and, basically, all languages are the same
on this level, no matter how their formal realization is effected.
Even if we do not have an exact apparatus for describing semological struc-
tures, the mechanisms of semantic change are reasonably clear, and we can
concentrate on those aspects that must be known as a basis of further investiga-
tion. It is possible to discuss semantic change with a vague term 'meaning',
if we remember that it is a variable of many dimensions indeed.
Central to semantic change is the nature of the linguistic sign, that is, the
connection and independence between form and meaning. There is no one-to-one
relation between form and meaning, which means that either end is free to change
without affecting the other (see §§ 1.3, 1.26). But we have already seen how
semantics can induce formal changes and how the form of the linguistic sign
can affect the meaning, because there is a tendency toward a one-to-one relation
between form and meaning. This interaction was clearest in analogy (Chapter 5),
and now we shall see that semantic change can be analogical.
[7.2 Pure Semantic Change] Changes in the linguistic sign are more
obvious than changes in the semantic structures alone. Figure 1-5 arranges the
semantic relations on exactly the same principles as those by which Figures 1-3
and 1-4 handle sounds, and such examples can be multiplied; see, for example,
Figure 7-1, in which Spanish semantic experience is divided in a different way
133
from Latin, and this is parallel to what happens in the relationships in a sound
system, as emphasized with the boxes of the diagrams. Some of the Latin
forms do survive in Spanish outside the system, for example, Latin novel/us >
novillo 'young steer, calf'. For pure semantic structure and change, one has to
observe the configurations of the boxes, as it were, and not the names of the
boxes. Thus the distinction between Latin 'horse' and 'mare ' has remained
semantically unchanged until Modern French, for example,
I. equus lequa Latin
2. I
cheval ive French (early)
3. cheval Icavale I French (later)
4. cheval Ijument I French (modern)
The meanings themselves remain the same, although the names change. However,
this kind of a situation is also called semantic change, because the word jument
meant 'pack horse', before it came to be connected with the meanings' female +
horse'. These meanings are connected with the form mare in English (Figure
I -5). These examples show the two possible ways of looking at the form-meaning
links, that is, we can concentrate on the name/form and see what meanings it
has represented through time, or we can take the meaning as the base and see
what forms have represented it at various periods of a language. The former is
called semasiology 'study of meanings', and the latter onomasiology 'study of
names', that is, forms. In both cases, the linkups of linguistic signs change.
When the form jument shifted its colligation from the meaning 'pack horse'
to 'mare', we had a case of semasiological change and the result was a new
linguistic sign, often loosely referred to as a new word. When the meanings
'horse + female' ('mare') replaced their form equa by ive, only sound change
had occurred, which might be regarded as a slight form of onomasiological
change. But when ive was ousted by cavale we have a normal case of name
change, and it is repeated in the shift from cavale to jument. Semasiological
changes are accompanied, at least somewhere in the grammar or lexicon, by
onomasiological ones, for example, overt increase or decrease in names, and
so on. This is indeed what makes discussion of pure semantic change so difficult,
and why one tends to remain with the total linguistic signs, that is, both semasio-
logy and onomasiology. In other words, the lexicalization rules, the rules that
link form to meaning, may change without any change in the semantic structure
itself. In addition to the Latin terms iiter 'black ' and a/bus 'white', there were
also two terms marked for the feature 'shining': niger 'shining black' and
candidus 'shining white'. When the semantic notion of 'lustre' is lost as an
obligatory feature, the units merge into one name for 'black' and 'white',
respectively, in Romance, for example, French noir 'black' (which continues
SEMANTIC CHANGE 135
Voiceless Voiced
Bilabial p b
Dental t d
Velar k g
Labial
Voiced b
Voiceless p I f
Stop fricative
'old' 'young'
'persons' senex iuvenis +human l ~
.§
'animals,
plants'
vetulus novellus -human ~ +
§
'things' vetus novus -animate

Latin
'age'
'old' viejo
'young' joven I nuevo
'animate' 'things'
(+animate) (-animate)
Spanish
FIGURE 7-1. Parallelism between phonology and semology (compare
Figures 1-3, 1-4, and 1-5). [Reprinted with slight modification from Eugenio
Coseriu, "Pour une semantique diachronique structurale," Trauaux de
linguistique et de /itterature, II, No. 1 (1964) (© Centre de Philologie et de
Litteratures Romanes, Universite de Strasbourg).]
the old marked term) and blanc 'white' (with no formal connection with the
old terms). Of course, the possibility of speaking about 'lustre' or 'shine' was
not lost; only its obligatory indication was. Semantic merger was here accom-
panied by a reduction of forms as well. With semantic split, the number of
forms increases, at least in part of the vocabulary, for example, when Latin
avis 'bird' gives Spanish ave 'big bird' and pajaro 'little bird'. When we look
at this semasiologically, avis has restricted its semantic range, and pajaro has
expanded it, since the form continues Latin passer 'sparrow'(§ 7.12).
Latin had a generic term homo 'man', with sex marked in vir 'man' and
femina 'woman' (compare Figure 1-5). French and Italian have eliminated the
masculine marking, thereby giving a skewed system as shown in Figure 7-2:A.
homme
A. Latin
homo
>
uomo Ifemme I French
Ivir I femina I donna Italian
iiter
B. Latin > French
FIGURE 7-2. Loss of semantic marking in the development from Latin to

French and Italian. [Reprinted from Eugenio Coseriu, "Pour une semantique
diachronique structurale," Travaux de linguistique et de litterature II, No. 1
(1964) (© Centre de Philologie et de Litteratures Romanes, Universite de
Strasbourg).]
French thus continues the old Latin forms, but Italian has replaced the female
term with what was earlier a more restricted term domina •mistress'. Note that
Latin is of the German type: Mensch (Mann-Frau) vs. English man (woman),
which is just like French and Italian. This is, of course, parallel to a total loss
of marking like in the liter area (Figure 7-2 :B).
[7.3 Reasons for Semantic Change] It is probably true that meaning is

least resistant to change. Most semanticists agree that meaning is always vague,
and this has indeed led to the use of logical systems and notation to lessen the
inherent ambiguity. We all know how difficult it is to communicate. In a normal
situation, the hearers have to ask for more information, and the speakers must
paraphrase their messages. Only in simple situations .like Pass the salt, please!
can one easily reach complete understanding. This is why most students need
a teacher in addition to a textbook. Many words have more than one meaning,
and sometimes ambiguity results in spite of the context. Indeed, the context
itself can be ambiguous. Further, the structure of vocabulary is open; linguistic
signs come and go. Thus the possibilities for semantic reinterpretation are
greater by far than for formal reanalysis. The more elements and relations there
are within a system, the more complex it is, and such a system is, a priori, more
likely to change than a simpler one. This applies very well to lexicon in contrast
to morphology. In mechanical terms: the more complex a machine is, the more
likely it is to break down.
To understand a semantic change, one often requires thorough historical
knowledge of the situation. The formal apparatus of language is much more
conservative than changes in culture or human experience, which expands
constantly and necessitates new semantic divisions. In short, there are always
more meanings than words, and one of the impressive facts about language is
its ability to adapt to such a semantic challenge, which, of course, is made
SEMANTIC CHANGE 137
possible by the syntactic rules (e.g., compounding, and semantic creation, e.g.,
metaphors). Semantic change due to change in the material culture is called
'thing change' or 'referent change' (German Sachwandel). English pen originally
meant 'feather', and in Pre-Latin days it was a motivated derivation from the
root *pet- 'to fly' (this indeed still lurks in the English word feather), that is,
'a flying aid' or the like. When quills were used for writing with ink, the old
name was appropriate. And it was retained even after pens were no longer
feathers; that is, the material culture got away from the original situation,
leaving the form behind. As a consequence pen means now only 'writing tool'
and semasiological change has taken place. English mint and money derive
ultimately from Latin mone6 'admonish'. We can explain this, because we know
the total historical situation. Moneta' The Admonisher' was one of the surnames
of Juno, in whose temple in Rome money was coined. This shows at once the
value of the principle 'words and things', which states that in etymological
studies one should not separate the two (Chapter 17). Another interesting case
is Latin proclivis 'sloping downhill', which is also used in the meaning 'easy'.
Such a metaphorical leap seems quite natural and immediately acceptable
without question. The problem is, however, that, in early Latin, the word also
meant 'difficult', and this appears to defy reason. An attempt to try to alter the
meaning so that it would also mean 'uphill' (i.e., going the slope the other way)
is out of the question. The basic meaning is simply 'downhill'. The solution
is provided by the linguistic and cultural context. The meaning 'difficult' is
contrasted with planus 'flat, level' (i.e., plain), and we can assume that the
metaphor arose when Roman vehicles did not have efficient brakes. For many
such changes, we have no knowledge; for example, how did Italian fiasco
'flask, bottle' acquire the meaning 'complete (ridiculous) failure'? One story
goes that a comedian, who was famous for never failing to come out with the
right comment, was given a bottle at one of his performances. This time he
could not find anything to say and in angry exasperation he finally threw the
bottle to the floor saying fiasco! All this could be true (at least the meaning
seems to refer particularly to a theatrical context), and it would show how a
mere historical accident can influence semantic change. But we do not know
the true history.
[7.4) A case where change was due to an ambiguous context is the meaning
of English bead. The word originally meant 'prayer' (compare bid, and German
beten 'pray'). Medieval and modern religious practice holds it important to
keep track of the number of prayers, and the scoring device is the rosary with
its small balls. Praying with this device was called literally counting one's beads,
that is, prayers. The balls just represented prayers as symbols, and praying and
counting the balls were contiguous activities, the former being the cause of
the latter. Now the more obvious referent to counting one's beads was the
physical activity of tallying the balls and the situation was interpreted this way,
whereby bead came to mean 'small ball' (also boon has shifted its meaning from
the 'prayer' [compare Swedish bOn 'prayer'] to the 'thing asked for, a welcome
benefit'). Without knowledge of this religious practice, the change from 'prayer'
to 'small ball' would be completely incomprehensible.
[7.5] Habitual linguistic collocation may become permanent, and if part

of the collocation is lost, the remainder changes meaning, when it takes on the
semantics of the earlier phrase. The Latin negative ne was emphasized as 'not
a thing' (rem), 'not a step' (passus), 'not now more' (iam +magis), 'not a
person' (persona), and so on. These gave ultimately the French negatives
ne ... rien 'nothing' (compare no thing), ne ... pas 'not', ne ... jamais 'never',
and ne . .. personne 'nobody'. All these are in a way discontinuous compounds,
as they represent the negative together. After this, the ne can be omitted without
change in the meaning of the earlier juxtaposition. Thus personne can mean
alone 'nobody' as well as 'person', which gives a situation parallel to Latin
proc/ivis with opposite meanings. Here, however, the reason is syntactic. In
other words, proc/ivis acquired its antonymic meanings metaphorically (iconi-
cally), whereas personne reached the same situation through ellipsis (indexically).
A parallel case is English but < be-iitan 'outside', where the negative ne but
'not outside' retains its meaning after the drop of ne: I have but five apples,
that is, 'only' = 'not beyond'.
In earlier French traire was the general verb for 'pull', also used in phrases
like traire les vaches, traire le lait 'to milk'. When firer replaced traire as the
general verb, the latter was retained as a farming term 'to milk', and its object
could be omitted. This is how social groups omit grammatical objects that are
the normal unmarked ones for them, whereby the verb changes meaning. Latin
ponere 'to place' could have the object ova 'eggs', that is, 'to lay eggs'. In
French and English farming circles, the object can be omitted: pondre 'to lay
eggs', The hen won't lay; similarly, in Hillbilly style, He is a-pickin' 'he is
playing a string instrument'. Completely motivated iconic compounds often
face the same fate, for example, airplane__,.. plane, drive-in theater__,.. drive-in,
swimming pool__,.. pool. This same process can even create completely "new"
words, if earlier boundaries are not observed. When automobile 'self-moving',
a descriptive term for car, was shortened to auto in many languages, auto
changed its meaning from 'self' to both 'self' and 'car'. In Swedish, however,
only the end of the compound was retained giving bil 'car', a completely
unmotivated single sign. The bus was also descriptively named omnibus, Latin
for 'for everybody', and later it was shortened to the last syllable. In this way,
a Latin case ending (dat.fabl. pl.) became a regular noun. Note that we are
dealing with loanwords, which implies partial bilingualism in those circles
where the words were coined (§ 8.15). A well-known truncation is Greek
om-mation 'little eye', where om- represents the original root and the rest is a
sequence of suffixes, which gives Modern mali 'eye'. The earlier ending is now
the noun itself.
In all these cases we have seen that ellipsis induced loss of motivation.
Compounds and phrases are motivated when they are built up according to the
productive rules of the grammar, in other words, they are iconic. When the
SEMANTIC CHANGE 139
formal side was truncated, an unmotivated sign (symbol) resulted, which had to
be specifically learned, because of the semasiological shifts. Loss of motivation
is always beneficial to semantic change, even when sound change is primarily
responsible for it. A symbol has to be learned anyway, so it does not matter
for what referent it is learned. Old English hliifordwas already a slightly obscured
compound hliif-weard 'bread warden', but when it became lord, all motivation
was lost.
[7.6) Thus, with cultural expansion, there is a constant need for new names,
and this is often quite explicit. Mostly one resorts to perfectly iconic (motivated)
descriptions, for example, radio detecting and ranging(§ 2.13), lunar-exploration
module, drive-in theater, and so on. Often some kind of shortening is the result,
as in radar, LEM, and drive-in. Very seldom, indeed, does one coin something
out of the blue, for example, gas, kodak; even a word like gobbledygook has a
considerable onomatopoeic basis. But under the right sociolinguistic conditions
such creations are indeed possible; Estonian has incorporated dozens of them
since the 1910s. The following belong to the active vocabulary of contemporary
Estonian: laip 'corpse', relv 'weapon', laup 'forehead', roim 'crime', kahur
'cannon', and veenma 'to convince'.
The process of giving new names to either old or new things is called nomina-
tion, and it characteristically implies the extension of the machinery already
available in the language. It is, at the same time, both onomasiological and
semasiological change. Often nomination can be carried out with loanwords,
and we shall return to this both in this chapter and in Chapter 8. The need for
a new name need not be a consequence of a new meaning/thing. There are all
kinds of social and psychological reasons for renaming things, for example,
euphemism and tabu in general. All such restrictions depend on the particular
culture and the particular speakers. For instance, the old Indo-European name
for bear has been replaced by a euphemism (hunting tabu) 'the brown one'
in Germanic, and the Germanic word for wolf gave way to varg 'out-law' in
Swedish, varg, in turn, being replaced by descriptions like 'grey-foot'. Other
European languages have used circumlocutions like the 'honey-eater', th~..
'honey-paw', or the 'apple of the forest' for bear. The tabu of obscenity is well
known, although the notion itself varies quite arbitrarily. For example, at one
point the word leg acquired indelicate connotations in America, which would
clash with good taste at Thanksgiving dinners, for example. Euphemisms like
dark meat or drum stick saved the day. Sometimes the correction itself would
seem to be more objectionable than the original term; for example, in some
American dialects, the highly tabu word bull was replaced by top cow. All this
shows the unpredictable social forces at play. And man does indeed play with h1s
language (e.g., kisser for 'mouth'). The world wars immediately produced rich
soldier slangs, which were useful in releasing emotional pressure. Weapons were
called with household words, for example, 'coffee mill' or 'sewing machine' for
a machine gun, 'repair shop for comrades-at-arms' (Finnish asevelikorjaamo)
for the first aid depot in the field, and so on. On the other hand, the use of war
terms for familiar household items was also able to lessen the grim connotations
of the former, for example, 'wire obstacle' for beard and 'hand grenade' for
potato, and so on. The first steam drills in the Rocky Mountain mines were
known as widow makers, where again humor lessened the grim realities. Similar
euphemism exists also in those social layers which practice deceit in one form
or other, as in the underworld; but, linguistically, merchants and politicians also
fall into this class, with their advertising propaganda (e.g., 'ultimate solution'
for genocide or 'home' for house). Literary style also requires new names for
old notions; as Aristotle said, if one uses too little metaphor, language becomes
plain and dull, and if too much, language becomes enigmatic.
[7.7] One way of handling nomination is to borrow a word , especially

when one borrows the referent at the same time. But native morphemes may be
substituted for the foreign ones, and we get what is called a calque or loan
translation, that is, semantic borrowing only. Various types of loan translation
can be distinguished, but the essence is clearly analogical: language A has a
form z with meanings 'm, n ', and language B has a form x with the meaning
'm '. Symmetry is attained by language B borrowing the meaning 'n' for its
form x. In Finnish, harja is a brush used for cleaning or tidying )lP, whereas
any paintbrush is pensseli or sivellin (literally' stroker', 'stroking tool'). Because
English brush covers both meanings, Finnish Americans tend to use harja the
same way, and occasionally even pensseli for ' pencil' (which is lyijykynii in
normal Finnish). In bilingual situations, one often "speaks one language with
the words of the other" (see§ 8.17f.). French arriL'er and English arrive matched
more or less in their semantic range, except that the French verb meant also
'attain success'. Ultimately, this meaning was also borrowed into English. Of
course, the word itself had been borrowed earlier. English earl meant originally
'man of noble rank'. Subsequently, it assumed the meaning of Scandinavian
jar! and thus replaced the native alderman. Phonetic similarity between the
two cognates was an obvious factor. Later still, earl borrowed the meanings of
count, and this time there was no phonetic support at all (the first instance is
of the type American Finnish pensseli 'pencil'). German has tended to translate
foreign phrases morpheme by morpheme, for example, SchOngeist for French
bel esprit and Geist des Jahrhunderts for esprit du siec/e. Also, English has such
phrases from French: gilded youth, castle in Spain, goes without saying, marriage
of convenience, and so on. Old English was very much like German in this
respect, because many foreign notions were rendered by native morphemes (e.g.,
eorpcr;pjt (earth-craft) 'geometry', tungohvitega (star-knowing) 'astronomer,
-logist ', godspell (good-tidings) 'evangelium ', gewritu (writings) 'scriptures',
and so on). This phenomenon is quite parallel to such German words as Wasser-
staff (water-stuff) 'hydrogen' and Fernsehen (far-seeing) 'television'. Of course,
Modern English still has this possibility for motivated (self-explaining) com-
pounds and derivations : railroad,farmer, eatable, and so on. Various aspects of
loan translation show how analogical and iconic relations reshape the semantic
content of native morphemes. The Middle English adverb faste had acquired
SEMANTIC CHANGE 141
the meaning 'swiftly' by about 1300, whereas the adjective fast retained its
meaning 'firm' (compare German fest). Toward the end of the fourteenth
century, fast borrowed the meaning from the adverb, hence 'rapid, swift',
though the original meaning also survives, he is fast asleep (compare fasten).
Thus the borrowing can occur within the same language between different
categories which display formal similarity. Here also the principle at work is
analogical, that is, 'one form, one meaning', in other words, borrowing from
within is analogy (see§ 5.18).
(7.8 Semantic Change, !conicity, and Indexicality] In sound change, we

saw that change was a function of speech production and a result of synchronic
variation. Analogy, too, is intimately connected with speech production and
grammatical rules, and change is thus a function of synchronic aspects. In
addition to referent change, semantic change is tied to synchronic linguistic
variation, which we can call style. Important in this connection are the so-called
figures of speech (tropes). These are the elements of literary rhetoric: metaphor,
metonymy, litotes (negation of the contrary: not a few, that is, many, in no small
measure), hyperbole (exaggeration), emphasis, and irony; these are the more
basic types, though there exist hundreds of ways of classifying and combining
these. We can touch here only on the very essential characteristics.
The subject matter of the metaphor alone is practically inexhaustible. Metaphor
is based on a perception of a functional resemblance between two objects. It
is one of the most important phenomena in human linguistic communication.
Although any utterance can be used metaphorically, current linguistic theory
has tended to regard the metaphor as something unnatural and ungrammatical;
this view is a consequence of neglecting semantics. Metaphor is an important
kind of analogy, or vice versa, and we have seen that both are subtypes of icons
(§ 1.16). One could even say that man has an innate capacity for analogy and
metaphor, and that language is only part of this. Like analogy in general,
metaphor is quite suitable for scientific and philosophical terminology(§ 9.16f.).
Metaphor was an important ingredient in Germanic poetry. Particularly
characteristic were two-part compounds for single items, for example, OE
mere-hengest (sea stallion) for 'ship' and hron-riid (whale road) for 'sea'.
These are known technically as kennings.
The indexical counterpart of metaphor is metonymy. When one uses parts for
wholes or vice versa, one refers to this as synecdoche, for example, bread for
'food' and army for 'soldier'. Metonymy is wider and covers any other conti-
guity or causal relation, as in throne or scepter for 'king' and White House for
'the President'. A thing may be named by any of its accompaniments, or indexes,
that is, instruments for agents, containers for the thing contained (even trousers
for a man and skirt for woman) and effects for causes. Other relations possible
are equipment for a person (ensign), action for agent (aid[e]), place for service
(church), and place for inhabitants (the City), and so on. We saw these same
plinciples in the development of writing systems and in the design of trade
marks(§§ 1.12, 2.7).
Metaphor is semantic transfer through a similarity of sense perceptions. A

subtype of it is synaesthesia, a shift of terms between the physical senses, as in
a sharp smell, a soft color, and a bright sound. If a comparison is spelled out
with as or like one speaks of simile, for example, he roared like a lion, you eat
like a pig, versus a metaphor like I do not tolerate pigs at the table. If a metaphor
is expanded through a discourse one gets allegory and parable.
Metonymy comprises words that are already related by contiguity in the same
semantic sphere, and it can be classified according to spatial or temporal fields,
for example. Inventions are often named after their inventors (e.g., ohm,
ampere, watt, sandwich, mauser), products, by the place where they are first
characteristically produced (e.g., bordeaux, champagne, madras, and china).
Similarity of names leads to folk etymology and blends. In cases like sandblind
(§ 5.5), there was a change only in the connotative meaning, not in the referent.
Similarly, German vrithof' an enclosed court' and sinvluot 'a general flooding'
were connected with Friede 'peace' and Siinde 'sin' giving modern Friedhof
'cemetery' and Siindflut 'deluge', with no change in the actual referent. In
shame-faced, we saw a change both in meaning and referent. The situation is
repeated by English belfry, which meant 'a movable tower used in attacking
walled positions'. But the first syllable was associated with the noun bell, and
the basic meaning is now 'bell tower'.
And we saw in our discussion of French negatives that words that frequently
occur side by side influence each other semantically so that one of them can
drop without semantic consequences. Such deletion is called ellipsis, and it is
often difficult to distinguish it from metonymy, for example, a daily (paper),
the main (sea), Latin prosa (6nlti6) 'straight speech', oriens (sol) 'rising sun',
ovile (stabulum) 'sheepfold', French a (main) droite, a Ia (maniere, mode,
fa~on) franfaise; a (painting by) Picasso, a burgundy (wine), a Winchester
(rifle), and so on.
The order of importance of the four mechanisms of change is metaphor,
metonymy, ellipsis, and folk etymology, the latter only peripherally important.
These are again only cardinal points; in real situations, they interlock extensively.
Particularly delicate is the boundary between metonymy and ellipsis. For ex-
ample, is German Schirm 'umbrella' a straight metonymy from the meaning
'shelter', or is it an elliptic form for the self-explaining compound Regenschirm?
Ieonicity lndexicality
(similarity) (contiguity)
Meaning (sense) metaphor metonymy
Form (name) folk etymology ellipsis
FIGURE 7-3. The interrelation among four mechanisms of semantic change.

[The essence of the diagram reprinted with permission from Pierre Guiraud,
La semantique (Que sais-je ?) No. 655 (1955) (© 1962 Presses Universitaires de
France).]
SEMANTIC CHANGE 143
We can relate metaphor, metonymy, ellipsis, and folk etymology through
Figure 7-3.
(7.9 Simplification in Semantic Change] Lasting semantic change occurs
when the figures of speech lose their stylistic value and become the unmarked,
normal representatives for a meaning. First, it should be noted that metaphor,
metonymy, loan translation, folk etymology, and the development of different
syntactic categories all add to the complexity of the grammar. They are, in a
way, 'rule additions', which increase the one-to-many relations between form
and meaning, as shown in Figure 7-4. All the mechanisms mentioned add the
right side to the diagrams A-D. These contrast in shape with E-G, where the
formal side is the more varied one. We already know case F from sound change
which splits up paradigms in this way, and case G represents phrases that were
completely motivated to begin with, but where the parts have fused into one
semantic unit. As with other innovations, the development of a new meaning
does not immediately oust old meanings. For a time the new and old meanings
exist side by side, and this situation is characterized in the diagrams. Those that
open upward represent semasiological aspects, the reverse ones, onomasiological
ones. This synchronic variation (one-to-many relations) is the basis of change.
We have already seen how case F becomes simplified through analogy (or
rule manipulation). Forms that are semantically the same tend to be leveled
out also formally, for example, 1\ > I (cowfcow-s), or else the paradigm splits
in two, 1\ > I, I (deus, divus and-shade, shadow). In this case we have a formal
split that-leads to a semantic split. The underlying principle here is that the mind
tends to eliminate purposeless variety(§ 5.21), that is, 'one form, one meaning'.
This is shown also by a well-known fact of synonymy (E), that exact synonyms
are hard to come by. Either one form is lost, as in 1\ > I, or differentiation
takes place, 1\ > I, 1. In other words, case F is just a subtype of E; their formal
relations in change are the same, although F belongs to the grammar (paradigm)
and E to the lexicon to begin with. English is rather rich in synonyms, and,
nearly always, there is some differentiation in that one term is stylistically marked
as more abstract, emotive, emphatic, technical, or colloquial (help-aid, reject-
decline, bloody-sanguinary, turn doll'n-refuse, and daddy-father). The old term
for 'animal' was deer, which became restricted to the animal as the main target
of hunting in contrast with the general animal. This is indeed quite common in
semantic differentiation: the old term takes on a special restricted meaning and
a new term becomes the normal unmarked one (§ 5.15). The Savoyard dialect
borrowed the words pere 'father' and mere 'mother' from Standard French,
and these clashed with the old p(m! and mare. Again differentiation took place:
the old terms became restricted to cattle; that is, they became technical, profes-
sional terms.
Case G is the starting point of ellipsis, which is simply the loss of one of the
formal constituents, 1\ > 1. Either the attribute or the head can be omitted
+
(swimming pool -r pool vs. drice-in theater -r drive-in and ne ... pas -r pas).
Here belong, also, those compounds that become fused together rather than
Literal Transferred 'Native' Borrowed

meaning meaning meaning meaning
A. metaphor
metonymy
Form Form
'off' 'of'
'firm' 'swiftly'
('precipice') ('trick') 'modest' 'shameful'
('flying mammal') ('baseball stick') 'attacking tower' 'bell tower'
etymology
Form Form
Meaning Meaning Meaning
swift fast shade shadow drive-in theater

answer reply deus divi swimming pool
help aid cow kine pas
(pare) (pere)
(deer) (animal)
FIGURE 7-4. Elaboration in the meaning-form links as a basis for simplifi-
cation and semantic change.
dropping one part, for example, hliiford > lord, hussy, shepherd (see § 5.15).
These have to be learned as single signs; in other words, a motivated relation
1\ has yielded I, one symbol.
+
In polysemy (case C), meaning is the trigger of change, contrary to F. Depend-
ing on the different grammatical categories, the same form becomes differen-
tiated or leveled (see § 5.14), that is, V > 1. I or I· Thus the more emphatic
SEMANTIC .CHANGE 145
adverbs retain forms like thorough and off, whereas the less stressed prepositions
yield through and of (compare further convey-convoy, clothes-cloths, costume-
custom, conduct-conduit, alternate-alternative, masterful-masterly, and so on,
and similar cases in other languages, e.g., Swedish kliidning 'clothing'-kliinning
'woman's dress' and Latin religens and religiosus, both originally 'pious', in
religentem esse oportet, re/igiosum nefiis 'It is proper to be religious, wrong to be
superstitious'). Latin homo/ hominem yields both French on 'one' and homme
'man'. On the other hand, if a variant borrows its meaning from a different
category, we get V > I as in the case ofjast with its meaning 'rapid' borrowed
from the adverb, where it had developed creating elaboration of the type V
(ignoring here relics of the original, and derivatives like fasten; § 7.7). We have
already seen that this kind of borrowing from within is a type of analogy(§ 5.18).
Here, borrowing leads to simplification, in case B, to elaboration. The reason
is the different basis of simplification; in C, it is agreement (correspondence,
iconicity) within one and the same grammar, and in Bit is agreement between
two different grammars (languages), that is, cultural influence rather than purely
linguistic (compare spelling changes,§ 2.15).
Sometimes the split occurs in writing only, for example, flowerjjlour, born/
borne, metal/mettle, French dessein 'design, purpose' (God) vs. dessin 'design,
drawing' (artist), German Mann 'man' vs. man 'one', which also are different
in stress (compare French hommefon). This is one indication of the importance
of writing in communication, and the parallelism of changes in writing to those
in language.
When the phonetic shape of a morpheme leads to a new meaning (case D),
the innovation is likely to survive, since it increases iconicity. When the old
meaning vanishes, the situation is again simplified as V > 1. And this is the
configuration also in metaphor and metonymy (A), when their literal interpreta-
tion is lost and the transferred meaning becomes the normal unmarked one.
This process is called fading, and it occurs with all figures of speech (e.g.,
awfully nice, ne ... pas). Repetition itself is not enough for fading, because in
certain semantic spheres metaphors may stay alive. This has, in general, been
true of Western religious metaphors. The Latin metaphor pastor 'shepherd'
for the head of the congregation ('herd') has faded outside Latin and I tali an,
but, in all languages, the metaphor of a shepherd and sheep lives on. In com-
munication without emotional overtones, metaphors lose their association
with the primary meaning more easily if the referents do not normally have
emotive value for the speakers. As long as both meanings are present, the meta-
phor has both cognitive and emotive value. If the metaphor does not catch on,
there is really no change, but if it does, and this leads to the disuse of the original
meaning, only the marked reading remains. But a marked value without a
corresponding unmarked one is not possible, and hence the remaining connection
becomes the normal one. A metaphor for a weeping person was maudlin (Magda-
lene, because she was often depicted in that state). When this extralinguistic
connection was lost, maudlin became a normal adjective meaning 'weeping,
foolish, sentimental'. This is also how euphemisms tend to become the normal
symbols for the referent, and thus necessitate new euphemisms, for example,
Swedish ulv 'wolf'__,.. varg 'outlaw'__,.. graben 'grey-foot'. A new euphemism
could occur when the old metaphor or metonym had faded and become the
normal sign for 'wolf'. In Old English, the antecedent of wanton meant 'undisci-
plined, unruly' and the word was euphemistically used for 'lascivious, lewd',
which, indeed, became one of the habitual meanings of the word. Different
social layers handle euphemisms quite differently. In high style, a euphemism
can remain as such (e.g., outhouse), whereas in low style it easily becomes the
normal word for the referent; then it has to be avoided as a vulgarism even by
the higher circles (in favor of toilet, restroom, and so on).
All the cases show that fading is simplification in the meaning-form relations.
It is a shortcut between form and meaning in the colligation of the linguistic
sign. It is a by-product of the tendency 'one meaning, one form'.
The mechanisms presented here represent only the very basic core of semantic
change. The subject is enormous if all the possible distinctions are drawn. It
is easy to see why semantic change is so uncertain and unpredictable. Every
utterance can act as a metaphor in the right situation. All the faded figures of
speech can enter new living ones, which in their turn may again fade, and so
on. Thus pioneer meant originally 'foot soldier ' , whose task it was to clear the
terrain for the more prestigious troops. It was applied metaphorically to the
forerunners of colonialization and civilization, which is now the basic meaning
in English (but, in Russian, 'member of the communist youth organization').
A further metaphor, such as pioneer in linguistics, could therefore spring up.
Semantic change takes place in terms of the total cultural situation. Isolated
words do not change their meanings (unless they are so isolated that reanalysis
becomes easy), but words in clear syntactic contexts in sentences and the relation
of these sentences to the physical environment are often decisive. The diagrams
(Figure 7-4) emphasized again the similarity of semantic change to analogical
change (or rule change) (§§ 5.14, 6.19, 6.23). Both are different ends of one
and the same force, the adaptive power of language to meet the needs of com-
munication. Analogy and the rules of the grammar are exactly those mechanisms
that allow for metaphor, and so on, when the need arises. And the tendency
toward 'one meaning, one form' restores balance when either the formal or
semantic marking becomes highly loaded. Change is a function of language
as a system of communication; analogy and rules are the mechanism for it
but not the driving force.
[7.10 Semantic Shifts] Because linguistic units are not isolated, any
change in one item may lead to changes in other items within the same semantic
sphere (e.g., jaw used to mean 'cheek' and cheek meant 'jaw'). Such shifts
may be so regular and far-reaching that they look like shifts in the sound systems.
One of the best cases reported comes from Latin legal terminology. In the older
period, we have the following terms: damnum 'legal obligation, trust', noxia
'damage', culpa 'guilt', casus 'negligence', and fortuna 'chance'. In the later
period, the form- meaning links have shifted one notch:
SEMANTIC CHANGE 147
'trust' 'damage' 'guilt' 'negligence' 'chance'

--Older
-----Later
l. . . ,. . . . . l. . . . . . . . L. . . . . . . 1. ,. . . . . . --l. . . . . . .
damnum noxia culpa casus fortuna
The semantic system as such has not changed much, only the form-meaning
pairings.
[7.11 Laws of Semantic Change] It has not been possible to formulate

truly general laws of semantic change, because the latter is often so intimately
bound with the historical events (fiasco!). This is a general difficulty with history
(§ 1.24). There are, however, universal tendencies. Aside from the general
anthropocentric way of looking at the world and of making metaphors, which
is common to all mankind (see§ 1.15), there are also other parallel developments.
One of the most interesting cases is Stern's study of English adverbs meaning
'rapidly', which all (some twenty-five of them) develop the meaning' immediately'
before 1300. The development has three stages, illustrated by the following
examples: (1) He wrote quickly; (2) When the king saw him, he quickly rode up
to him; and (3) Quickly afterward he carried it off In ( 1), the verb is imperfective
and the adverb means 'rapidly' (speed in space); in (3), the verb is punctual
and the adverb is 'immediately' (speed in time); and (2) the verb is ambiguous,
because it can be taken as action in progress or the action as a punctual unit.
The reverse development 'immediately' > 'rapidly' does not occur.
Similar cases can be found in fairly well known semantic systems. But certain
metaphors and metonyms are also widespread all over the world. The sun is
often called day's eye, or sun gives 'day' and moon gives 'month'. Language is
often named after the tongue; that is, man has always given preference to the
speaker, and this has been repeated by modern linguists. NO' language seems to
have made a metonyrn ear for 'language'. The mouth seems to be the dominant
organ; that is, its activity is the most visible one (compare the counting of
beads), because, for all appearances, the brain and the ears do not do anything
(compare, also, German Mundart 'dialect', i.e., 'mouth-fashion'). It is also
very common to name one's own language 'language' and a foreign or neigh-
boring language 'nonlanguage' or the like. The Austro-Bavarian dialect of
Sauris in the Carnian Alps is called tails 'German' or inzara spro·xe 'our
language'. Cheyenne is from Sioux for 'to speak unintelligibly or in a foreign
language'. The Russian word nemec 'German' is a derivative from a word for
'mute'. But in semantic change the relation can hold in the reverse order as
well, for example, Russianjazycnik 'heathen' (having a language [of his own])
and American Finnish kielinen 'English-speaking' (provided with language),
in which particular sociolinguistic factors are responsible for the formations.
The concept of property is also fairly universal, and it often happens that
words denoting 'cattle' come to mean 'money', and vice versa. In North
America, and apparently also Finland, the development from 'fur' to 'money' is
attested.
In short, the universal "laws" of semantic change are based on the figures
of speech in all languages (the same is true of other classifications to follow
below). In some cases, an item has obvious attributes after which it can be
called; for example, birds can be noted for eggs and flying. And, indeed, they
are rather commonly named after one or the other in the languages of the world.
German Vogel and English fo wl derive from 'fly/wing', although the latter is
no longer connected with flying; compare Finnish lintu 'bird' with lentiiii 'to
fly', and the Sanskrit words for bird a!Jrjaja 'egg-born' and dvija ' twice-born',
which refer beautifully to eggs.
[7.12 Classification of Semantic Change According to Range and Evaluation]

It has been customary to classify semantic changes quantitatively according to
their ranges, that is, extension and restriction. This is exactly what we saw with
analogy and rules. It is another variant of labeling before-after relations and
does not explain anything; it just states a fact. Restriction is the more common
direction, since everyday life is directed toward the concrete. Thus deer has
changed from 'animal' to a particular kind of animal, hound from 'dog' to a
particular kind of dog, and fowl from 'bird' to domesticated edible birds
(German Tier, Hund, and Vogel retain the original meanings). English starve
is a particular way of dying in comparison with its German cognate sterben
'to die', and so on. Semantic extension is rarer, but still easy to find (e.g., Latin
paniirium 'bread basket' > French panier 'basket ', and target 'small round
shield, shield-like device for shooting practice ' now has a much wider range).
Similarly, batch which meant loaves baked at the same time, now means any
set that goes together (this is generally true of faded metaphors). The last two
changes can also be classified as a change from concrete to abstract meaning.
One axis of classification is evaluation, that is, either pejorative or meliorative
developments. Latin villiinus 'inhabitant of a farm' gives English villein 'serf'
and villain, both lower in value than the original term. English knave meant
'boy, servant' (German Knabe) and was thus higher than the modern meaning.
The reverse happened in knight, also originally 'servant' (German Knecht),
and the melioration occurred during the age of chivalry when horse-related
activities became prestigious (compare marshal from 'horse servant'). A word
meaning 'exile' has given both English wretch and German Recke 'warrior,
hero ', with opposite developments in the two languages. Hungarian szemreluinyas
'reproach' meant once literally 'vomiting on the eyes', and Low German
Hunsvott 'rascal' is still, formally, the original 'dog's cunt'.
The value of tabulating restrictions, extensions, pejorations, and so on, is
rather limited. All they show is that figures of speech do, in fact, fade and that
different indexical collocations can lead to different directions; for example,
exile meant both misery and daring deeds of war and caitif.f'a mean, cowardly
person' is the same word as captive. In this semantic area of Medieval society
and warfare belongs also vassalage, originally 'the state of being a vassal to
somebody'. Inferiority of status in relation to the overlord led to a meaning
'servitude, bondage', but bravery in such service also to the now obsolete
SEMANTIC CHANGE 149
meaning, 'valorous deeds of war'. German follows the development of English

wretch in £/end 'misery', which originally meant 'foreign country, exile'. The
"cultural" context is obvious ; what is heroic to the doer can be criminal to
the sufferer; that is, different parties look at the same event differently. This is
the basic fact in the development of occupational jargons, for example. Words
denoting women often go down in evaluation. We have already seen housewife >
hussy. German Dirne meant originally 'virgin'; in the literary language, it is
now 'whore', although in dialects, just 'country girl'. French fille can mean,
depending on the context, 'daughter',' girl', or 'prostitute'. Much more seldom
is there melioration in this area, but even here one can note that the Swiss
German (Kiissnacht) word for 'whore', huore, could, at least around 1956, be
used quite generally, for example, by children for their mother, without bad
connotation. Once more we see that the meaning developments remain in a
clear semantic field, that is, women in their different contexts. It would again
be absurd to posit the rule change as occurring first; that is," change the colliga-
tion Dirne 'virgin' to Dirne 'whore', whereby those women not on their guard
would lose their virtue." The total context leads to an abrupt new interpre-
tation.
What classification of this kind shows is the universality of the total cultural
and historical contexts in shaping linguistic change. Lists on these lines may also
be helpful for comparatists when there is doubt about a naturalness of a par-
ticular semantic leap that has to be assumed.
(7.13 Grammaticalization and Lexicalization] The distinction between

grammar and lexicon is a well-established one, although the exact border is
not clearcut. In fact, traditionally, one treats these areas in separate volumes,
with some overlapping. Lexicon corresponds to the symbolic sign aspects,
grammar to the iconic ones, that is, rules. Restriction of the semantic range of
a word may lead to a complete loss of lexical meaning. The inflectional suffixes
of agglutinative languages are often independent words that have been gram-
maticalized. A Hungarian noun bel 'guts, core' (the inside) gave, in its lative
case, bele, be!e, compounds like vilagbele 'into the world' in Old Hungarian.
In Modern Hungarian, this has been shortened into be, ba, and it acts as a mere
case ending, vilagba. A Baltic Finnic inflected noun *keroa-l!a 'at a turn, on
time of', used with genitive attributes like koira-n kera!!a (Finnish) 'with the
dog', has yielded pure comitatives in the Eastern dialects, with a shortened
form ke (compare the Hungarian): Karelian vel/e-1}-ke 'with the brother',
Lude vere-1}-ke 'with blood', and Veps kirvhe-1}-ke 'with the ax' (the hyphens
separate the original genitive ending). Note that in these examples the original
head and attribute have switched places, because the head has become a mere
appendix to the attribute, which retains its lexical meaning. There are many other
clear cases in Finno-Ugric; for example, Finnish kohta 'place, spot', in the
adessive kohdalla 'on the place', and talon kohdalla 'on the spot of the house'
becomes just 'at the house', and kohdalla is now a postposition with the earlier
genitive attribute talon as its head. Here semantic fading produces a similar
switch to the one caused by sound change and reinterpretation(§ 5.17). Indeed,
Old English compounds with had 'state, quality' and lie 'body, form' give the
suffixes -hoodf-head and -ly (motherhood, tenderly, and so on). In Finnish, a
similar noun-forming suffix develops from the word vuosi 'year' > -uus;
compare uusi vuosi 'new year' vs. uut-uus 'novelty'. The French counterpart to
English -ly, -ment, was, in Latin, the nominal head; for example, dulce mente
'with a sweet mind' > doucement, and thus etymologically identical to ment
'mind'. Spanish still retains independent accent on the adjective, as in rdpida-
mente 'rapidly', although no space is written. German Drittel '3rd part' and
Viertel 'quarter, fourth part' contain a variant of Teil 'part'.
All this is quite parallel to the grammaticalization of the emphatic attributes
of the French negative. Forms that go together habitually become reinterpreted
as a unit, and semantics and forms adjust to the situation. Free nouns become
adverbs, and adverbs become affixes, prepositions, and postpositions, as well
as conjunctions. This is how grammatical morphemes often originate. We have
already seen the development of adverbs from the formal side (§§ 4.24-4.27,
5.7, 5.15), but even then semantics had to be considered as we are now consider-
ing form (belf-be, kerallaf-ke, /ikef-ly, Teilf-tel, vuosif-uus). In other words,
we see that sound change, analogy, and semantic change represent a whole,
which must be split up only for expository purposes (see Figure 9-1). And
syntactic change, also, forms a part of the whole-as a result of these other
changes; it is not an independent mechanism (see§ 19.5).
In Indo-European languages noun stem-forming suffixes rarely have any
clear meaning. But when inflectional endings are apocopated, their meaning
sometimes is reassigned to the (originally meaningless) stem formant that
remains. Thus PIE *ukwse 'ox' (nom. sg.) and *ukwsenes 'oxen' (nom. pl.) are
typical en-stems: *ukwsen- is the stem, and *-es is the ending for the nominative
plural. These forms appear in Old English as oxa, yxen and Old High German
as ohso, ohsen; the nominative singular without -n is an ancient form, but the
cases have disappeared from the ends of the other forms, leaving the -en to be
reinterpreted as a case or number marker (English ox, oxen shows a minor
adjustment of the vocalism-yxen would have given *ixen-but German Ochs,
Ochsen is quite regular). This also happened in the German weak feminines
like Kirche, Kirche-n 'church', where the bare stem (neutral with respect to
number) still occurs in compounds like Kirche-n-spiel 'parish'. In the same way,
the German plural ending -er is an originals-stem (as in Latin gen-usfgen-er-is,
N.B., by both Latin rhotacism and Verner's laws > r); and the Russian genitive
plural -ov represents the Indo-European u-stem from which the original Proto-
Indo-European genitive ending had been lost (see § 9.13). These cases are just
regrammaticalizations. In English, there is a tendency to reinterpret final -s fz/
as 'plural', especially if the meaning supports this. Thus cherry+- OF cerise,
where the mass noun was obviously plural ('inany berries'), and ME pese,
pees__,. pea, where the old form pease still lives on in certain dialects and archaic
contexts (e.g., nursery rhyme pease porridge). The result in all these cases is a
shift in morpheme boundary along the chain of sound units.
SEMANTIC CHANGE 151
Actually, the development of adverbs from nouns is also a case of lexicaliza-

tion. When an adverb splits off from a noun, it has to be learned separately
and is thus a new lexical item. Whenever a linguistic form falls outside the
productive rules of grammar it becomes lexicalized. We have seen examples of
this in ellipsis (drive-in) and shortening (bus, bil) and in loss of motivation in
general. Often compounds go their own way (e.g., lord and hussy, which have
become lexicalized), whereas the simplex parts remain intact and can still
enter productive (motivated) compounds: loaf warden and housewife. On the
other hand, compounds may retain the original meaning as in nutmeat, sweatmeat
('food'). These are now lexicalized units quite different from horse meat,
dog meat ('flesh'), and so on, which display the productive meaning. Similar
relics are Holy Ghost ('spirit'), widow's weeds ('clothes'), and fishwife ('woman
who sells fish') . The reason semantic change seems to go so haphazardly in all
directions is that there are more semantic environments than phonetic environ-
ments in sound change. Lexicalized compounds can, of course, enter productive
compounds, and so on. And change always occurs in a concrete environment.
One form of lexicalization is particularly clear in English, where many
common suffixes or end parts of Greek-based compounds have become inde-
pendent words (as in bus). Although this is not very general, one can note the
following cases, some of them rather literary or technical: ism, ology, anomy,
ocrasy, ade (lemonade), itis (bronchitis), and also, from native materials, teen
(teen-ager). Other languages also show this phenomenon, but we shall leave
the subject with these examples.
Deeper syntactic reinterpretation also leads to lexicalization. We have already
seen cases of the development of adverbs from inflected nouns. Adverbs may
then further shift and become conjunctions. In other words, we have different
degrees of fading. Conjunctions develop often from pronouns, for example,
I think that; You come tomorrow. 'I think this/that. You come tomorrow',
German Ich vermute das; Du kommst (the odd English represents here the typical
early Indo-European situation). The two coordinated sentences merge together,
and the pronominal element fades and joins the following sentence, giving
subordination I think that you come tomorrow. and Ich vermute, dass du kommst.
Fading meant a shift in the syntactic boundary; and note the difference in
German orthography, which was introduced on the principles discussed earlier.
Finnish follows this same pattern: Mina luulen etta. Sina tulet 'I think thus.
You come'. > Mina luulen, etta sina tulet 'I think that you come'. Thus
conjunctions are often very intimately bound with pronouns, or other adverbs
(compare while§ 4.25; Wait while I do it!).
We have seen how semantic change can also be due to reinterpretation. Here
the speakers play a role, as, in metaphor and so on, it is the speaker who first
perceives a similarity between two things and then uses his analysis deductively
in forming his figure of speech. Perception is recognition of qualities and rela-
tions. The hearer may not always · completely understand such figures and
requires further clarification. The most important message of this chapter, which
can hardly do justice to the enormous topic, is that the main forces that operate
in semantic change are iconic and indexical, exactly the same ones that operated
in analogy and rules, as well as in the development of the writing systems.
These are the forces of change in historical linguistics. Culture and society are
particularly clear in this respect, because the referents have so many connections
and similarities of function, and so on (see§ 9.16f.).
We have now seen that on all levels of grammar we have iconicity, part of
which is known under the term motivation. Onomatopoeia show phonetic
iconicity, and metaphors show semantic iconicity. The former show the nature
of images, the latter that of diagrams, exactly like analogy. Grammatical or
morphological iconicity resides in the rules of a grammar, for example, in the
motivated compounds like steam engine, raincoat, and armchair, which all show
indexical connections in addition; that is, steam is the energy for the engine, the
coat is against rain, and the chair has arms (itself a metaphor) (see Figure 1-6).
(7.14 The Role of History] The accidental nature of history and its
influence on language (semantic change) cannot be overstressed. Etymological
research has discovered many semantic leaps just by the availability of accidental
historical knowledge. Although the case of fiasco was chosen as a possible ex-
ample, it, of course, is not conclusive. But there are many others, although
perhaps not of such stark character. In 1956, in a Finnish army unit, one of the
women kitchen workers was known as Risteilija 'Cruiser'. Such a nickname
is metaphorical, as nicknames and names often are (if they are not indexical,
e.g., son of ... , names after the trade of the person, after individual physical
characteristics, which is also iconic, and so on). As the town had navy units, the
most obvious conclusion would have been that her promiscuous behavior had
been labeled by a direct metaphor from the naval vessel. But closer familiarity
with the total "cultural" situation proves that the assumption would be false.
Mess-hall tables had a bowl where one could deposit potato peels, bones, and
so on. This bowl cruised regularly between the eaters and was known as risteilija
'cruiser'. The nickname was a second metaphor based on this garbage bowl! In
another example, at the time of the first atom explosion on the atoll of Bikini, a
contemporary bathing suit was metaphorically named after it, that is, something
that has startling effects, leaves very little cloth there, lays things bare, or the like.
When, in the mid-1960s, the topless fashion set in, the word bikini was reinter-
preted as having the same bi- as, for example, binoculars, because the item did,
in fact, consist of two pieces (compare formation § 5.5), and the newcomer
could be named a monokini. It is perfectly irrelevant that bi- is originally Latin
and mono- Greek. This is how metaphors and other analogical changes combine
and pile up, when language adapts to the needs of communication. After the
passage of a few thousand years many such steps will necessarily always remain
beyond our grasp. Current history is being recorded in more detail than in the
past, so future etymologists will have it easier on this score.
(7.15 Semantic Change and Speech Production] We saw that both sound
change and analogy were intimately connected with speech synthesis. Change is
SEMANTIC CHANGE 153
a function of language use. In phonology, speaking means variation, which be-
comes socially interpreted, and, in social interplay, change results. Analogy is
based on the mechanism of the very rules of grammar. Change results when the
rules win over tradition (symbolic aspects). Semantic change has shown all this
in a much clearer profile, because the role of society and history is unmistakable.
The phenomena of culture, in general, elicit various responses to nomination,
for example, metaphor, metonymy, or other figures of speech, and, as a result,
synchronic variation increases. This variation is the basis of semantic change,
when fading in the marked values takes place. Fading is, of course, loss of
stylistic marking, style to be understood in its widest sense and not as literary
style only. Change is always a result of variation and speech production. A
language that is not used does not change.
Semantic change can be as abrupt mentally as other changes. The cultural
environment, of course, shows smooth gradience between situations and objects
(referents), but the semantic reinterpretation can be abrupt. It would be difficult
to imagine a gradual change from' prayer' to' small ball'. There was a contiguity
in the physical situation only. Characteristically, semantic change is gradual
for the speaker or the innovator, for example, in the formation of metaphors.
The shifts can be very small indeed. But the hearer may drastically reinterpret
such metaphors, and, in any case, the diachronic correspondences appear to
witness abrupt changes (see § 6.22). This exemplifies the two mechanisms of
change that a natural human language can undergo: evolution (more frequent)
and mutation. In contrast, artificial languages are subject to mutation only.
REFERENCES
General: Breal 1964, G. Stern 1931, Ogden and Richards 1923, Thorndike
1947, Ullmann 1959, 1962, S0rensen 1967, Leumann 1927, Sperber 1930,
Meisinger 1932, Ohman 1951, Kronasser 1952, Graur (ed.) 2.343-714; 7.2
Coseriu 1964, Hjelmslev 1963, Wiegand 1970; 7.3 Breal 1964, Shands 1970;
7.4 G. Stern 1931; 7.6 Tauli 1968; 7.8 G. Stern 1931, Sohngen 1962, Todorov
1967, Lausberg 1967, Lanham 1969, B. Campbell 1969, Reddy 1969; 7.9
Menner 1936, 1945; 7.10 Oertel 1901; 7.13 Tauli 1956, Ullmann 1962, E.
Itkonen 1966, Szemerenyi 1968, Stein 1970.
CHAPTER 8
EXTERNAL CHANGE: BORROWING
Borrowing reflects contacts between languages and cultures

and is thus of importance for historians and anthropologists.
Its mechanism, however, is highly diagrammatic, as in
any other kind of linguistic change.
[8.1 Relation of Borrowing to Other Mechanisms of Change] Various

aspects of borrowing have already been referred to in the preceding chapters,
for example, speiiing speiling, in which a word borrows its speiling (or part of
it) from another word (§§ 2.6, 2.15, 2.16), and hypercorrection, where the
borrowing dialect goes beyond the model (§§ 3.3, 5.3), that is, the borrowed
feature goes beyond its original range. This was also true of analogy as borrowing
from within (§ 5.18), because, here, an element expands its distribution within
one and the same grammar. Then, of course, loan translation showed semantic
borrowing, in connection with an analogical situation (§§ 7.7, 7.9). Borrowing
is not a change all by itself, as the term 'external change' might suggest. It is
intimately tied to other mechanisms of change, one of which is analogy, as
mentioned. In fact, at some point, the difference between inheritance and borrow-
ing disappears, since one might as well say that language learning is borrowing
it from those who know it. The same is true of dialect borrowing, which indeed
can result in sound change. However, one usually speaks of borrowing only
when the item borrowed crosses a more noticeable barrier. If the transmission
occurs within the same language, one usually speaks of inheritance and sound
change. Also, if one lifts an item from an earlier stage of the language, one calls
it an archaism, but if it is early enough, it is a regular loan. Thus if Modern
French borrows a word from Latin, it is regarded as a loan, but if it borrows
from seventeenth-century French, it is an archaism. But dialect borrowing
restricted to vocabulary items means loans, for example, Savoyard pere and
mere from Standard French (§ 7.9). If, ultimately, the pronunciation of a
neighboring dialect is adopted in toto, sound change results. The spread of any
feature is borrowing as long as it is happening. Curiously enough, learning and
adopting another dialect may be called borrowing, but not learning another
language. However, if foreign language learning is typical of the whole speech
community, one speaks of bilingualism, and of adstrata, when learning is not
perfect(§ 8.16).
Thus borrowing is a notion that fuses into other mechanisms of change, and
it competes with the figures of speech as an important source of new nomination.
154
EXTERNAL CHANGE: BORROWING 155
[8.2] Loans are the easiest to observe in vocabulary if they represent

tangible objects, tools, utensils, and ornaments. Such items diffuse easily from
culture to culture. Any new item necessitates new nomination, which can be
met by loan translation (loanshift), metaphor, or straightforward borrowing.
The necessity for new nomination is often referred to as the need-filling motive.
Cultural items and notions also diffuse, but generally the more abstract the
element is, the more difficult is the transfer. For concrete items, English has
borrowed freely, for example, gnu, aardvark, and sputnik, whereas borrowed
abstract terms are more limited, although English has borrowed them with
less constraint than many other languages (e.g., tabu, Weltanschauung, and
hubris). Of course, there is less need for abstract items in any language.
The need-filling motive is just one reason for borrowing; an equally important
motivation is prestige. Of course, prestige is itself a rather elusive notion, although
it is clearly the driving force in social interaction and linguistic change. As one
dialect (whether social or regional) may be regarded prestigious compared to
others, so certain foreign languages may exert the same influence. This happens
often if the ruling class speaks a different language from the subjects, or if the
speakers of a foreign language represent a culture that is being imitated. The
Baltic Finnic tribes must have lived in rather close symbiosis with the Baltic
tribes, and a little later with the Germanic ones. Hundreds ofloans were adopted,
among them items for which there was clearly no other motivation than the
prestige factor. Even if such a word as Finnish morsian 'bride' might reflect new
wedding customs, there is hardly any such reason for tytiir 'daughter', sisar
'sister', and iiiti 'mother' (Germanic), as well as hammas 'tooth', napa 'navel',
and kaula 'neck', reisi 'thigh', and karva 'fur, body hair'. It would be ridiculous
to maintain that Finnic speakers did not have native, inherited names for
female relatives and body parts. If "prestige" itself is not the right term, then
the examples indicate very close cultural contacts and intermarriage.
[8.3] Often borrowing increases synchronic variation, which solidifies

into stylistic contrasts at least (see§ 7.9). Such style contrasts embrace not only
snobbish overtones, as in the so-called inkhorn terms of English, but also
derogatory connotations. The Finnish word koni 'jade, nag' is originally a
Slavic word for 'horse', and the Russian dialectal varza 'a bad or very young
stallion' is borrowed from Finnish varsa 'foal'. Similar borrowing, both ways,
occurs at many language boundaries, for example at the German-Czech one.
Foreign words are often felt to be descriptive/suggestive, even if they are not
used with negative or snobbish overtones. Thus at the Finnish-Russian bound-
ary, Russian has Finnish names for many tools, activities, and agricultural
products, and vice versa, without necessarily having borrowed accompanying
techniques.
In short, loanwords can be stylistically neutral or marked (high style, low
style, intense forms, and so on). In Finnish, the Germanic word huusi (house)
is a "low" or colloquial word for 'outhouse' with respect to ulkohuone 'out-
chamber' or various circumlocutions, and the same is true of pottu vs. yoastia
'night bowl', that is, 'chamber pot'. Similarly, ruuma (+-room) is a technical
term for the section of the stable where dung is collected. On the other hand,
pissa is the "nice" children's word for 'urine', with the native kusi having very
vulgar overtones.
[8.4 The Retailoring of Loans] Loanwords may be taken over with the
foreign morphemes unchanged, as in the above examples. Sometimes, part of
the word, especially if it is a compound or derivative or interpreted as such,
is substituted for by a corresponding morpheme from the borrowing language.
An often quoted example is the Pennsylvania Dutch substitution of the native
-ig for English -y, for example, bassig 'bossy ', fonnig 'funny', and tricksig
'tricky'. American Lithuanian, also, substitutes native suffixes, as in bossis
'boss ' ,Joniskas 'funny', and dotinas 'dirty'. This type can gradually grade into
a loanshift, for example, American Finnish lukkoruuma 'locker room', formally
a compound of lukko 'lock' and ruuma 'ship's hold' (cf. above in nonnautical
context). Both words are earlier Germanic loans in Finnish, but the new meaning
was triggered by the phonetic similarity to the English model (see § 7.7). The
scale and interrelationships between different types of borrowing can be repre-
sented roughly as in Figure 8-1. Sound substitution can range from zero to
Morphemic Morphemic Sound

importation substitution substitution
Loanwords + - ±
Loanblends + + ±
Loanshifts
(loan translations, - + -
semantic loans)
Pronunciation borrowing - - ±
Sound change - - ±
FIGURE 8-1. A table defining various types of borrowing through three
features. Note how the last row indicates that borrowing can blend into sound
change.
such a degree that the original model is no longer discernible to the uninitiated.
English loans in Japanese are usually standard examples (bus--+ basu, taxi--+
takushii, and baseball-+ beisuboru), but similar situations obtain elsewhere,
for example, English loans in Hawaiian: laiki 'rice', palaki 'brush', and Me/e
Kalikimaka 'Merry Christmas'. Considerable sound substitution has occurred
in the following American Finnish loans from English: runnata rilisteettiii 'to
run real estate', taippari 'diaper', and karpitsi 'garbage'. The amount of
sound substitution depends on the level of bilingualism (which is a prerequisite
for borrowing). In a prebilingual period substitution is heavy, but with succeed-
ing generations (as in the American immigrant situation) it becomes less and
less, and ultimately one switches to English altogether. Pronunciation borrowing
like /iy(y~r/ for fayo~r/ and /drens/ for /dans/ can be spotted when it is dependent
on particular words, but when a British English speaker switches completely
to the American pronunciation, he has borrowed the whole dialect (discarding
cases like lift-elevator, and so on). But even here there may be sound substitu-
tion; that is, the imitation is not perfect.
In some languages, phonetic substitution must be accompanied by inflectional
adjustment and gender alignment. Words ending in a consonant are given a
final vowel -i in Modern Finnish, as in posti 'mail', tulli 'customs', and jeeppi
'jeep'. In the last item, the long pp gradates in the inflection: the plural, for
example, is jeepit. An English plural may give the stem, for example, pointsi
'point', keksi 'cracker' (cakes), and American Finnish kukiiksia (partitive
plural) 'cookies'. Here the final /z/ of cookies was interpreted as /s/, which is
normal, and this further as an alternant of the -ks- stem, as in teos/teoksen (see
§ 6.14). Other immigrant loans show the same phenomenon, for example,
American Norwegian kars-er ' cars ' and American Italian pinozz-i 'peanuts'.
In these two, however, a native plural just overlays an English plural (compare
kine, and so on, §§ 5.4, 6.20, 6.21), whereas in kukiiksia there is a further stem
adaptation. As an extreme example, the Finnish word tituleerata 'to address
with a title' contains the original French infinitive ending as -eer-, then the
Swedish infinitive in -a-, and finally the Finnish infinitive in -ta. Such stratigraphy
tells part of the route the word has traveled.
These alignments are often impossible to predict though the language may
have set morphological classes where loanwords are accommodated. German
must assign one of its three genders to any loanword. Often the gender of the
lending language is retained, as in das Drama (Greek), die Mensa 'student
restaurant' (Latin), and die Chaise longue (French), but also das Chaiselongue.
Some other times, the gender of a native equivalent seems to prevail, as in
das Baby from English (das Kind), das Sofa from French (das Bett), and der
Smog from English (der Rauch 'smoke', der Nebel 'fog', der Dreck 'dirt'). But
why die Sauna from Finnish (against das Bad[ehaus]) and die Couch from English
(against das Bett, das Sofa)? In short, every alignment cannot be reasoned away,
and, anyway, such reasoning starts after the fact.
A striking example of substitution and adaptation is shown by Spanish loans
in Chiricahua (Apache), for example,jab6n ~ lu'ry6n 'soap', rico~ zi·go 'rich',
and loco ~ fo·go 'crazy'. Assignment of tones is obligatory in addition to the
various sound substitutions. Further, the distribution of sounds in Chiricahua is
changed, as i and I occurred only in medial and final position in native vocabu-
lary. Moreover, there are no adjectives of the Spanish type in Chiricahua, and
rico and loco were interpreted as third person verbs and equipped with paradigms
according to the native pattern of prefix and stem, for example (with partial
paradigms):
NI- · · · -CA HA-·. ·-CA LOANS

Sg I nsca· ha·sca lo·sgo zi·sgo
2 nca· hai1ca Mngo Zfngo
3 nca· ha·ca to·go :z;·go
'to be 'to burst 'to be 'to be
big' into tears' crazy' rich '
Similar things happen in other languages as well (see reanalysis § 5.5); for ex-
ample, English film fits into the Semitic triconsonantal pattern quite well, and
gets an Arabic plural 'aj/iim.
[8.5] Native speakers are aware of the distinctive features of their phonol-
ogy. Thus English doggerel and Mother Goose rhymes reflect the psychological
reality of componential features in phonology, witness nasality in a stitch in
time saves nine, one for my dame, and one for the little boy who lives in the lane,
or voiceless stops in Little Tommy Tucker sings for his supper (next : ... butter),
If the ocean was whisky and I was a duck, I'd go to the bottom and never come
up, and he catches fishes in other men's ditches, and so on. In sound substitution,
the borrowers apparently make a kind of distinctive feature analysis of the
foreign sounds and assign them to the closest native bundle. In oldest Germanic
loanwords, an f- is reflected by Baltic Finnic p- (§ 8.6), as [voiceless, labial].
There were no voiced stops in Finnic at that time. Later f is rendered by -hv-,
that is, [voiceless] = h and [labial, spirant] = v. Splitting a bundle of features
into two segments like that is not infrequent. French [i.i] was replaced by [u]
in English, but [u] gave a decomposite [iu] or [yii]. Similarly, Russian borrowings
render Baltic Finnic [ii] by [u], or more often with palatalization + [u], sysmii .-
s'uz'om [or s-] 'thicket'. And Russian [w] has a similar fate in Baltic Finnic, as
in mylo .- Karelian mujla 'soap'.
Attempts at using borrowing as a window to the psychological reality of
abstract phonology have not yielded valid universals. The above shows, however,
that in particular cases it may yield useful information. As other changes can
support abstract mechanisms, borrowing can be expected to do the same .
. [8.6 Criteria for the Direction of Borrowing] Sometimes an item occurs

m two neighboring unrelated languages without any certainty of the direction
of borrowing. A classical case has been Finnish laiva and Lithuanian laiva,
both 'ship'. There is no way of telling whether Baltic Finnic borrowed from
Baltic or vice versa, because the forms are isolated in the derivational morpho-
logies of both languages, although, generally, Baltic Finnic is on the receiving
end. Handbooks, on the whole, have taken both directions as equally probable,
or rather .that Baltic is the borrower. In a situation like this one, it may, of
course, turn out that both languages have borrowed the word from a third.
And closer scrutiny does, in fact, show that the origin must be Germanic *fiauja-
' ship' < *plowyo- ( > Greek ploion 'vessel'), which gives Old Norse fley, from
where the word was borrowed into Old English as jla!ge > ME fiey. The word
shows the same root as float. In Baltic Finnic, an expected sequence *lauja
metathesizes into laiva. Consequently, Baltic is indeed the borrower from
Baltic Finnic, which itself had borrowed this and many other navigational terms
from Germanic. The sound correspondence Germanic fl- : Baltic Finnic /-
leads us to phonological criteria for determining the direction of borrowing.
It was noted early that Baltic Finnic shares hundreds of words with Germanic.
Many scholars cherished the idea that such items had been borrowed from Baltic
Finnic into Germanic, with the assumption that much of Europe had had a
Finnic substratum. Here, however, the matter can be settled with a phonetic
criterion, namely, sound correspondences (written horizontally in Figure 8-2).
The table contains an English word where possible, that is, English and Finnish
represent their respective families. The direction of borrowing is decided quite
simply. One can predict the Finnish sound, given the Germanic one, but not
vice versa, and thus one has to choose the Germanic column as original. The
same kind of mapping relation will be important in comparative linguistics
(Part III), where the original roster of sounds is always chosen so that from it one
can predict all the outcomes in the various languages that are being used in the
reconstruction.
Another criterion for the direction of borrowing is morphological and gram-
matical. If a word occurs in two unrelated languages, and it is an unanalyzable
(English) Germanic I IBaltic Finnic (Finnish)

flat strand (C1)C2Cs Ca ranta lattia 'floor'
pound (Go)paida p p paita 'shirt' punta

beard ball b p pallo parta
Friday field f p pelto perjantai
turf token t t taika 'magic' turve 'peat'

(Go)paida field d t pel to paita
(Go)aipei death I> t tauti 'sickness' ~iiti 'mother'
kettle token k k taika kattila

gold garden g k kartano 'manor, kulta
yard'
heifer hen h k kana kauris 'goat'
FIGURE 8-2. Consonant correspondences between Germanic and Germanic
loans in Baltic Finnic. English stands in for Germanic, Finnish for Baltic
Finnic. The words are arranged symmetrically from the middle.
sign in one and a motivated compound or derivation in terms of the grammar

of the other, the situation is quite clear: it is a loan in the language where it is
unanalyzable, for example, English aardvark (Afrikaans' earth pig'), smorgasbord
(Swedish 'sandwich table'), and Finnish hunsvotti 'rascal ', which is a meta-
phorical compound in German (§ 7.12). Similarly, Finnish aurajatra 'plough'
is a loan in Finnish, because on the Indo-European side it is a derivative from
a verb 'to plough' (*ara-tro-, and so on). The languages can, of course, be
related as well. Slavic and Baltic share a word for 'hand', OCS rQka vs. Li
ranka, respectively. The word is isolated in Slavic, without other morphological
connections. In Baltic, however, it is a derivative of a verb, Lithuanian rii1kti
'to gather' and occurs in a compound paranka 'gleaning of ears of corn' as
well. Thus it is likely that the Baltic word meant originally 'gatherer, palm [of
hand]'. It seems that the word was consequently borrowed from Baltic into
Slavic. Of course, it is possible that folk etymology interferes with this principle.
Thus English sparrow grass is newer than asparagus, and it would be wrong to
say that German Sparge! 'asparagus' is borrowed from sparrow grass (see
§ 5.5).
Sometimes semantics tells us the direction of borrowing, even if we are not
able to understand morphological motivation in one language. Certain words
occur both in American English and in some Indian languages, as in wigwam,
moccasin, and squaw. Clearly, these are not motivated in English; but we do
not need that information from the other side, since the meanings 'Indian
house', 'Indian shoe', and 'Indian woman' decide the issue. The "objects"
belong integrally to Indian culture, and this telJs us that the words were borrowed
from there. But, of course, such cultural differences are not always available,
for example, between the groups speaking many American Indian languages
themselves.
[8.7 Borrowing As Evidence of Change and Earlier Stages] Once a form

has been transplanted from one language into another, it usualJy is no longer
influenced by its original source, although it can be (e.g., spelling spelJing-even
from beyond the original source, det > debt; § 2.15). Even if the entrance fee
in the form of sound substitution is high (e.g., brush to palaki), radiation from
the source language into various other languages records some phonetic detail.
And, of course, a source language can, on its part, be the receiver, and this
mutual borrowing will tell something about both languages. When languages
go down the stream of change, they throw clues to the shore, which the linguist
can interpret.
We saw above(§§ 4.4, 4.15) how Latin k > ts > sand k > ts > sin French.
The earliest stage is confirmed by words like Greek Kafsar and German Kaiser
(+--Caesar' emperor') and would thus be certain, even if some Romance dialects
had not preserved the k. Similarly, Latin celliirius gives German Keller 'cellar'.
Later, however, we get ce!la-?Zelle [ts-] 'cell ', and Ziisar 'Caesar', borrowed
apparently during the stage of affrication. The earliest French loans in English
retain the stage ts in words like chair and chase, and thus the change ts > sis
subsequent to this period. Newer loans, of course, have s as in chevron and

champagne. As in the above German examples, the" same" word can be borrowed
at different times; thus, for example, chief with ts is older than chef with s
(compare Charles with Charlotte or with Charlene). Similarly, the shapes jaunty,
genteel, and gentle betray three different borrowings from French, although
here the consonantism is rather constant dz-nt-(1) (compare saloon with salon,
liquor with liqueur, and so on). Characteristically, the meanings are different
also when the "same" sign has been borrowed twice; compare further Finnish
patja 'mattress' (Gothic badja-), which attests to a stage before umlaut. Later,
the same word was borrowed again, but after umlaut: peti 'bed' (with an
automatic -i at the end of newer loans). Now, even if Gothic badja- had not
been attested, Finnish would confirm the Germanic reconstruction *badja-.
This is what Finnish, in fact, often does (e.g., kuningas for 'king', for the recon-
structed *kuningaz, and rengas 'ring, loop' for a Pre-Germanic *hrengaz (before
the change eNC > iNC; see§§ 12.2, 13.2). In this way, loans can tell us much
about relative chronology and earlier shapes of items.
[8.8 The Effect of Borrowing on the Structure of Lexicon] New-coming

words generally change the preexisting semantic relationships, because complete
free variation with a previous word does not go on indefinitely (tendency toward
one meaning, one form). If the loanword ousts a previous word completely,
no semantic shifts need occur. We have seen already that very often an innova-
tion within a language renovates only the primary function of a form, leaving
the secondary functions on their own(§ 5.15). This is true of borrowing as well
(e.g., animal-deer, pere-pare [§ 7.9]). In these cases, of course, the semantic
fields change, if either the native or the new term becomes somehow stylistically
or semantically marked (Figure 8-3, where in the first two cases the loanword
assumed primary function; in the last two, the loanword is the marked term).
A B
Savoyard
English French Finnish Russian
animal pere hevonen losad'
vs.
FIGURE 8-3. Changes in semantic marking through borrowing. In A the old

term becomes the marked one. In B the borrowed term becomes the marked
one.
It is interesting that borrowing shares many of the characteristics of other

mechanisms of change, especially the liability of leaving secondary functions
alone. When Finnish adopted the Baltic word for 'tooth', the old word pii and
its derivatives remained untouched in metaphorical usages (the' teeth of a rake').
In this way, borrowing knocks the feet from under the metaphor, and "immedi-
ate" fading is the result. Pronunciation borrowing, too, can affect primary
function only (e.g., the Lithuanian word for 'snow' is expected to be *snaigas).
Extensive Slavic contacts led to a replacement of the native ai with the Slavic
'e = ie (OCS snegu > Russian sn'eg, Polish snieg) yielding sniegas. In some
derivatives, however, the old ai remained: snaig(u)te 'snow flake ', snaigyti 'to
snow a little', and [snaiga 'snow hanging from trees'. Of course, the derivatives
based on sniegas have ie.
Borrowing is one of the main factors behind changes in lexicons. In English,
its effects are enormous. Borrowing has contributed to the many stylistic levels
and it has led to a considerable loss of motivated compounds and derivatives
(as we shall see). Metaphors and metonyms strive for novelty. With time they
fade, necessitating new metaphors, and so on. Loans are not very different; :
they carry considerable stylistic loading but are subject to fading like other
mechanisms, thereby increasing synchronic variation. And the stock can be
replenished by new loans, and so on.
[8.9 Borrowing As Evidence of Cultural Contacts] In many documented

cases throughout the world, it is possible to observe borrowing situations that
take shape when a foreign upper class imports or imposes its way of life on
speakers of other languages. Of closest concern for English are the Norman
conquest and the subsequent centuries. The Normans represented what is
referred to as a "superior" culture. Among other things, " superior" means
the official grip of the Norman government, church, legal system, and various
aspects of social and economic life. Hundreds of loanwords were introduced
in these areas, among them
government and social order: baron, noble, dame, servant, government,
crown, state, reign, court, tax, subject, duke, manor, vassal.
ecclesiastical sphere: religion, sermon, homily, prayer, chapter, faith,
virtue, ordain, divine.
law: justice, crime, bar, suit, judge, attorney, inquest, verdict, bail,
sentence, prison, plead, pardon, tenant, heir.
social life: fashion, dinner, supper, victuals, venison, beef, salad, boil,
chair, towel, garner, marriage.
the arts and skills: art, music, painting, poet, prose, grammar, gender,
ointment, balm, poison, metal, mason, labor, tailor, powder.
These lists could be easily expanded to book length. Similar situations obtain
with Arabic loans in Persian, Turkish, and many African languages (including
even Spanish); Turkish loans in the Balkans; Nahuatl loans in the Mayan
languages; and Russian loans in Soviet Asia. Indeed, even Alaskan Eskimo
bears witness to Russian loans in the areas of food, housekeeping, clothes,
housing, techniques, domesticated animals, religion, politics, and intellectual
life in general. Especially well represented are all kinds of terms connected with
trade items. In all these situations we know from history that the loanwords
reflect what went on quite accurately.
[8.10] Thus grouping of loanwords into semantic spheres can give valuable
support for historical inferences even when no other documentation is available.
(Of course cross-language comparison must first establish which words are
loans.) Germanic loans in Finnish cluster into roughly the same areas as the
French ones in English:
government and social order: airut 'messenger', hal!ita 'to govern',
joulu 'Yule', kihla 'security', kuningas 'king', kunnia 'honor', laina
'loan', murha 'murder', rikas 'rich', ruhtinas 'prince', sakko 'fine',
tuomita 'to judge', kartano 'estate', raha 'money', lunnas 'ransom',
t•akoilla 'to spy', vuokra 'rent', and so on.
religion: peijaiset 'funeral banquet', siunata 'bless', taika 'magic',
hurskas 'pious', and so on.
tools and skills: kaira 'auger', naula 'nail', mitta 'measure', saha
'saw', lukko 'lock', and so on.
housing and housekeeping: !a to 'barn', lattia 'floor', leipi:i 'bread',
saippua 'soap', patja 'mattress', kattila 'kettle', tupa 'living room',
and so on.
A justified inference from all this is that the Baltic Finnic speakers apparently
absorbed a Germanic-speaking upper class, although, of course, borrowing
can take place without absorption of peoples. At least the other available
evidence, mainly archaeological, does not speak against this hypothesis but
rather supports it, in that there seem to have been Germanic trading posts in
the Baltic. In this way, assessment of loanwords is an important tool for anthro-
pology and history, as such words record cultural contacts.
[8.11] One can also derive certain indications about the geographical
position of a language family in relation to other families by plotting correspond-
ing borrowings. Thus, for Finno-Ugric, we have the situation given in Figure 8-4.
When this type of a table is used in connection with the family tree (§ 15.1,
Figure 15-1), many inferences can be made. The importance for considering
the subgrouping and the particular phonological shape of the words comes
out in the first two rows. All the languages have loans from Old Iranian and
Slavic, but they must be assigned to different depths in the tree. Old Iranian
loans go into the protolanguage, whereas Slavic loans generally enter each
individual language separately. The splits in the tree are clearly reflected in the
table; for example, Hungarian does not have early Germanic loans and Baltic
Finnic does not have Turkic ones. Both contacts were obviously made in
different locations after the split. Sometimes the exact passage is not clear,
164 HIST O RICAL LINGUISTICS: How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
l=i
Loans
I In ..d
·a"'d
d
·;;: "'
"§
<!) d
~
(II
~
.;::!
....
(II
~
0. "C
.... .... -~ .,_.
>.
(II
.,_.
>.
bJ)
From 0.
(II 0
Q)
..d
....
>. 0
d
;:l
ii: .....:l ~ u N > 0"' :::c:
Slavic in general + + + + + + + +
Old Iranian + + + + + + + +
Proto-Baltic + (+) ? - - - - -
Proto-Germanic + (+) ? - - - - -
Old Norse + + - - - - - -
Scandinavian in general + + - - - - - -
Old Chuvash - - - - - - - +
Chuvash - - - + (+) + - -
Volga and Irtych Turkic - - + + - + + -
Other Turkic - - - - - - - +
FIGURE 8-4. The sources of loans for the Finno-Ugric languages. [Reprinted
from Robert Austerlitz," L'Ouralien," Le /angage, Encyclopedie de la Ph!iade,
25 (Paris, 1968 © Editions Gallimard).]
e.g., there is doubt whether the Baltic and Germanic loans entered Lapp directly
or came through Baltic Finnic (the latter is more likely, perhaps).
[8.12 Internal Criteria for Borrowing] Dialect borrowing, such as

fgriyziyf for fgriysiy/ greasy or /rut/ for /ruwt/ root, are very difficult to spot if
the dialects are close. Because there is no clear boundary between dialect and
language, it is obvious that the same obtains between closely related languages.
In the following pairs
NATIVE WORDS shirt rear 'em yard whole

SCANDINAVIAN LOANS skirt raise them garden hale (or Northern)
certain phonological features betray the loans (sk-, -s-, th-, g-, -a- in these
words), because, otherwise, they are completely acclimatized in English. The
situation is completely different from the Latin and Greek loans (which norm" lly
carry technical meaning). Note the following short sample where in each group-
ing the radical parts come ultimately from the same Proto-Indo-European
root:
NATIVE tooth sooth-sayer three five ten

LATIN dent-ist essenc-e tri-nity quin-tet dec-imal
GREEK odont-ology ont-ology tri-ad penta-gon deca-de
punch (Hindi)
NATIVE hund-red foot sun know/can be
LATIN cent(i-grade) ped-al sol-ar i-gno-rant fu-ture
GREEK hect-ograph pod-iatrist heli-ocentric a-gno-stic phy-sical
ExTERNAL CHANGE: BoRROWING 165
NATIVE father mother brother dough kin

LATIN pater-nal mater-nal frater-nity fig-ure/fic-tion gen-itive
GREEK patr-iarchal metr-opolis phratr-y tich-odrome gen-otype
pal (Romany) (para)-dise gender
(Persian) (French)
NATIVE yoke naked quick (the q. and the dead)
LATIN junc-tion/con-jug-ate nude viv-id
GREEK zeugma gymn-astics bi-ology
yoga (Sanskrit)
NATIVE murd-er wolf feather
LATIN mort-al lup-ine pet-ition/pen
GREEK a-mbros-ia lyc-anthrope petr-ify/petr-ol
Sometimes one of the corresponding classical words is not cognate with the
whole set, or the English word is not, for example,
NATIVE tongue fish fire workjwroughtjwright

LATIN lingu-istics pisc-atorial [igni-tion] [labor]
GREEK [gloss-olalia] [ichthy-ology] pyr-omania org-an/en-erg-y
NATIVE queen/quean [horse] [engine ( < French)]
LATIN [femin-ist] vs. equ-ine machin-ation ( < Greek)
GREEK gynec-ology hippo(-potamus) mechan-ical
but it still takes part in the configurations and adds to the semantic fields of
English. When large-scale borrowing occurs between related languages, we
get regular sound correspondences between the items; note t- d- d (TOOTH, TEN,
FOOT, HUNDRED), th-t-t (TOOTH, THREE, FATHER, MOTHER), f-(p) - (p) (FOOT,
FATHER, FEATHER, FIRE, FISH), k - (g)-g (KNOW, QUEEN, YOKE, but see KIN with
affrication before e), b-f-(J) (BE, BROTHER), m-m-m (MOTHER), n-n-n (KIN),
r-r-r (FATHER, MOTHER), and so on (this of course clearly exemplifies Grimm's
law; §§ 4.9, 4. 10, 6.3). Such correspondences are curious in that, formally, they
are like morphophonemic alternation, but, psychologically, they need not be
connected at all, because there is no rule for the alternations. No clear environ-
ment for them can be specified (just try to write rules even for a simple case like
E-gyptfCopt-icJGyps-y!). Similar correspondences obtain in the Romance
languages through loans from Latin, for example, Spanish leche 'milk' vs.
lactar 'lactate ' , and noche 'night' vs. nocturno 'nocturnal' (ts-kt), or French
croire 'believe' vs. credible and loi 'law' vs. legal (wa-e +voiced stop). Such
situations originate easily when a language borrows from a literary norm of its
own past, for example, Old Church Slavic loans in Russian and Sanskrit loans
in Hindi. Scandinavian loans in English, Low German loans in Swedish and
High German, and Iranian loans in Armenian give the same configuration.
(8.13 The Notion of Correspondence in Linguistics] It will be useful to

make a detour into the notion of the correspondence. It is one of the central
concepts in linguistics and has been used throughout this book. In addition to
the sound-meaning correspondence (which is basic to a sign system like natural
language, as well as to its change, as we have seen) and the sound-writing
correspondence, transformational relations rest on similar correspondences.
The type shooting of the hunters corresponds to both the hunters shoot and the
hunters are shot. Since we can unambiguously map from the full sentences to
the nominal phrase, we take them as the basis of derivation. Such a notion was
familiar in Latin grammar; for example, the semantically ambiguous phrase
amor dei 'the love of God' was either the "subjective" genitive (from deus
am at' God loves') or the" objective" genitive (from deum am at' he loves God').
In these cases, one can then establish transformational direction exactly on the
same principle as borrowing direction. On the same principle, dialectal sound
correspondences could be mapped unambiguously one way but not the other
(e.g., from General American to Fox). In such cases it is the "richer" side that
is again more "original" (see§§ 14.5, 14.6, 21.22, 21.23, 22.11). The essence
of sound change was a correspondence between the sounds of the earlier and
later stages. The dialect correspondences, however, are psychologically real, as
is shown by hypercorrect formations (a type of analogy); and the morpho-
phonemic alternations that result from sound change are quite regular for a
long time, even if they ultimately split (e.g., bake/batch). Typically such native
splits occur between different parts of speech without marked semantics other
than archaic (see also§ 5.15).
The above sound correspondences are thus without statable environments,
and one cannot definitely predict their manifestations, (e.g., there is no Latin p
in the FIRE set and no Greek p in FISH, and so on). Still, such sound cor-
respondences always point to historical connections. If conditioning cannot be
found within one grammar, it means that we have interference between many
grammars, though in the form of lexical items only. The highly technical mean-
ings in these sets support this analysis. The whole array further reveals that
borrowing occurred between related languages. Situations like this are of great
interest because they seriously interfere with comparative work. Vocabulary
comes and goes and one cannot trust it in comparative studies; instead one
also requires sound correspondences in grammatical elements, although they can
also be borrowed, but not so easily. Note that if English had borrowed sub-
stantially from an unrelated language, no sound correspondences would have
resulted within English (just as, e.g., there are no obvious sound correspond-
ences between liver and hepatitis). But they would, of course, exist between
English and the original source (e.g., between English hepatitis and Greek hepar
'liver'). Given enough time, borrowing would not be so easily recoverable;
but if such similarities occurred chiefly in (technical) vocabulary, the likelihood
of borrowing would be great, as it always tends to be.
We have seen here that, in favorable cases, internal evidence can point to
borrowing, especially from a related language or languages. This can be shown
ExTERNAL CHANGE: BoRROWING
with sound correspondences without regular (stable) environments, in connec-

tion with semantics. But loanwords often do not comply with the rest of the
rules of the language and can be spotted accordingly. At the time when English
spirants alternated generally like knife/knives, sheath/sheaths [ejo], newcomers
like chief/chiefs and faith/faiths without such alternation stuck out of the grammar
(see§§ 4.2, 6.21, 10.8). Of course, borrowing can be proved in this case; but the
situation is typical of borrowing and would have invited the linguist's closer
scrutiny.
[8.14 Borrowing and Different Levels of Grammar] Sometimes, the

description of a language must recognize a special phonological layer of foreign
forms. The more recent loans in Modern Finnish (since about 1800) have
established four new phonemes: /b, g, s, f/. In addition, the distribution of the
earlier /d/ has been extended to initial position. The following pairs are kept
distinct in educated (standard) Finnish and in the speech of most young people:
/b/ Kuuban 'of Cuba' baari 'bar ' betoni 'concrete'
kuupan 'of a lampshade' paari 'bier' petoni 'my beast'
fg/ liiga 'league' goottiin 'into Gothic' Golgata 'Golgotha'
liika 'surplus' koottiin 'was gathered' kolkata 'knock out'
/8/ sakki 'chess' sekin 'of a check' passaan 'into a pasha'
sakki 'gang' sekin 'also it' passaan 'I serve'
/f/ fasaani 'pheasant' /d/ dyyni 'dune' duuri 'major key'
vasaani 'my fawn' (part.) tyyni 'calm' tuuri 'luck'
The lower word in each pair is the older one and shows the shape in which the
upper word would have entered Finnish at an earlier date (except for /f/, see
§ 8.5). For those who still use the old system these pairs are homophones.
There is also a drastic change in the distribution of old and new phonemes.
The old native words did not allow an initial consonant cluster. As we saw,
loanwords with original (C1 )C2 C3 - were always adopted under C3 - (Figure 8-2).
But now loans have introduced new clusters, both initial and medial: struktuuri,
frekvenssi, and so on. Even the vowel harmony breaks down: po!ygamia,
papyros, kalypso (y = ii). Earlier, front and back rounded vowels did not occur
together in the same word.
If we include /b, d, g, f, s/, and so on, in our description, it is easy to state
simple rules of replacement for dialects with the old phonemic system. This is
impossible in the other direction. This kind of mapping relation is characteristic
of dialect relations, as we have seen (§§ 3.2, 3.3). Note that in the earlier loans
there was more sound substitution than here in the educated norm, but the
conservative dialects follow the old pattern. It is also significant that the inno-
vating pattern is connected with a social layer where knowledge of foreign lan-
guages or bilingualism is extensive.
Mordvin used to have only medial voiced stops and spirants in voiced sur-
roundings, but no initial ones, for example, jalgo 'on foot' (compare Finnish
jalka 'leg, foot'), pize 'nest' (pesii), kandoms 'to carry' (kantaa), kargo 'crane'
(kurki). Russian loans have introduced initial voiced sounds, and these have
spread even beyond the original model, for example, hypercorrect bauk 'spider'
(Russian pauk). Often such rare foreign sounds have considerable descriptive
force, and they are preferred in onomatopoeic, descriptive, or suggestive forms,
or in intense forms and nonsense forms, whatever we call them. In Mordvin
the voiced sound has spread to native guffzems 'to growl' (kurnia) and guj
'snake' (kyy 'viper'), enhancing their emotional color. Similar spreads of rare
sounds that had entered originally through borrowing occur in all Baltic Finnic
and Lapp languages. The same phenomenon is well attested elsewhere also;
the Berlin dialect of German spreads its z, originally confined to loanwords
like genieren [z-] 'to embarrass, bother', to descriptive vocabulary, e.g., kuzeln
'to cuddle' and wuzelig 'unkempt'. Other languages could be cited as well;
note in this connection the sm- "reduplication" in American English, for
example, doctor smoctor and a few other words with s(m)-, schmalz, schlemiel,
mainly from Yiddish.
Earlier it was shown that loans helped to establish English /v, z/, and the
same is true of /dz, zf (§ 4.2). Foreign sounds thus typically come in as parts of
whole words, even if the words are imported precisely because their sounds
are felt to be expressive. This is true of bound morphemes as well. The hosts
of Latin/French words in -able, -ism, -ize, -tive, and so on, were the basis for
expanding these into new creations, for example, eatable, tokenism, macadamize,
and talkative.
It is customary to say that English has borrowed a great many Latin/Romance
phonological rules, as the essence of the Latin stress rule and the Romance
softening of k > s in certain environments (opaque/opacity). Such a statement
sounds as if the rules were borrowed without the actual items on which they
operated. In reality, the rules are a result of the importation of the units, the
individual words. Sound change had produced the French morphophonemic
alternations in clearly definable environments (§§ 4.4, 4.15). When both items,
such as opaque and opacity, had been borrowed into English, a synchronic
rule could be formulated. Because it had to cover the" same" facts in the" same"
environments, it turned out very much like the original French rule. Such rules
may well be different for different speakers, and it may take quite a while
before a child is exposed to all the necessary facts. Similarly, English has in
many cases borrowed both singular and plural formations of the Classical
languages, for example, phenomenon/phenomena and alumnus/alumni. The level
of bilingualism made this possible, and, also, English had the categories of
singular and plural to begin with. The pluralization rules were not borrowed
but rather the actual forms. The rules, whatever they are here, were just a by-
product.
The borrowing of intonation, which is frequent in convergence areas(§ 8.18),
would seem to come closer to straight rule borrowing if it carries a meaning
like 'question'. But note that intonational contours can as well be regarded as
"morphemes," and hence it is not primary rule borrowing. In American Finnish,
the question intonation has been borrowed from English, and it sticks quickly,
even to Finns who speak normal Finnish. Finnish yes-no questions are marked
by the particle -ko with no characteristic intonation; this can be replaced by a
suprasegmental unit __j •
[8.15] Borrowing in vocabulary results when foreign words are adopted

into native syntactic patterns. Interference can go the other way as well; that
is, one takes native words into foreign syntactic patterns, and, of course, both
types can be mixed together. The latter type requires an advanced degree of
bilingualism, whereas the first case is possible with a more superficial knowledge.
Both are potential results of a society's shift of languages after a period of
bilingualism. When the Normans finally adopted English, they retained thou-
sands of words from French, as is easy to demonstrate. In syntax, however,
exact determination of borrowing is much more difficult, because the chances
of parallel development are great. This fact has led many linguists, especially
in more recent times, to the position that syntax is not easily borrowable and
is likely to be always inherited. Others maintain that syntax is most vulnerable
to foreign influence.
The evidence as we have it today shows that syntax can be borrowed as
easily as other parts of grammar; grammatical morphemes show the greatest
resistance to borrowing, but it still occurs. (The reason is, perhaps, the great fre-
quency and abstractness of such units. They are unconscious and" too obvious"
to draw attention.) Closely related to syntactic borrowing is loan translation,
where native elements are joined according to the foreign model (see § 7.7).
Latin exerted considerable syntactic influence on the languages of Europe, as
well as pervading their vocabularies. The development of German and English
interrogatives (welcher, which, and so on) into relatives is an imitation of
Latin. So are the free participles like generally speaking, taken literally, which
render Latin ablatives absolute. These have caught on in English, whereas the
construction was abortive in German: dieses Geschaft berichtigt 'this transaction
corrected' (Schiller), nach aufgehobener Tafel 'the dinner party having ad-
journed', and nach gestillter Blutung 'after the bleeding had been stopped'
(Carossa 1943). Similarly archaic today are some German imitations of accusa-
tiz:us cum infinitiz:o: mich gewesen sein in grosser Not 'me having been in great
peril'. In the eighteenth century, the purists were also able to establish the Latin
ban on double or multiple negatives in literary English (see § 3.4). It is also
likely that the rise of periphrastic conjugations (use of auxiliaries) all over
Europe irrespective of the language (family) is hardly altogether independent
in each case ; considerable mutual influence must be assumed.
One language family where syntactic borrowings are quite obvious is Finno-
Ugric. Relics of the original syntax can be found in varying degrees in all
languages of the family, but the following facts are significant. Finnish syntax
is largely Indo-European (Baltic and Germanic, apparently Swedish for the
most part). Lapp syntax in Finland is strongly Finnish-in fact, almost like
Finnish with Lapp words, but in Norway is markedly Norwegian. Turkic
170 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE'!
influence is obvious in Cheremiss and Votyak syntax, Russian in Veps and
Zyrien. Historical reasons and the bilingualism necessary to account for this
are amply attested (see Figure 8-4). A lack of bilingualism may necessitate
translation, which serves the same end. The sacred Buddhist texts in Burma were
written in Pali, an Indic language. Because the knowledge of Pali was very
limited among the people, Pali words and phrases were glossed in Burmese.
Such bilingual texts, known as Nissaya Burmese, are known at least from the
fifteenth century and subsequently increase in number. With time, the Nissaya
style became established: each Pali morpheme was matched by a Burmese one.
This is parallel to "Lapp being virtually Finnish with Lapp words"; Nissaya is
highly artificial Burmese with native vocabulary and Pali grammar. In due time,
the original Pali was omitted; the prestigious position of Nissaya secured it as
the literary model, and, since then, Pali syntax has seeped into more colloquial
styles as well.
The loss of the Greek infinitive (§§ 5.16, 6.22) has had repercussions through-
out the Balkans. It has been lost in various degrees in most Balkan languages,
and there is a clear correlation between its loss and the proximity of the language
to Greece. The Greek pattern has thus diffused northward. In Southern Calabria
the Greek speakers finally switched to Italian, as often happens to minority
enclaves, but in place of the Italian syntax of the infinitive, they retained their
old rule. A sentence like 'I cannot see you ', which requires an infinitive in
Italian, is rendered instead non pozzu mu ti viju (e mu ti sentu) 'I cannot that I
see you (and that I hear you)'. In other words, this sentence is Greek with
Italian words, or Italian with Greek syntax. The total dialect shows, however,
that the dialect is Italian, and hence this syntactic feature is borrowed from
Greek. The end result is that a syntactic rule is borrowed; but such a rule borrow-
ing in syntax is not an abstract occurrence-it is based on bilingualism and a
correspondence between the two languages. Like loan translation, it is analogy
between two languages. The situation is clearly diagrammatic:
MODEL Semantics A forms X syntactic rule Y

BORROWER Semantics A forms M syntactic rule N
If X replaces M we have morphemic borrowing, if Y replaces N we have

syntactic borrowing. Bilingualism is just another kind of synchronic variation
for the speaker with code switching occurring in certain situations. This variation
goes through the whole language, both grammar and vocabulary. From the
psychological (if not from the social) point of view, this is an enormous burden,
hostile to the efficient principle ' one meaning, one form'. When social forces
permit, simplification results in the two complete codes ending up as only one.
Ultimately, in vocabulary, the word of one language wins out, or else semantic
differentiation takes place; most English speakers would admit that there is a
slight difference between freedom and liberty. As for grammar, one language
wins out, possibly with patterns from the other. It is useful to realize that
bilingualism is indeed one aspect of synchronic variation, and often there is,
ExTERNAL CHANGE: BoRROWING
of course, no way of drawing a line between dialect variation and bilingualism

(see§ 3.6). Once more, we have an indication that borrowing shares characteristics
with the other mechanisms of change and variation. The transfer from bi-
lingualism to monolingualism is another aspect of simplification, or the move-
ment toward 'one meaning, one form'. And this situation is the most fertile
breeding ground for borrowing. Bilingualism can be of two main types (1)
coordinate (in which the speaker keeps his two systems apart), and (2) compound
(in which systems interfere). The latter is particularly conducive to borrowing.
[8.16 Borrowing and Wider Configurations of Language Contact and Use]

Language switches produce adstrata, that is, the adoption of features of the
old languages by the new one. This is often given as a reason for particular
phonetic developments, and sound change in general. One distinguishes a
substratum when speakers abandon their language for another, a prestige lan-
guage; and a superstratum, in which conquerors take up the language of their
new environment. Thus French is said to have a Gaulish or Celtic substratum
and then a Frankish or Germanic superstratum.
Let us now return to the Fox dialect mentioned in Chapter 3. It shows a
clear Finnish substratum. Germanic loans in Finnish given in this chapter
have demonstrated the general phenomenon that voiced sounds are replaced
by voiceless ones, and a voiceless one by a voiceless geminate, for example,
rilisteetti 'real estate', paikki 'bike', spiikkeri 'announcer' (speaker), partti
'party', taippari 'diaper', jeeppi 'jeep', and many earlier loans (§ 8.6). This
replacement principle is clearly visible in the Fox dialect, as are other Finnish
features. In this case, we need not rely on inference alone, as a community with
a predominantly Finnish base (drawn mainly from two locations in Finland)
is historically documented from 1900. In the heyday of the dialect, 1920-1940,
the school records show about 70 per cent of the students to be from Finnish
families (the percentage was higher in 1967, but the numbers are too small to
be significant). The dialect was spoken by persons of other backgrounds also,
but this fact is irrelevant for the substratum; it shows merely that the Finnish
element was strong enough to establish the norm for the community (as was
mentioned, the dialect now has age and occupational meaning).
Similar cases of substrata have been attested in all parts of the world, but the
American society is, of course, particularly conscious of substrata; in fact,
there are even handbooks on theater dialects to enable actors to imitate proper
ethnic "accents." A well-known case from New York City is the Yiddish
substratum feature [-IJg] in coming, for example.
[8.17] The various kinds of borrowing, that is, vocabulary, adstratum

phonetics, and syntax, have led to the notion of a mixed language. This concept
has remained undemonstrable to the present day. In bilingual situations, there
is frequent code switching even in the middle of the sentence, for example,
nineteenth-century "Aristocratic Russian" 'on se reunit le matin au breakfast,
et puis vsjakij delaet, cto xocet'. The sentence begins in French and has one
I72 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS; How DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
English loan, and then shifts into Russian. The French part is totally French,
so is the Russian, Russian. This is no mixed language, but two languages used
jointly. Similar sentences can be found in America and Russia among the
linguistic minorities, and, of course, elsewhere. On the other hand, sentences
like American Finnish Menin norttiin muuseja hunttaamaan 'I went north to
hunt moose' or Lude D'uod'i pivad, d'uod'i vinad, pajatet't'i, p/assit't'i 'One
drank beer, one drank liquor, one sang, one danced' are hardly mixed. In the
first, all but one word are loans from English, but the grammar is clearly
Finnish, and the same is true of the Lude sentence: the grammar is all Lude,
although, in vocabulary, only d'uodi is, the rest coming from Russian. The Gypsy
dialects are also often referred to as mixed, but, here also, much of the
vocabulary and phonetics is borrowed from the "host language." Consider the
following "pure" old English Gypsy sentence: Kom6va te jal adre mi Duve!esko
keri kana mer6va 'I'd like to come to my Lord's house when I die'. In modern
English Gypsy this goes I'd kom to jal adre mi Duvel's ker when mandi mers.
This is English in grammar except that it has an extra set of vocabulary, which
is characteristic of social jargons. Actually, classification by syntax or vocabu-
lary is an arbitrary decision; for example, Nissaya is considered basically
Burmese with Pali syntax and not Pali with Burmese vocabulary. Considerations
of continuity, and the social status or attitudes of the speakers, play a role in
such decisions.
The only certain conclusion that can be drawn is that all languages are mixed,
if mixing merely means borrowing. Some are, of course, more mixed than others.
Over half of English vocabulary is borrowed, which is also true of Swedish
(both about 75 per cent). But because Swedish has borrowed mainly from Low
German, it does not show so readily. Albanian, on the other hand, has borrowed
more than 90 per cent of its vocabulary, and even if Finnish has borrowed
only 20 per cent, it is still mixed in the same sense. The same mixing is true of
syntax, but there is no workable way of measuring that because of the universal
features prevalent in it.
In a puristic context, one speaks of "pure" and "hybrid" languages. Pure
language should avoid or even uproot loans from the outside, but encourage
them from the past of the same language (archaisms). Such conc~rn is school-
masterly and has value for genetic linguistics only insofar as it may provide a
sociolinguistic setting for certain innovations. The distinction between "pure"
and "hybrid" languages is untenable, of course.
[8.18] When adjoining and overlapping languages give and take, the
result can be what is called convergence (Sprachbund). In such convergence
areas, different languages may develop identical phonetics, similar phonological
systems, and very similar grammars, even if the lexical items and phonotactics
remained different. Famous convergence areas are, for example, India, the Bal-
kans, the Caucasus, and the Pacific Northwest. On the Marathi-Kannada
boundary one can find villages that have one basic grammar with two sets of
morphemes, one Marathi, the other Kannada. This leads to the startling position
that it is the lexicon that does indeed determine genetic relationship, and not
grammar! The reason is, of course, that lexicon (including grammatical markers)
is heavily symbolic, whereas grammar is iconic and largely universal. Vocabulary
comes and goes, but when it is retained, it remains symbolic. Now, is modern
English Gypsy still Gypsy with English syntax?
Maybe there was a convergence area in the Baltic as well. We have seen a few
examples of far-reaching borrowing in Finnish from both Baltic and Germanic.
Although grammatical influence can at present only be guessed at, there seems
to have been a complete upheaval in the sound system. The two thousand or
so years preceding and following it have apparently been relatively stable in
comparison. Thus feeding Pre-Baltic Finnic into the convergence area and
taking it out, we get the configuration in Figure 8-5. Note that Germanic had
Verner's law alternation between/p x sand j3 o y z, which is a startling parallel
to the Baltic Finnic consonant gradation between p t k and j3 o y and s "' h
(viisas, (gen.) viisahan > Modern Finnish viisaan 'wise'). All the individual
phonological changes between Pre-Baltic Finnic and Late Proto-Baltic Finnic
are commonplace; but the cumulative effect makes the convergence hypothesis
impossible to ignore. If convergence areas can guide phonetic change like this,
it means that loss can be one side of borrowing. In this vein, it has been observed
that less prestigious languages avoid native forms that resemble obscene forms
in the prestige or upper language.
Such filtering does indeed seem to happen, and it is the reverse of adstratum
influence: one keeps one's language and borrows only the prestige phonetics.
It has been noted that Welsh has an" English" type of phonetics and phonology,
whereas Breton shows "French" features. Surely English and French, respec-
tively, are responsible for this.
[8.19] Convergence areas and adstrata are not the only situations referred
to as mixed languages in layman classification. Other candidates are various
trade jargons known as pidgins, which arise in superficial, often short-termed,
and limited cultural contact. They have sprung up since the European expansion
from 1500 onward, based on the languages of the maritime powers, that is,
English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish. A rarer phenomenon is a native-based
pidgin, as in the Chinook Jargon of the Northwest, Police Motu in Papua, and
Kituba in the Congo.
The belief that a pidgin is a mixture of the grammar of one language and the
vocabulary of another is oversimplified but very practical and fits quite well
the examples already mentioned. Pidgins are no more mixed than some other
languages, although they are drastically simplified in grammar and in the size
of their vocabularies. The aiding factors in the formation of a pidgin are the
very limited vocabulary, which is sufficient in such situations, and the univer-
sality of syntax. This vocabulary is largely directed toward universal human
experience (see Chapter 21), which makes syntax a side issue only. The concen-
tration on learning such key words can be verified in modern refugee or tourist
situations. Both sides try to let syntax take care of itself; for example, sentences
Sprachbund filters
Pre-Baltic Finnic Baltic Germanic Late Proto-Baltic Finnic
p p p p(B--b)
t t t t(5--d)
k k k k(y--g)
b
d
g
6 B(b)
5' iS( d)
y y(g)
f
p
h(x) h
s s
s s(z) s s
s
z z
m m m m
n n(IJ) n(IJ) n(IJ)
n
IJ(Ij)?
1 1 1
I'
r r r r
v v v v
j j j j
c = ts c = ts
c=tS
c = t's
kt kt
ht ht
pt pt ft
mt mt
nt nt nt nt
In In
11 11
FIGURE 8-5. The filtering of the Baltic Finnic sound system through the
Baltic and Germanic ones. [Reprinted from Lauri Posti, "From Pre-Finnic
to late Proto-Finnic." Finnisch-Ugrische Forschungen, 31, 1-91 (1953).]
such as me eat coconut (coconut me eat, and so on) or you catch train (train catch
you, and so on) cannot be misunderstood in a practical situation in which
philosophizing is incongruous. It is also normal that the pidgins developing
in slavery situations in the New World would resort a great deal to African
syntax, although it is often difficult to spot. This is a solution of least effort.
The masters would also imitate this, for various (scientifically false) reasons,
but the result is a system that does the work. Drastic simplification is charac-
teristic even in Kituba, even though the neighboring languages are quite similar
to its base, the dialect of Marianga. Pidgin formation implies elimination of
morphophonemic alternations and suppletion, reduction of grammatical classes,
and emphasis on single unaltered forms of lexical units. In short, practically all
inflection is stripped off; this mirrors an attempt to improve the efficiency of
the system, and it especially helps the person with a limited experience of the
dominant language. By concentrating on and hearing one form of any item,
both encoding and decoding are greatly simplified. One result is the "baby
talk" effect, which, incidentally, shows that speakers do, in fact, implicitly
know how to simplify. In other words, they are knowingly applying the principle
'one meaning, one form', and this is done so easily in these situations because
of the limited content the sign system has to handle. Note that here also, as in
similar "analogical" changes, there is a break in tradition. Against analogical
simplification is opposed the total community, which upholds linguistic con-
ventions; but, even so, analogical changes sneak in. In a pidgin situation,
however, there is no community or tradition, because the whole language is
largely a makeshift for economic profit (for at least one of the partners). In
more recent times it has become obvious that economic motives erode traditions
in other areas of culture as well. Note a certain parallelism to the lack of tradi-
tion in the Greek adoption of writing, which was very conducive to the rise of a
simple and efficient orthography. The social status of a pidgin is generally very
low indeed, below the less-valued dialects of the standard languages; and often
a gradual shift to one of the standard languages occurs. In areas where many
native languages are spoken, a pidgin may provide the most convenient lingua
franca, a common language for communication; in such a polyglot area Melane-
sian Pidgin English, for example, has remained vigorous. A pidgin is always a
lingua franca, but a lingua franca need not be a pidgin; for example, English
is a lingua franca in India, and, to an increasing degree, throughout the world.
The original lingua franca was pidginized Romance, mainly from the Riviera
area, and it served in the Mediterranean in various forms at various times during
and after the Crusades.
Artificial languages are pidgins coined in the calm of the study. The most
famous and successful one is Esperanto (contrived in 1887 by L. L. Zamenhof),
which can be classified as a kind of pidgin Romance or Neo-Latin, with loans
from other European languages; in other words, European Pidgin Romance.
A similar version of individually "pidginized" English is Basic English (con-
trived by Charles K. Ogden [1889- 1957]). The name is an acronym of British,
American, Scientific, International, and Commercial, and the "language" is
intended for international communication and as first steps into English, that
is, for typical pidgin purposes. It has not caught on very well (it is so modern
as to be copyrighted, which would seem to be inimical to the very idea of a
contact language).
We have seen that, generally, when words shorten, units multiply. English
and French have lost most of the Indo-European inflection, but this has been
compensated for by syntax (prepositional phrases, word order). The great
reduction of pidgin phonology, morphology, and vocabulary must likewise be
compensated for in syntax. Elaborate periphrasis must be used , that is, metaphors
and metonymy. Children are capable of the same, even with very limited vocab-
ulary; this is one side of the human capacity to analogize (Chapters 5 and 7).
Thus Melanesian Pidgin English has the metonymic (indexical) phrase woman
he brother belong me for 'my sister', he no got money for 'poor', and, for
example, metaphoric grass belong face 'beard ' and grass belong head 'hair'.
Basic English with its 850 words is more" wasteful" in that it includes the words
sister and poor, but not beard or hair. "Technical" terms like thyme must be
paraphrased as in goodly (note the regularity) smelling and tasting grass, smelling
grass tasting good, or the like. Pidginization is always directed toward greater
redundancy. Free pronouns rather than affixal forms result in longer phrases;
independent adverbial particles instead of tense morphemes, for example, do
the same. (Redundancy is another factor that facil itates communication and
that must be prominent in an efficient sign system.)
[8.20] When a pidgin becomes the first language of a community, one

speaks of creo!ization. This happened often on the plantations of the New
World, where slaves from different language backgrounds were forced to use a
pidgin among themselves, and between themselves and the masters. After
escape, freedom, or revolution the pidgin was all they had, and it had to become
the first language of the community. Creoles can approach the source language
by continued borrowing. A typical creole would have some 5,000 words, which
is about five times the number in Chinook Jargon, whose 1,100 words are in
the bracket of Basic English. In some families, Esperanto is handed down to
children as a first language, but no true speech communities have arisen; this
is why creoles are often also referred to as marginal languages, but such a name
for Haitian Creole French, for instance, is very misleading, because it is the
colloquial norm throughout the country.
In conclusion, pidgins and creoles are usually taken as very aberrant dialects
of their source languages and not as "mixed languages." The source language
is the dominant language. We have seen that it is often rather difficult to draw
exact lines for classification. Speaking of dominant languages implies social
values, and these are very important in the definitions of pidgins, creoles, and
so on. A kind of lingua franca with prestige overtones is the standard language
of a stratified society (see Chapter 3). Then, a kind of standard for business
purposes without necessarily having social overtones is a koine, which often
carries considerable simplification, but with no such drastic breaks in structure
as in the pidgins. For instance, the Greek koine, based on the Attic dialect,
remained mutually intelligible with the Greek of the Greeks themselves. In a
way, the notions "mixed language," pidgin, creole, trade language, lingua
franca, standard dialect, and koine overlap extensively, because so many criteria
enter into their definitions. As always, classificatory schemes run into difficulties
(see Chapter 16). We simply do not know all the facts yet. Since all languages
are mixed, the notion "mixed language" is not very useful in classification.
The task is to find out what happened in the histories of languages, and our
concern need not be whether such events can be put into neat classificatory
pigeonholes.
It is interesting to note that in pidgins and Sprachbund situations it is the
vocabulary or morphology that decides the genetic language alignment, not
syntax (see § 16.10). It would seem that the characterization of a pidgin as
having been filtered through universal syntax is correct. Universal syntax
cannot be used for classification. After the syntax has been pumped empty, it
gradually fills from the languages involved. In this sense a pidgin might be called
a new language (admixture) altogether, because a language has been stripped
and filled again around a few symbols. Because genetic linguistics is concerned
with genesis, origin, and continuum through time, pidginization is a legitimate
problem that has not been solved (see § 21.3). Note now that in the cases of
American Finnish, Lude, and modern English Gypsy the morphology was
Finnish, Lude, and English, respectively, and this decided the issue.
[8.21 Conclusion] Basically, borrowing is no more external change than

semantic change is. In both cases the cultural setting and cultural change
induces grammar change. In borrowing, however, it is more obvious. Even if
borrowings often complicate the grammar, especially in phonology, it can still
be seen that the total communicative situation becomes more iconic in that
more of the language moves toward the greater efficiency of 'one meaning, one
form' . As the primary function of grammar is to serve communication, the
"naturalness" of the earlier grammar is sacrificed. We have seen this before.
I conicity in one part of the grammar (e.g., -n- plural for bovines of both sexes
[kine, oxen]) results in a highly marked plural from another angle (kine with
umlaut + n) (§ 6.20). Similarly, spelling spelling, like island and debt, increase
iconicity toward Latin, but they, of course, complicate spelling rules in that
s and b are arbitrary parts of these words in terms of English. Loans are mainly
introduced by bilinguals who, of course, have a mental reason to level out the
vocabularies of the respective languages (usually in one direction only). And
characteristically, the loans then spread to monolinguals. Similarly, persons who
knew Latin introduced the spellings island and debt. When a group does not
want to communicate with another and tries to maintain cultural independence,
borrowing is greatly impeded.
REFERENCES
General: Haugen 1950, Weinreich 1968, Deroy 1956, Martinet (ed.) 1968,
Petrovici 1969, Alatis (ed.) 1970; 8.2 Tabouret-Keller 1969; 8.3 Kalima 1915,
1936; 8.4 Aron 1930, Hoijer 1939, Yannay 1970; 8.5 Raun 1968, Maher 1969a,
1970b, Hyman 1970ab; 8.6 E. Itkonen 1966, Koivulehto 1970, Bernstejn 1961,
Halldorsson 1970; 8.8 Senn 1953, Patterson 1968; 8.9 Baugh 1951, Jespersen
1956, Hammerich 1954, H. Vogt 1954, Doerfer 1967, Kazazis 1972; 8.10
Hakulinen 1961; 8.11 Austerlitz 1968, Jacobsohn 1922; 8.13 Katicic 1966,
1970, Krahe 1970; 8.14 Ravila 1952, Specht 1952, Petrovici 1957, 1969; 8.15
Bach 1956, E. Itkonen 1966, Okell 1965, Burling 1970, Rohlfs 1922-1923;
8.16 Nielsen 1952, Szemerenyi 1964, Herman and Herman 1958; 8.17 Mueiier
(ed.) 1954, Fokos-Fuchs 1962, Havranek 1966, Petrovici 1969; 8.18 Becker
1948, Posti 1953, Emeneau 1956, C. F. Voegelin 1945, Weinreich 1958, Pisani
1966, Burling 1970, Martinet (ed.) 1968; 8.19 R. Hall 1966, Nida and Fehderau
1970, Welmers 1970, Ogden 1968; 8.20 Nida and Fehderau 1970, R. Hall 1958,
Martinet (ed.) 1968.
EXERCISES
I. Rewrite the first paragraph in § 1.25, the last paragraph of Bloomfield's

book ( 1933: 509), or any other paragraph chosen by the instructor with-
out using any of the known loanwords in English.
2. Rewrite the same paragraphs in Basic English (for the rules, see, e.g.,
Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language, College
Edition, p. 123, or Ogden 1968).
CHAPTER 9
WHY DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?

LINGUISTIC AND SOCIAL FACTORS
Summary of the first eight chapters in which the unity of

the mechanisms of change is emphasized. Linguistic and
social factors are mediated by a psychological one, the
principle of'one meaning, one form'.
[9.1 All-pervasiveness of Change and Language] The previous chapters

have shown the complementary positions of the mechanisms of language
and the change of language. Without synchronic variation, change would not
have a launching pad. Change is not peculiar to language alone; evolution
pervades the whole of "reality," that is, the inorganic/cosmological, the organic/
biological (Chapter 22), and the human/psychological (Chapter 21). The whole
question of variation and change in language has a direct parallel in life, which
is complex self-reproducing and self-varying matter. Of course, language is a
parasite on the biological and psychological factors, but it can be viewed as a
sign system that perpetuates itself through time. If biological change can be
largely characterized as coming from behind, by automatic natural selections,
and cultural evolution from in front, from a conscious purpose, where does
language fit in? Language serves the sociocultural ends and its task is thus to
keep itself in an enduring state, to keep functioning, adapting itself to new
environments. We clearly have to start out from the Heraclitan statement that
everything changes. Cosmological change is very slow, and so is biological; this
leaves language with culture, where change is more readily observable. In short,
since everything changes, it would be truly phenomenal if language did not.
This, of course, is no issue; language does indeed change, and it shows variation
like any living matter. And, of course, culture allows for great variation and
duplication of items on its part as well. The question to be asked is: Why does
language change?
[9.2] Problems of Explaining Change and the Structure of Change] It has

been almost impossible to separate the factors and mechanisms of change from
its causes; indeed, even the consequences of change, that is, various classifica-
tions of change, have been given as explanations. We have seen all the basic
mechanisms and factors (and, in fact, their similarities are considerable), but
are they causes? Linguists have always fallen easily into the trap of circularity.
When it turns out that certain changes can be described as rule loss or rule re-
ordering, it is easy to shift to stating that change occurred because of rule loss,
179
and so on-an easy way of changing a how into a why. In this chapter we shall
see that much of the why can be answered. In historical explanation, one has to
use the so-called genetic explanation, which states that things are now as they
are, A, because earlier they were B; and they were B, because before that they
were C, and so on (§ 1.24). Certainly much of historical linguistics has been
explained this way. One of the difficulties has been the tendency to look for
one cause only, which is hardly advisable when one is dealing with such a
complex system as language. Further, there is hardly any bottom to causes.
For instance, why do we have a particular change? So that language gets simpler.
Why does it get simpler? So that it will better serve communication. Why do
we need communication? So that people interact better. Why do they have to
interact? Because their survival is linked with culture. Why do they have culture?
Because ... , and so on, and so forth. In this sphere, of course, no answers
can be given to satisfy everybody. What is explanation for one is just description
for another.
One usually speaks of internal and external causation of change. These are
extreme poles, a situation we have encountered often before, as it is difficult
to draw a line where one ends and the other starts. Language is so integrally
connected with the speech community that one has to look at the grammar of
the community when studying change, and not at the grammars of individual
speakers, the so-called idiolects. Semantic change due to "thing change" would
seem to be caused by external factors, even historical "accidents," whereas
(§ 8)
Borrowing
Sound change (§ 4)
Morphophonemic conditioning
(§ 6) Rule change
of sound change (§§ 4.27-30)
(§ 5) Analogy Grammatical conditioning

of sound change (§§ 4.22-26)
FIGURE 9-1. The different mechanisms of change share a common analogical
core. The change types blend into the adjacent ones.
semantic change due to euphemism and other metaphors have psychological

and emotive factors as the driving force. Other changes that we saw were connec-
ted with linguistic factors, as in the ellipsis of one of juxtaposed units. Various
analogical changes, or rule changes (if corresponding notation is used), resulted
in simplification. This simplification itself is not the cause of the changes, but
WHY DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE? 181
it is triggered by the mental constraints on a maximally efficient sign system of

the type of natural language; that is, the mind shuns purposeless variety(§ 5.21).
This is connected with constraints on the capacity of memory. Frequent forms
do, in fact, resist change, whereas infrequent forms are prone to be caught by
change much more easily. We have seen that this ultimate mental cause for
simplification creates either leveling or splits in terms of signs, or leveling or
extension in terms of the grammar. The slogan 'one meaning, one form' refers
to this force. This reason is one of the causes of borrowing as weiJ, in addition
to the prestige factor. And borrowing for descriptive usage is also psychologically
motivated, because it is felt to be iconic (image) to the thing meant. Throughout
the preceding chapters it was stressed that all changes share the analogical
mechanism, and one change type gradually gives way to (or shifts into) another,
as shown in Figure 9-1. Some of these types are, of course, subtypes of others;
for example, grammatical conditioning is analogy, and rule change is a restate-
ment of analogy. But it is still true that all have the same "analogical" mecha-
nism; that is, the mechanism is diagrammatic, based on one kind of iconicity.
In former times one said that analogy permeates everything; today, when
analogy is rewritten as more explicit rules, one repeats that all change is rule
change. This reiterates that the basic mechanism of change is iconic, and
diagrammatic, in particular. In other words, language is an intricate system of
relations. Whatever we call these relations, grammar, patterns, inflectional
paradigms, derivational groups, and so on, these are not the causes of change.
They just supply the patterns (or rules) according to which change takes place.
The driving force is the mental striving to adapt language for communication
with least effort, that is, the psychological motive and the necessity of fulfilling
the functions of speech. These same patterns work both for clarity (e.g., in
analogical changes), or for concealment in secret jargons, and so on, because
the same relations (rules) provide the mechanisms for metaphors, metonyms,
and so on. In the latter case, we still have communication, though not meant
for the total community. Of these changes, sound change occupies a peculiar
position, and we shall return to it.
[9.3 Manifestations of the Principle 'One Meaning, One Form'] A

maximally efficient system avoids polysemy (forms with many [related] meanings,
especially if these occur in the same semantic sphere) and homophony, two
(unrelated) meanings getting the same form. Again, the border between polysemy
and homophony is not always clear, because in ultimate analysis it depends on
the psychological reality or awareness of the speaker (see § 18.17). Either of
these one-to-many correlations between form and meaning are easily tolerated,
if they have to do with different parts of speech or different semantic spheres.
A voidance of homophony and polysemy provide clear evidence of this mental
force of 'one meaning, one form'. We have seen that the apocope of the past
marker -ed in Negro English led to homophony between present and past only
as a statistical variable in some verbs, not in strong or "irregular" ones (give-
gave, tell-to/', and so on; § 3.5). In Trinidad English, however, the invariant
I82 HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS: HOW DOES LANGUAGE CHANGE?
forms roll, give, and tell are used for the simple past. Homophony with the
present is avoided by the use of the auxiliary do, He does give •He gives' vs.
He gire •he gave'. The present has become the formally marked form, unless
one wants to derive the past by deleting does. Similar cases exist in many other
well-known languages.
The most famous case comes from Southwestern France in the history of the
Latin gallus •rooster' and cattus •cat'. In this area two sound changes worked
toward the merger of the two forms: (I) Latin -11- > -t, and (2) initial c- > g-.
Both •rooster' and •cat' should now end up as gat. But in a farming situation,
such a homophony is .. insidious" and detrimental to an efficient sign system.
And, indeed, one of the forms was replaced by another, namely, •rooster' by
bigey •village judge, deputy (vicar)', azii •pheasant', or put •young chick'. An
.. intolerable" homonymic clash resulted from the merger of Old English
lfttan • allow' and lettan •hinder'; one had to go, and it was the latter. It survives
only in the phrases without let or hindrance and a let ball (tennis term), which
has been folk-etymologized into net ball (though, in strict terminology, there
is still a difference between let and net balls). In a similar way, Old English cwen
•queen' and cwene ·wench' end up as /kwiyn/. Of these, queen has stood its
ground, whereas quean is strongly limited. It is also natural that the latter has
receded, as it has dozens of synonyms to replace it.
Even if the semantics are unrelated, homonymy is still avoided if it has
obscene overtones, because this is another impediment to communication.
Speakers react to embarrassment (either ridicule or annoyance) by avoiding
the homonyms to the tabu words. This has been observed in many languages, for
example, in American English, rooster and donkey are much more prevalent
than cock and ass. Finnish kuti • spawned' does not assibilate t > s as expected,
apparently because of kusi •pissed'.
Borrowing can be the mechanism to correct polysemy. In Finnish, kutsua
means •to invite' and •to call'. In the dialect spoken in the Province of Varmland,
Sweden, kuhtua is retained in the first meaning, and kal/oa has been borrowed
from Swedish for the second.
[9.4] Polysemic clashes are also revealed through dialect geography. If

the same form-especially a technical term-has different meanings in adjacent
geographical areas, a difficulty arises at the borderline, where both meanings
would meet, resulting in polysemy. A buffer zone may now develop to bar
either meaning and thus keep the sign system unambiguous. In the central
German speaking area, Korn means 'rye', in the southwestern corner, 'spelt'.
The two areas are kept apart by a narrow strip going northeast of Bodensee,
looping around Stuttgart, and petering out at the Black Forest, where the
•rye'/' spelt' line runs southwest to cross the Rhine north of Basel (Figure
9-2:A). In the buffer zone, Korn retains its original meaning •grain' and, as a
generic term, covers both sides. Note that the meanings 'rye' and •spelt' abut
along the Black Forest; but this is not a farming area, and it is thus natural that
this isogloss separates the Rhine valley from the Neckar and Danube valleys.
In the standard terminology of dialect geography, the Black Forest is a natural

barrier to communication, especially for farming. Another clear example comes
from the Belgian province of Limburg (the following matter is slightly simplified).
In the western section the word Opper (quoted in Standard German form)
means a 'big heap of hay' in the north, and a 'row of oat sheaves' in the south.
In the eastern half, the farthest northern corner with the meaning 'small heap
of hay' is adjacent to the western part, and the southeastern meaning an 'un-
bound half sheaf' would clash with the meaning in the adjacent southwestern
sector. The clashes all through the territory are prevented by a strip of no man's
land running all through the province (Figure 9-2: B) in which the form Opper
is missing. In the Korn case, the form itself could remain, with retention of the
old meaning of the word not giving way to the innovations of either side,
whereas in the Opper case the form had to go, in any meaning, in favor of
other, "neutral" carriers. In both cases, the efficiency of the system in the
expected clash area was preserved.
A B
1
'big pile of hay'
sheaf' •
Maastricht
'grain'
FIGURE 9-2. Geographical distribution of meanings. A, the meanings of

German Korn in the southwestern German-speaking area. B, the meanings
of German Opper (standing for the Flemish variants) in Belgian Limburg.
[Reprinted with modification, by permission, from Jan Goossens, Strukture/le
Sprachgeographie, Heidelberg, 1969 (© Carl Winter UniversiUitsverlag).]
In the tabu cases, we saw that uncalled-for connotations and reactions may
lead to the elimination of a term, even when there is no danger of ambiguity.
A similar case can happen also in polysemic clashes. Again, in Belgium, in the
Brabant area, liiufig (Standard German form) means 'in heat' (of cows),
whereas in the East (Limburg-Rhine) it is applied to bitches. The two areas are
separated by a no-man's-land. The reason is not cognitive, but apparently
avoidance of ridicule (compare how funny it sounds when a foreigner says
squeeze instead of press). Interference with communication for other than

semantic reasons does indeed occur; imagine a stockbroker who worked in
pajamas. His "actual" working capacity would not be impaired, but the
disturbance created in our cultural setting would render all work impossible.
[9.5 Preservation of Redundancy] One aspect of an efficient sign system

like language is redundancy, to ensure proper decoding in adverse conditions
(see § 2.13, and end of§ 8.19). It has been maintained, on this account, that
excessive shortness necessitates replacement of a term to increase redundancy.
But clear examples are hard to come by; the most persuasive are French e
'bee' < apem, and hui 'today' < hodie, which have been replaced in various
ways (in Standard French by the outcome of a Latin deminutive apiculam >
abei!le, and a compound aujourd' hui, of which the original short form itself is a
part). The problem, however, is that French retains many forms just as short,
for example, monovocalic nouns like fu/ aout 'August', /li/ us 'custom', and
fof eau 'water'. Note also that hui 'today', huit 'eight', and huis 'door' (all
fqif) represent different parts of speech, and thus the homophony is not insidious.
But compounds like aujourd'hui are on occasions demonstrably a way of
avoiding ambiguity; for example, in certain areas of Scandinavia, the form for
'potato' and 'pear' is the same, let us say X (e.g., Swedish par). One of the
signs is now explained by a compound like apple X, tree X, or earth X(compare
logographic writing and pidgins § 8.19).
In the previous chapters we saw many examples of avoidance of homophony
in paradigms (analogic resistance to sound change), or therapeutic removal of
homophony (by analogy, borrowing, or grammatically conditioned sound
change). But all languages have homophony to different degrees, and one can
never predict with complete confidence when a community or speaker will
find it inconvenient enough to be corrected, although certain guesses have a
high probability of being right. And even when avoidance or correction of
homophony does occur, there is no way of telling by what mechanism of change
it will happen (the possibilities are metaphor and borrowing, and subtypes of
them). Further, it is not always possible to predict which of the homonyms will
be replaced.
[9.6 Holes in Patterns] From this internal cause we can move to another:
the symmetry or asymmetry of phonological systems. The hypothesis is that
systems strive toward perfect symmetry, that is, gaps tend to be leveled out.
Language is normally full of gaps of all kinds, and not only phonological ones
(e.g., in derivation, all possible combinations are never used), and this skewedness
is, of course, a prime target of analogy. Similarly, all possible combinations of
distinctive features need not be used in one language. If in the middle of an
otherwise perfect pattern an "expected" unit is missing, one speaks of a hole
in the pattern. In English, there is a gap in the combination of the forms good
and the comparative -er. When the "expected" combination is made the gap
is filled by goode;·(§ 5.14).
The vowel system of Middle High German was the following, after the umlaut
and before the lengthening of short vowels in open syllables:
i ii u i u fl
e 0 0 e 0 6
e ( )
ii a a ii
Here we have a twofold asymmetry, one between short front and back vowels
and one between short and long vowels. Balance can be achieved by eliminating
one front vowel or creating a new back vowel. In certain parts of Switzerland
e has indeed been eliminated by merging with e, in other localities by merger
with ii, with the result that the long and short systems correspond exactly. In
areas where four unrounded front vowels remained, there was a split:
~~~ · u~u
0~0 0~0
5 ;)
and the hole was filled. In the lengthening of short vowels, a is integrated in
three ways (in different areas):
fl
fl
6 /~(new)
a~ii a a
The last alternative obtains only in those areas where the short vowels have
four degrees of height.
A striking development toward symmetry is the first-syllable vocalism of
Proto-Baltic Finnic, in which the short vowels had one degree of height more
than the long ones, and contained the only rounded front vowel in the whole
system:
PROTO-BALTIC FINNIC FINNISH

i ii u i ( ) fl i ii u i fl fl
e () 0 e ( ) 6>e 0 0 e 6 6
ii a () ( ) ii a a ii
Finnish has filled every single gap and ended up with perfect symmetry. Another
asymmetry is known in the Serbo-Croatian system of velars:
g ( )
k X
The gap is a missing combination of features (parallel to the missing combina-

tion good+ er), viz., [voice + spirant]. This gap has been filled, depending
on the dialect, by splitting either the g or the x, that is,
g ~ y (Cakavian dialects oflstria) or g y t (dialects of the
k x k x Montenegrian coast)
This is the kind of evidence thought to show internal causality of sound
change, but all linguists do not agree that this furnishes satisfactory evidence
for cause; after all, it is quite clear that most sound systems contain gaps and
that perfect systems become skewed (compare Rotuman § 4.6). But what the
Swiss mergers and splits do show is that the spread of certain innovations are
favored by internal factors, and that certain sound changes can mutually exclude
each other. (N.B.: Internal structure of a language may easily adopt borrowing
or resist it.)
Taken negatively, this same principle would say that a system would resist
the development of a hole in its pattern. This would, of course, work against
some mergers, whereas the positive side calls for splits to fill the gaps. The
dual concept is the same as that behind analogy in its role of either preventing
sound change or straightening out its results. Note that the negative side of
this principle would be the basis of push chains, the positive, of drag chains
(§ 6.4). Sound shifts do, in fact, occur, although we cannot always say whether
they are push or drag chains. Some consolation is given by the fact that both
chains represent one and the same underlying force, even if this is controversial
and not perfectly established as yet.
[9.7 Articulatory Balance] Chain shifts would further show one aspect
of the principle of maximal differentiation. There seems to be a universal tendency
for phonological space, as defined by the articulatory possibilities (Figures 1-3
and 1-4), to be divided evenly among the units so that each has maximal elbow
room. Languages with one s-sound show [s]- or [s]-type phonetics for their
Js/ (e.g., conservative Finnish); languages with three vowels would normally
display i, a, and u (see§ 6.5); and so on. Further, a universal tendency in vowel
shifts is that tense vowels rise and lax ones get lowered. Hence push chain
shifts are in principle quite possible. Another regularity in the idea of maximal
differentiation is that languages with skewed vowel systems have more front
vowels than back vowels. This is a consequence of the shape of the mouth and
articulatory organs, which provide more room in the front area. Although this
factor is internal with respect to the human head, it should be classed as an
external one as far as the actual language is concerned. Then there is the problem
of "perceptual space," which may be relevant. Unfortunately, not much is
known about it as yet(§ 9.16).
Note how frequently linguists rely on the principle of articulatory balance
by using arguments based on holes in patterns. We saw above a case in which
German dil) was anomalous in its final IJ, because elsewhere it occurred before
velars only, dal)k. The hole could be filled by g, dil)g, which is then automatically
dropped by a phonetic realization rule (§ 6.15). Here the linguist tries to fill the
hole that sound change is trying to create (or has created, depending on one's
vantage point; see§ 19.6).
[9.8 Tendencies, Statistics, Universals, and Frequency] In speaking about

causes of change, one has often to refer to tendencies. Some linguists feel that
it is below the dignity of their subject to resort to such a notion. This dissatis-
faction stems from a more ambitious goal-that of wanting to be able to predict
everything in linguistic change. This requirement ignores completely the fact
that language is perhaps closer to anthropology and behavioral science than to
philosophy and logic. It is certainly clear that language is not all logic, and, as
in the social sciences in general, statistical inference is often all that we have
to base predictions on. Note also that arguments based on language universals
are statistical in nature, and so are the universal kinds of changes described in
the previous chapters. In other words, language universals represent a sophisti-
cated kind of interlanguage inference of statistical tendencies.
One of the factors in sound change is frequency of occurrence. Frequency is
by no means a mere mechanistic concept, as it has repercussions in association
formation and memory. High frequency presses forms into memory, and we
have already seen how this was a factor in analogic changes(§§ 5.14, 5.21); that
is, infrequent forms are replaced more easily, or they merge more easily with
others. Frequency is also a factor in ellipsis(§§ 7.5, 7.6, 7.8). In Parisian French,
/&/and fef tend to merge into jef, and have largely done so, but the frequency
of un and a few other forms retain /&/ in the system.
One of the results of high frequency is exceptional wear, which is common
in grammatical forms like auxiliaries, negatives, pronouns, and particles (see
the Finnish apocope in case endings; § 4.24). Of course, in these cases one could
maintain that grammatical conditioning is enough, or that the generally un-
stressed phonetics of such forms could do as well. These factors are indeed
valid candidates, but why should there be just one force of change? We do not
know to what degree grammatical conditioning is tied to frequency, because,
by necessity, grammatical markers are always more frequent than other signs.
Similarly, there are apparently more unstressed forms in the speech chain than
stressed ones. Frequency is a function of grammar and thus a legitimate "gram-
matical conditioning." But frequency is also a function of social intercourse,
which requires more frequent use of certain signs, depending on the particular
culture, subculture, or social group. Frequent wear occurs also in greetings,
titles, and names (where, of course, hypocoristic forces also operate), or basic
vocabulary such as come, go, be, can, and know.
It is this area of wear that is mainly responsible for irregular sound changes
(see§ 4.32). From English, we can mention, for example, Old English ne willan >
nyllan 'not wish' and niin wiht 'not a creature = no one creature' > niiwiht,
niinuht, niiuht, niiht, noht, and so on, 'naught' and 'not'. With the negative,
this is later repeated in will not > won't, and the like. In German, sk- gives fzf
in sol/en 'shall', instead of the regular/'S/ as in Sch(ff'ship ', and so on. From
the nongrammatic area we have already seen forms like hussy < hiiswif, lord <
hliiford, lady < hliifdige; others could be added, for example, head< heafod.
(Lord and lady fall basically into the area of titles.) From the sailor's vocabulary,
one could name similar forms, for example, /bows'dn/ bosun ""' boatswain and
/st'dns'dl/ studdingsail. Developments like Eboracum > York occurred all over
Europe, where we have old records to prove the cases.
Another aspect of frequency in linguistic theory is the claim that sounds that
distinguish very few forms from others are more likely to disappear than those
z
with a higher functional yield. In English, the contrasts =1= is rather peripheral,
and its elimination (say, through merger into s, or z into dz would not disturb
many signs, whereas it would be quite a different matter with s =f z, or with any
of the other consonants, especially stops. The pairs k =f g, t =f d, and p =f b
differentiate among a host of words in English. In a way, a low functional load
is the same as a hole in the pattern, that is, a hole in the distribution of sounds
in the lexicon or morphology. The inbalance can be eliminated by increasing
the load of the precarious sound (e.g., by borrowing) or eliminating it. Here
again, scholars do not agree on the extent of the phenomenon, or even on its
existence.
There is one further area where frequency plays a role in change, namely,
resistance to pronunciation borrowing. Words with high local frequency tend
to be the last ones to be changed. Now if high local frequency acts as a barrier
to change from the outside, it is also supposed to initiate change from the inside.
The hypothesis goes that the most frequent sounds can get away with less precise
articulation. This variation goes one way, for example, toward less marking,
and sound change results. Thus one would say that the relative frequency of
the voiced stops d g in Indo-European launched Grimm's law. These were
marked with [+voice] in contrast top t k. As the most frequent stops they
tended to lose their marking and move toward t k, which in turn had to shift
out > (f) jJ x. We do know that variation is the basis of change, but the exact
role of frequency in this connection is unknown and unknowable. On the other
hand, speakers themselves seem to know statistics connected with speaking,
because in certain sociolinguistic situations the proportion of the cases in which
a rule applies is rather consistent considering all the possible cases in which it
could apply (Figure 3-1, §§ 3.3, 3.5, 9.3, 9.11).
[9.9 Marking and the Naturalness of Systems] Various schemes of

markedness can be easily devised to explain shifts. If we interpret Indo-European
t d dh as plain (voiceless), voiced, and murmured, respectively, we have a
hierarchy of marking, as murmured sounds are highly unusual in the languages
t
of the world. If [murmur] is replaced by [spirantness], we get t d dh > do, where
o is doubly marked for [voice] and [spirantnessr It is unusual to have voiced
spirants without voiceless ones in a language that has the feature [voiceless],
jJ
and thus t > jJ would correct that, yielding do. But now the system is even
further skewed, because there are no unmarked sounds. This is an impossibility,

tp
and d has to shift > t, that is, 6. Now the 6 is again in the air, until it becomes
tp
a stop in some environments, d a, and the system is finally symmetric. There is
the least reason for the change t > ]J, because it increases markedness. If we
assign this step to a substratum, then we get
jJ t]J t]J
d > dh > d
dh
quite easily if we further interpret the Germanic d as a stop only, and then
t]J
Verner's law completing the symmetry d a. Now, substratum influence exists
in phonology, that is, sound substitution when borrowing a whole language
(as well as influence in other areas of grammar). Language-learning situations,
in general, are responsible for various simplifications (or analogical develop-
ments; see§ 9.14). Because of the same mental requirement that meaning and
form should be connected in a maximally simple fashion, a child, for example,
tries to make shortcuts accordingly. And we formalize these shortcuts with
analogy or various types of rule manipulation (loss, reordering, and so on; for
such shortcuts in Ding and tieq, see §§ 6.15, 6.17).
Another very popular explanation of cause is ease of articulation. Here one
would say that the spirants require less effort than stops and consequently
that p t k > f jJ x in Grimm's law. But ease is a highly subjective concept and
clearly dependent on the specific language. If spirants are easier to pronounce
than stops, why would the Baltic Finnic speakers have replaced them with
stops (Figure 8-2)? On the other hand, the results of assimilation indeed often
require fewer articulatory movements (§§ 4.14-4.16). But this requires us to
maintain that the· result is the cause. Once alternation is produced by the vacilla-
tion between the unassimilated and the assimilated sequence, the simpler sequence
may be favored for the final adoption. Cases where cause and result are intri-
cately connected are known by the term 'teleology.' One should note, however,
that simplification is not the same as ease and, further, that all sound changes
do not produce simplification. Even if analogy is always simplification in some
respects, sound change is not. If it were, all languages would now be maximally
simple phonologically, that is, a mumble or silence. But this would not serve
the function of language, where signs have to be kept separate and redundancy
maintained.
It does not seem advisable to review other combinations or various (still
developing) theories of markedness and change. Suffice it to note that they are
variants of the notion of a hole in the pattern.
(9.10 Sound Change and lndexicality] We have constantly seen how

change is intimately connected with variation. Change is the struggle of variants;
without variation, one could not understand change, and without change, one
would not understand synchronic variation. Sound change shows the social
factors of change, in addition to the phonetic/physiological (determined by
the articulatory organs), phonological (determined by the pressures of the
system), and psychological factors (e.g., tabu).
The starting point of sound change is index formation. The articulatory basis
of pronunciation always ensures a certain amount of random variation. Culture
allows for the same, for example, in the area of clothing. Striking random
fluctuation (in pronunciation) has been quoted for example, from Papuan,
where the velar in voka 'coffee' varies (or varied) between kh, kx, g, and y,
or the French of the Ardennes, where l'eau 'water' can (or could) be [lot:J],
[lou], or [lao]. When a particular variant is given social interpretation, it becomes
an index of that group. In the same way, animal sounds are indexes of the
corresponding animals, and this index is often reproduced iconically in language
in naming the animal (onomatopoeia). Similarly in culture, variation can become
a social index, as in a particular clothing fashion. If a group which shows
social cohesion through pronunciation indexicality has wider appeal, its pro-
nunciation will be imitated; that is, others try to produce the index as iconically
as they can. This represents the combination 'pronunciation pronunciation'
which was missing in §§ 2.14, 2.15 (see end of§ 21.4). Again, the same happens
in culture, say the imitation of fashions if it is not proscribed (e.g., the imitation
of royal insignia, and so on). If on the other hand a group is stigmatized for
its pronunciation by a more prestigious group, it may ultimately give up its
index for the prestige model. Such indexes need not be absolute but can be
statistical parameters; that is, one throws in the index at the proper frequency
(see Figure 3-1, §§ 3.3, 3.5). This easily results in hypercorrection by those who
try to belong to the prestige group. They overdo the index. A similar reaction
in nonlinguistic culture (and scientific schools) is typified by the aphorism:
"The Irish are more Catholic than the Pope." This is also why upstarts, or
social climbers, are often easily spotted.
Much of this index identification is subconscious, but at times it reaches the
level of awareness. Even linguistically naive speakers can brand pronunciations
as vulgar, soft, hard, coarse, and so on. (N.B.: To do this they thus use indexes/
metonyms and icons/metaphors!) Indeed, misinterpretation of the index can
lead to serious misunderstanding among different groups. Young people may
interpret the pronunciation of older people as pompous and authoritarian, and
older people that of the young as provocative and irresponsible. An American
can interpret the British intonation as patronizing and insulting. Practically
every "major" sound change since the seventeenth century was explicitly
discussed by French orthoepists. This shows the struggle of variants and their
social implications, and, of course, reveals that the whole situation could be
observed. The first occurrence of English labialization wa > WJ is attested from
1640. In 1766 Buchanan used J in some words (ward, warn, want) and <e or a
in others (wabble, wad, wallop). In 1780 Sheridan connected the pronunciation
of quality with J with the meaning 'people of high social rank', whereas, in its
abstract meaning, the old ;e remained. In 1633 there was apparently no difference
in the vowels between good and blood, both with u·. Later in the seventeenth
century, when short u > A, the long u· was in the process of being shortened
(attested already in 1569 for good). Now this variation u'"'"' u· interfered with
the change (variation) u >A. Those words where the long variant was more
frequent were not affected, except by the later shortening (good), but those in
which the short u was dominant underwent u > A (blood). Thus the apparent
double outcome depends on the overlap of two sound changes, which went on
as synchronic variation in the grammars. In 1747 Johnson sometimes had
difficulty in deciding the proper pronunciation for his rhyming dictionary, for
example, whether great rhymed with state or seat. The best speaker in the
House of Lords decided without hesitation for (st)ate = (gr)eat, and the best
speaker in the House of Commons likewise for (s)eat = (gr)eat. These English
examples have shown three facts: (1) variation and change can spread from
word to word and need not be simultaneous throughout the vocabulary, (2)
statistics/frequency does play a role, and (3) identification with a social layer
exists.
In French, many grammarians have recorded the alternation we '"'"' wa (loi
'law', and so on). The variant wa occurred in monosyllabic words, and in
polysyllabic words before rand 1. The upper classes condemned wa and regarded
we the only acceptable pronunciation. Toward the end of the eighteenth century,
both pronunciations were almost on equal footing. When Louis XVIII, who
had fled in 1791, came back in 1814, and uttered: C'est moe /e roe (i.e., we),
he was quickly told that in his absence this pronunciation had become vulgar
and provincial. In other words, the complete social upheaval of the French
revolution reversed the social value. This is often true when new social classes
come to political power.
[9.11] Information on the interrelationship between variation/change and

social meaning can be gleaned not only from the orthoepists of the past. William
Labov has shown in studies of Martha's Vineyard and New York City that
the same situation obtains everywhere. There is a close correlation between a
speaker's ethnic background, profession, age level, and so on. Let us review
briefly the pronunciation of the diphthongs Iail and Iau! in Martha's Vineyard.
The phonetic characteristic of these diphthongs is centralization of the first
part, maybe all the way to [;J]. At the time of the New England dialect survey,
1933, laul showed very little centralization, whereas !ail was [;)I]. This situation
had apparently existed a long time before that. The island is divided into two
social sectors, a rural up-island, and a down-island with three small towns.
Up-island is characteri~ed by a high degree of centralization in both !ail and
laul, but centralization occurs in one of the down-island towns in a more
restricted measure, particularly in words such as right, white, wife, but not so
much in others, for example, time, while, I, my. Both phonetic conditioning and
particular words are involved, exactly as in the English and French examples
already quoted. A centralization index is calculated by assigning the value 0
(to [a]) and 3 (to [~]), with two steps in between. Centralization indexes by age
groups are as follows:*
jAij jAuj
over 75 0.25 0.22
61-75 0.35 0.37
46-60 0.62 0.44
31-45 0.81 0.88
14-30 0.37 0.46
In 1933 the centralization for jail was about 0.86, for jaul only 0.06. For jauj,
centralization has been steadily rising. There is a clear difference in the geo-
graphical distribution as well:
jAij jAuj
Down-island 0.35 0.33
Up-island 0.61 0.66
or occupation
Fishermen 1.00 0.79
Farmers 0.32 0.22
Others 0.41 0.57
Labov gives such indexes for ethnic groups also, but the most revealing is the
correlation of centra:lization with the attitude of the speaker toward the island.
The indexes for four 15-year-old high school students are: down-island and
leaving 0.00-0.40 and 0.00-0.00, up-island and staying 0.90-1.00 and 1.13-1.19.
With those people who feel very strongly about the island, the index can go
even beyond 2.00. In general the attitude test gives the following centralization
averages:
NO. OF PERSONS jAij jAuj
40 Positive 0.63 0.62
19 Neutral 0.32 0.42
6 Negative 0.09 0.08
The immediate meaning of centralization is 'Vineyarder'; it indicates group

cohesion. The total cli~tribution of such index shapes correlates quite well also
with other factors of social interaction on the island. Here again we see that
statistics is a factor in the measurement of social indexes and that symmetry has
been achieved for the phonological space by letting jaul go the same way as jaij.
Similar findings are recorded from New York City (see Figure 3-1, § 3.3;
compare § 14.4).
* The tabular material in§ 9.11 reproduced by permission from William Labov, "The social
motivation for sound change," Word, 19, 273-309 (1963).
[9.12 Change and the Social Setting] The social setting shows a common
mechanism of change. A feature is adopted by a group as a social index. Now,
understanding why a particular feature should be involved at a particular time
is beyond us, exactly like predicting fashions. If a group becomes a reference
group for some other, the latter will accept the index and exaggerate it. Hyper-
correction further spreads the feature, perhaps in combination with structural
symmetry. This establishes a new norm when the social situation stabilizes,
which again can serve as a model for other groups. Equally important is the
acknowledgment and realization of the heterogenousness of the transmission of
a change. It may be individual or occasional and it may first affect women or
young people, sailors or farmers, individual words or word classes (e.g., verbs
or certain semantic fields), and so on (see § 6.8). All this makes it possible for
many irregular forms to come into being "regularly," for example, the pronun-
ciation of good vs. blood. That is, grammatically irregular forms have a regular
explanation in terms of the relations in the speech community. Linguistic change
cannot be understood without data from the speech community, because lan-
guage exists for the community, is maintained by it, and refers to the culture
of the community. Sublinguistic (e.g., allophonic or individual) fluctuation is
given noncognitive social meaning, and this results in sound change. When one
variant wins out at the end, ultimate regularity is produced, if one excepts
certain irregularities here and there.
The particular cultural setting may involve a long history of writing. This
creates the additional possibilities of spelling pronunciation and archaisms,
which are loans from earlier stages of the same language. Semantic change, in
particular, emphasized that linguistic structure alone is not sufficient for the
unfolding of linguistic change. The causality of change resides in a complicated
texture of social, physiological, psychological, phonological (and other systemic)
factors. It is clearly wrong to seek only one factor which would explain every-
thing. One must acknowledge the psychological factor to be the strongest one-
that is, the general tendency toward simplicity and symmetry. It is also clear
that this chapter has been a general summary of the preceding ones, and that
we have continued to discuss more the 'how' than the 'why' of change. Nonethe-
less, the factors that have been delineated are all we have at the moment, and,
on the whole, it seems plausible that such factors combine to give causes of
change.
[9.13 Teleology of Change] In fact, it has not been enough to refer to

only 'how' or 'why' (for what reason) in linguistic change. We have also asked
the question 'for what purpose'. The same combination of questions must also
be used in biology, in the study of living organisms (Chapter 22). It is the nature
of the organism to be oriented toward the change that occurs. This "nature"
influences the range and direction of change that can occur. Possible changes
are added to others, which together are the' causes' toward which the developing
organism is drawn. In other words, the 'causes' are the results, the purpose.
In cases like this, one speaks of goal-directed behavior, teleology, or entelechy
(having the end in itself). And language is also a teleological or goal-directed

system, exactly like human culture, that is, all aspects of the specifically human
environment.
The "purpose" of language is to keep functioning through time and in any
new cultural environments within the boundaries of human mental capacities.
Causes and results entwine to ensure both the survival of the system and the
self-reproduction of the system. In other words, finalistic and causal influences
are closely connected. (As in biology, outside factors also play a role.) The
mechanisms of this teleological purpose are various kinds of iconic (diagram-
matic) or indexical relations. In linguistic change, an observable tendency toward
a goal is known as drift. As in biology, it takes a form of complex synchroniza-
tion, for example, loss of inflection with increased use of prepositions and word
order in English. It is also understandable why two related languages can go
different ways. If they both start out from a particular imbalance, say, a "hole"
of some kind in any level of grammar, one may fill it, the other may eliminate
the odd term. Or they can independently resort to the same remedy, and the
result will look as if it had been inherited in both. A good formal imbalance is
the indication of the Slavic genitive plural. Proto-Slavic (and Old Church
Slavic) had three forms, -u, -m:u (see § 7.13), and -lji, the first being the most
frequent and widespread in declensions. With the loss of -u, the most frequent
marker became zero, creating literally a hole in the system. Now, in every Slavic
language zero has lost ground and is no longer the dominant form in any of
them. The languages inherited the triggering for the same drift, and although
the individual replacements have been different, they are, nonetheless, similar
to a great degree.
[9.14 Sound Change and Language Learning] It has been mentioned that
language is one manifestation of an innate ability to analogize(§ 7.8), and that
children, in particular, introduce analogical creations (§§ 3.3, 5.2, 5.4, 5.14).
The contribution by children to linguistic change may be quite considerable;
it is difficult to know its exact scope, however, because tradition usually prevails.
Linguists stated early that one of the chief factors of sound change is 'imperfect
learning' by children. The reason for this might well be biological/psychological;
that is, there may be an innate natural system of phonological processes,
manifested particularly in the postbabbling period. This innate system is gradu-
ally modified by linguistic experience so that the child comes closer and closer
to the standard; if he fails to any degree, change results. An innate system would
also explain the implicational laws or scales presented in § 6.5.
Such a 'natural phonology' (Stampe) is the first language of the child, a
kind of "innate speech defect," which automatically produces a substratum
effect in the acquisition of the pronunciation of the community. The child masters
the underlying phonological units earlier than he can produce all the contrasts.
Surface contrasts are eliminated through the application of the processes of
the innate system. Thus there is a "biological" pull toward the language-
innocent state of affairs and a social pull toward the language of the community.
Many linguists believe that the former is the more important factor and often
state it in the slogan: "Children simplify (restructure) grammars, adults com-
plicate them." The way adults "borrow" phonetic change (§§ 9.10, 9.11),
however, is no different in mechanism from language acquisition. In both cases
there is regular sound substitution (see § 8.4; Figure 8-1), although the inter-
ference comes from different sources. The regularity of substitution, of course,
results in the regularity of sound change. Such an innate sound system is also
compatible with the fact that sometimes change is very radical indeed.
When the child fails to suppress some innate process that does not apply in
the standard language, phonetic change occurs which looks like an addition
to the standard grammar. One of the natural rules appears to be that word-final
obstruents are devoiced, and English speakers must unlearn it (in contrast with
German speakers, for example). If they fail in this, the language gets an "addi-
tion," for example, d > t: [b~:·d] > [b~:·t] 'bed' (which, in fact, has become
standard in some Appalachian dialects). The word still remains distinct from
[b~:t] bet, because the lengthening of the vowel before voiced stops carries the
contrast jbe·tf vs. /bet/. The lengthening had been copied correctly (see§ 10.4),
which automatically "orders" it before the devoicing in the synchronic applica-
tion of rules. The innate application is unordered (strives toward perfect un-
marking), and thus synchronic order would result from the order in which
particular distinctions are copied from the standard language. (This is parallel
to the possible different chronology in dialect borrowing;§ 14.8.) An unordered
application of vowel lengthening and devoicing would produce [bat] for both
'back' and 'bad', but when vowel lengthening is applied first we get [bat]
'back' and [ba·t] 'bad', as above. Here again we see that our descriptive
mechanisms of change (or rather diachronic correspondences, § 6.22) look
totally different from the point of view of language acquisition; that is, they are
not historical explanations. The apparent addition, generalization, and unorder-
ing of processes arise in the child's failure to suppress, limit, or order processes
of the innate system, to the extent required by the standard language.
Such a natural phonology is the exact opposite of the empirist tabula rasa.
In spite of the "neatness" and the dramatic appeal of the hypothesis, it is highly
controversial; it serves, however, as a modern example of bold reasoning into
the causes of sound change. (We have not discussed those earlier attempts now
proved unfruitful-climate, geography, and so on.)
[9.15 Rules, Sound Change, and !conicity] Because all the different
mechanisms of change are so heavily diagrammatic (analogical), and because
change is, in general, connected with iconicity and indexicality, the traditional
interpretation of sound change as something very different would, if true, be
quite noteworthy. On the contrary, it is notable that sound change is indexical,
and iconic (especially in its spread). Since rules are largely iconic, and since
phonological rules handle the commutations, associations, and distributions of
distinctive features, they are iconic as well. They represent the relations in the
hierarchy of distinctive features and are thus diagrammatic (see §§ 1.13-1.16).
The function of phonological rules within the phonological system is to produce

overt signs of the distinctive-feature relations that define the phonemes. Allo-
phonic variation and neutralization are such overt signs (at the time they are
introduced). Ukrainian assimilates its obstruents to following voicing, for
example, [s] ~ [z] / -[b], [proz'ba] 'request', but not to following voiceless-
ness: [duzka] 'handle'. Russian does both, in addition to utterance-final devoic-
ing. This shows that the Ukrainian opposition is [tense] vs. [lax], Russian
[voiced] vs. [voiceless]. Serbo-Croatian is like Russian except for its Jack of
final devoicing and thus provides no evidence for the nature of its distinctive
features. Pure phonetic evidence might still tell the features in question. The
fact that English initial voiced stops show delayed onset of voicing characteris-
tically indicates that the relevant feature is [lax] and not [voice] (§ 10.3). In
contrast Russian voicing starts immediately and represents [voice]. In this way
we do indeed have diagrams of the feature hierarchies. (Note that this diagram-
matic axis is different from lexical or semantic representation through a limited
number of phonemes [§ 1.14]. The most striking case of the latter is Semitic in
which consonant sequences represent lexical meanings and vowels grammatical
meanings, for example, Arabic /k-t-b/ 'write', /kataba/ 'he wrote', /ka·tib/
'writing [person]', /kita·bf 'book', and so on [see the end of§ 8.4], although
there are of course also affixes, for example, /ma-ktab/ 'place for writing,
study', and /katab-at/ 'she wrote'.)
The diagrammatic aspect of sound change is clearest in phonetic analogy
(sound analogy), which takes place irrespective of meaning (see §§ 4.20, 5.1,
5.3). This is the factor that makes sporadic sound change regular in the end
(compare § 9.10), that is, a particular outcome in a particular environment is
generalized. The process is the easier the more natural the rules involved are
(§ 9.14). Note that the rebus principle is also a particular kind of analogy
without conceptual meaning, unless we want to speak of visual meaning (§ 5.3).
In the following we will see how distinctive-feature hierarchies are subject to
reanalysis in the same way as other linguistic hierarchies are.
[9.16 Abduction, Language Learning, and Change] The references to

induction and deduction in change (e.g., § 5.6) need refinement, because there
are actually three modes of reasoning or argument. The natural order of the
logic of the syllogism is the following:
RULE: All men are mortal. (major premise)

CASE: Socrates was a man. (minor premise)
RESULT: Socrates was mortal. (conclusion)
This inference is deductive. Now, induction is inference with the order of the
procedure reversed: we infer the rule from the case and the result. But the most
common type of reasoning is hypothetical inference, in which the rule and the
result are given and we infer the case. This is abduction, the everyday logic par
excellence. It is extremely fallible (all modes of reasoning are, to some degree),

but people go on using it even though it gives correct results only part of the
time. Man seems to have an instinct for abduction. Abduction is a reasoned
guess as to how a surprising observed fact may have come about and is conse-
quently an 'explanation'; it is an act of insight, coming to us in a flash. It is the
idea of putting together what we never thought of connecting before. It suggests
that something may be; unlike the other modes of inference it introduces a
new idea. Any learning or understanding must be by abduction. Its purpose is to
stand as the basis for, or to represent, predictions. The purpose of deduction is to
infer those predictions, and the purpose of induction is to test them. These are
the steps for solving any problem by the methods of science. Abduction is
always a gamble, whereas deduction, with little risk and low return never
introduces anything new. In short, abduction suggests that something is the
case, that something may be; deduction proves that something must be; and
induction tests to show that something actually is.
Thus the various changes usually called 'inductive' in this book and elsewhere
are actually 'abductive'. This is how a grammar or language is learned. Every-
body has to abduce his own grammar from the output of other grammars; in
this situation ambiguities can be newly resolved. The essential link (which
repeats itself indefinitely) can be diagrammed thus according to H. Andersen:*
Universals
r------------------,
:I Grammar 1 II Grammar2
L--------- ----------~
Output2
Grammar 2 is inferred from Universals (the major premise) and Output 1 (the
minor premise) by abduction; if Grammar 2 is different from Grammar 1, we
may speak of abductive change. Output 2 is inferred or derived from Universals
and Grammar 2; if Output 2 is different from Output 1, we may speak of
deductive change. Note that deduction is always an experiment. In language
the test is whether Output 2 is acceptable to speakers who produce Output 1.
If it is, the general rule has been verified: the two grammars are the same for
practical needs, although they may be drastically different in structure.
Although the exact nature of the language universals is still unknown, their
existence is a certainty, and they are connected with man's innate capacity to
learn a language. We have at least seen some of the cornerstones of the uni-
versals, scattered throughout the preceding chapters. The most important one
• The diagram reproduced by permission of Henning Andersen.

is' one meaning, one form' (e.g.§ 9.3), which need not be repeated here. We have
seen various assimilation phenomena and other phonetic processes (Chapter 4;
see also§ 16.8) and marking conventions which somehow represent universals
(§§ 6.20, 6.21, 9.8, 9.9). Then, there is a universal phonetics (§§ 6.5, 9.14) and
articulatory balance between units(§ 9.7).
Many linguists have posited a particular 'language acquisition device'
(LAD) that would handle language learning alone. But there is no need for a
separate learning device or autonomous mechanism like that. Language ac-
quisition is a process of socialization and not verbalization alone. Language is
just one facet of the human capacity for analogizing (§§ 7.8, 9.14), in other
words, the human capacity for abduction. Significantly, diagrams for language
learning devices (to process the speech signals) tend to have compartments
corresponding to abduction, deduction, and induction. Perceptual differentiation
comes earliest and this leads to a discovery of perceptual values (abduction).
Then these values are given an articulatory optimization to find and produce the
favored contrasts; this is discovery of articulatory values ("creative behavior,"
deduction), aided by a device that handles articulatory balance (§§ 6.4, 9.3,
9.6, 9.7, 9.9). The principle of perceptual differentiation maximizes the degree
of perceptual contrast, and the principle of least effort minimizes articulatory
expenditure. The balance between these two factors keeps the phonology natural,
"easy-to-hear" and" easy-to-say." Finally there is interaction with the environ-
ment and adult speech in general that leads to normalization (induction).
This is quite correct, except that we must allow for the learning of culture at the
same time. Our diagram in fact does this; it is a general acquisition and learning
diagram. Note that the order of learning phonology is hierarchically ordered in
that first come sentence units, then words, unanalyzable syllables, and last,
distinctive features and segments. This exhibits a striking parallelism to the
development of the alphabet(§§ 2.7-2.11), or even language(§§ 1.27, 1.28).
Chapter 4 treated the mapping of sounds into other sounds, for example,
t > e, which looks as if Output 1 has been directly changed into Output 2.
But this was just a convenience of description. Similarly, the diachronic corre-
spondence rules of Chapter 6 took Grammar 1 directly to Grammar 2. Historical
change actually must go through abduction; this was more clearly seen in our
discussion of morphology and semantics (e.g., §§ 5.6, 5.16, 6.13-6.15, 6.19,
6.22, 6.23, 7.4), but the same is true of sounds also. Sounds cannot be shifted
directly on the articulatory scale (Chapter 4, and Figures 1-3, 1-4) in spite of
the convenience of such terminology. The child cannot learn all the articulatory
facts-many are simply not visible-but he has to abduce the sounds from his
perception. Here the child is well equipped since he can distinguish rather early
between features and things he cannot yet produce (primates and some other
animals have this ability as well). Articulatory space and ease do produce
random variation on which social forces feed (§ 9.11), but this happens through
abduction. Only in this way can we give a natural explanation for changes
like x > f (genoh > enough, hleahhan > laugh), f > x, e > f (§ 4.2 I); the child
reinterprets the acoustic signal. Thus, after the Pre-Greek *kw gave *kw > *kY
before i (§§ 6.16, 18.13), we had more or less the following acoustic scale with p,
t, and k: [t- kY(i) I k - kw(u) I kw(o) - p]. At some point somebody inferred
that [kY] could be taken as a variant of a dental, [kwu] as [ku], and [kwo] as
[po ]. This abduction was successful; we end up with p - t - k as indicated by
the vertical divisions above. Of course there is a fair amount of "articulatory
justification" in this, but as cases like x ;c f show, the auditory justification is
more powerful. This is why a reduction of an acoustic scale [t - p' I p] in a
Czech dialect into t - p is not so exotic after all (in the standard dialect p'
merged with p, which is more "normal" or natural). In general, near homoph-
ony can easily lead to a merger, also in terms of words. We have seen how the
Old English high vowel scale [i - y I u] was reduced to i - u by merging i and
y (§§ 4.5, 4.12, 4.13, 4.22). This is a reversal in the distinctive feature hierarchy.
As long as y was a clearly derived unit, rounding was the primary feature. At
some point frontness was inferred as basic, and this led to i quite naturally
through Universals (front vowels are characteristically unrounded). To take
another example, the voicing of intervocalic consonants is a natural assimilation
(articulatory ease, the speaker's "lazy tongue") that can easily catch on. Once
[voice] is interpreted as the primary feature, voiceless variants are likely to
disappear (compare§ 6.13).
Reversal of basic and derived features is particularly clear in the fading of
metaphors and so on(§§ 7.9, 7.15). The cultural situation allows for the learning
of base and derived forms separately or in the reverse order of the actual
history (irrigate [§ 5.5], counting one's beads [§§ 7.4, 7.15]). We see again that
culture change is parallel to linguistic change: there too boundaries shift
through abduction (§§ 7.3, 21.8). More generally, culture and human semiotic
systems show markedness reversal in marked contexts. As an example, consider
the distinction between formal and casual dress. In the everyday situation formal
wear is marked and casual clothes unmarked, but in the marked context of a
festive occasion, the values of formal and casual clothes are reversed (compare
other reversals in§ 21.13). Similarly, in the marked context of the underworld or
war killing can be unmarked activity. We have already seen how such facts
guide semantic change in terms of social jargons(§ 7.5). But the same phenom-
enon is operative in syntax also. In the marked subjunctive mood, the past vs.
present opposition (they knew vs. they know) is neutralized; the normally
marked past tense is used to the exclusion of the present (/ wish they knew).
The number opposition (they were vs. he was) is also neutralized here so that
the normally marked number is used to the exclusion of the unmarked number
(/wish he were).
Now we can profitably return to the German syllable-final devoicing. We
saw that devoicing was a sign of neutralization into the unmarked voiceless
member in Russian (§ 9.15). German manifests the features [tense] vs. [lax]
and hence the unmarked member should be [lax]. But note that this phenom-
enon occurs in syllable-final position. This position is marked in respect to
syllable-initial position. The order of learning syllable types goes (1) ev, (2)
eve, (3) ve, and (4) V. Voicing is learned earlier in syllable-initial position;
for example, when an English-speaking child can already produce [buk] 'book'
he goes on saying [pik] 'pig' (compare§ 9.14). We see now that in the German
case the usually marked member of the opposition takes up unmarked behavior
in the marked position of the syllable. Thus "devoicing" turns out to be
another misnomer which has to be taken as a traditional term.
Another universal factor in change is syllable structure. We have seen its
influence as a conditioning factor in terms of open and closed syllables or
various cluster rules. The assignment of syllable boundaries (and not only the
learning of syllable types) tends to be rather universal, although there are
language-specific differences (§§ 4.6, 4.7, 4.16, ll.l9). Syllable structure does
not only guide sound change, it can also be its target. The most unmarked
syllable structure is CV (open syllables only). Slavic seems to have had a "con-
spiracy" toward CV (drift, teleology) in its passage from Proto-Indo-European
to Proto-Slavic. Three changes are mainly responsible for producing open
syllables: (1) metathesis of liquids, CerCV > CreCV (§ 4.18), (2) monophthon-
gization CeyCV > CiCV, CewCV > CuCV, and CenCV > C~CV, and (3)
cluster simplification, for example, Pre-Slavic *supnos > sunu 'sleep, dream',
where both closed syllables drop the final consonant. The language ends up
with open syllables only (compare the Rotuman loss of one syllable or length;
§§ 4.6, 4.7, Figure 6-l: B). On the other hand, all the modern languages have
reverted to complicated clusters (by syncope), that is, a marked state of
affairs.
[9.17] Of course, it may take a long time before the change gets established
for good. Let us look at one more example of restructuring (§§ 6.13- 6.15,
6.19). Many English dialects have an underlying diphthong JyuJ after dentals:
ftyuwnf tune, Jnyuwf new, and so on. In some dialects the glide is considerably
weakened, so that it has been inferred as being an irrelevant accompaniment to
the dental. This leads to restructured forms like JnuJ without the glide: /nuw/
new. If this output is not acceptable to the community, it can be corrected into
the "proper" JnyUJ. Another possibility is to keep JnUJ and to add a patch-up
rule g ~ y after dentals to pacify the community. Now the outcome is again an
acceptable fnyuw f new. But the problem is that the rule applies only in certain
words which have to be specially learned (compare § 3.3), and thus hyper-
correction can creep in: Jnyuwnf for noon (which never had JyuJ). As time goes
by, such a patch-up rule is gradually eroded, because a person who was forced
to put it up has little or no reason to require it from his own children, and so on.
Somewhere on the line the patch-up rule can be omitted, as our predictions
would tell us.
Let us look at another typical readjustment. An English-speaking child
learns early a base form foot and a pluralization rule with -s (frequency and
basic meanings). He can now predict a plural foot-s(§ 6.21; the grammar gives
the -s rule, and the universals, 'one meaning, one form') . But this deduction is
not accepted by the community, and he has to redo it. Normally he does not
want to abandon his first attempt completely, but patches it up as feet-s
(compare § 5.4). Finally he learns that this is one of those cases that "defy
reason." This is a case without any danger of changing the underlying form.
Note that a reinterpretation of distinctive features is obligatory for an adult
borrower (§ 8.5). This shows that features are more important than segmental
units (which must be combinations of features).
[9.18] Folk etymology and semantic change show most clearly the short-
cuts abduction helps to make; even completely "unjustified" extrapolation can
become successful. The reversals in base and derived values we have seen are
by no means rare. If the historically derived form is the most frequent one or
otherwise represents basic morphological, syntactic, or semantic categories, it is
natural for the learner to take it as basic and derive the original form from it in
reverse (if alternation is not leveled out altogether). This is inverse derivation
(compare "inverse spelling" [§ 2.6] and "inverted reconstruction" [§ 18.14]),
the exact reverse of the original history, that is, history: a > b I -c, inverse
derivation: b ~a I- non-e (see the form of rules in §§ 6.7-6.10), which is a
synchronic process.
In the Yiddish revoicing phenomenon we saw how a base form (voiced stop)
asserted itself also on the surface (§ 4.27). Similarly, the German vowel length-
ening in the nominative singular proves that the derived long vowel in the
majority of the paradigm (one kind of frequency) had apparently been reanalysed
as basic, and it thus surfaced everywhere. Note also the role of frequency in
the reversal of markings in the pluralization of final-spirant nouns in English
(§ 6.21). When alternation is eliminated no inversion remains. But it is clearly
there in cases where the alternation is extended beyond the original items. The
preconsonantal lbet<JI better is more frequent than the prevocalic lbet<Jr/, and
was clearly taken as basic whereby the /r/ became an automatic transition
sound, and thus spread (§ 5.3). Of the various final -n deletion cases let us look
at English mine fmaynl (§ 4.24). Like lbet<J/, my was the original preconsonantal
derived form which came to be taken as basic, whereby the /n/ in mine was
reinterpreted as a derived predicative marker. And again, in some dialects it
has spread into other persons: his'n, her'n, our'n, and so on (the alternation is
made "purposeful use" of;§ 5.21). This is the same process that gave the final
stop in Estonian kuusk (§ 5.3). Some Estonian words even switch consonants
after d > 0 and g > 0 (§ 5.9). The derived form, 0, is taken as basic and we get
a reversal 0 ~ d and 0 ~g. We know this from the fact that sometimes the
wrong stop is reestablished: d > 0 ~ g, and vice versa.
Proto-Indo-European had a large number of roots of the shape CeRC
(§ 4.18), for example, Greek derk- 'see' (or English help), but relatively few
roots of the type CReC, for example, Greek trep- 'turn' (or English break;
see § 12.3). From such shapes another root variant was derived by the deletion
of the vowel, e ~ 0, whereby both CeRC and CReC result in Cf!.C. Thus in
Sanskrit, where e > a, we have the deletion as a~ 0: dars ~ drs 'see', kalp ~
kfp 'be adapted', myak$ ~ mik$ 'mix', and mrad ~ mrd 'crush', and so on.
These derived forms without a hold the majority in morphology, and came to be
taken as basic. The deletion rule was reversed in that now the vowel had to be
inserted in the grammatical environments where it had originally belonged. But
the vowel was inserted according to the majority pattern CeRC, and thus goes
always before the medial resonant: mik~ ~ *mayk~ > mek~, mrd ~ mard, and
so on. The old base form, if not ultimately lost, is often relexicalized into a
separate root not subject to vowel alternation at all, for example, myak~ 'join,
belong to' (compare§ 17.9).
One of two possible word orders is often called 'inverted'. This implies that
also linguists take the other one as basic. Reversal of word order easily occurs if
the frequency and the semantics are right. Even more peculiar are cases like the
Finnish head and attribute switches (§§ 5.17, 6.22, 7.13), although they can be
explained through abduction, the main force of syntactic change (§ 19.5). In
syntactic change a single case leads to a new syntactic pattern, where:as the
matter is quite different elsewhere in grammar, because a single direction may
be lacking. Linguists (and other scientists) have not been willing to acknowledge
abduction because of its unpredictability. Only when its results are regular have
they been happy to formalize the situation post facto, bypassing the actual
abductive link. But such regularity is "accidental" and does not represent the
essence of abduction (e.g.§§ 5.9, 5.10).
[9.19 Conclusion and Transition] Reasoning is basically diagrammatic,

and this is why analogy must be used in all sciences (§ 5.19), in all the modes
of reasoning: abduction, deduction, and induction. For Peirce the three modes
of reasoning complement each other, which is quite parallel to his triad of sign
types (§ 1.16). This works out very well in genetic linguistics, as we will see in
turning to comparative linguistics, which is basically inductive. We will no
longer refer to these matters, except in passing (e.g. § 10.6), and no distinction
between induction and abduction will be drawn (to lessen complications for
those who start with Part III). Why comparative linguistics is inductive is this:
We have a hypothesis that certain facts can be explained from a common origin.
If this is so, we can predict certain things (e.g., certain similarity, certain corre-
spondences), and finally put the predictions to test (e.g., through the comparative
method). Thus we put the universals of Part II to test in connection with certain
languages. We quite legitimately expect that languages behave like languages.
Abduction is certainly psychologically real, although we might get to know the
particular cases only accidentally. It also explains why the actuation problem of
change cannot be perfectly solved (compare § 9.5), because it is not a purely
linguistic question, but a much wider one of human perception and reasoning.
On the other hand, it explains the common core of change mechanisms (§ 9.2)
and analogy in analysis (§ 18.16). Note that like folk etymology such analysis
can be "wrong" (ridefrid [§§ 10.7, 10.16], serps [§§ 17.5, 17.6]).
At present we do not know how much a speaker knows about his language,
and thus we cannot draw a clear boundary between synchrony and diachrony
(compare § 18.17). Whenever a phonemic rule becomes a morphophonemic one,
that is, loses its phonetic motivation(§ 6.21), it is prone to lose its psychological
reality altogether (restructuring). Since our purpose is to retrieve history, our

emphasis has been throughout past-oriented in that historical relics have been
pointed out beyond conscious associations. Synchronic grammar is not past-
oriented to that degree, and thus cases like cleanfcleanse, heat/hot, opaque/
opacity, and so on (§§ 5.8, 5.14, 6.21, 6.24, 7.9 [Figure 7-4:E-F], 7.13, 10.7-
10.9, 17.5, 18.17), can become a form of suppletion, similar to borrowings from
related languages (§ 8.12). Such forms may belong together through various
degrees of association(§ 5.14), but need not. This is another feature of abduction,
difficult of formalization. It is parallel to the difficulty of formalizing folk
etymology, in fact, both represent one and the same thing. Folk etymology,
however, is at least future-oriented like linguistic change or language in general
(§§ 1.16, 9.13, 18.16). Much confusion has arisen from the fact that linguists
have tried to use past-oriented models to predict change (Hjelmslev [§ 12.6],
Chomsky and Halle).
Very doubtful is also synchronic rule ordering as a psychological reality
(§§ 6.5, 6.6, 6.15, 6.16, 6.25, 10.15), because the real momentum seems to be
abduction and perhaps unordering (§ 9.14; some rules are persistent, whether
biologically or in a language-specific manner, e.g., diphthongization in tieq
[§ 6.17]). Again, attention to such ordering questions highlights our difficulties
with relative chronology (§§ 6.1-6.4), a prime goal in genetic linguistics. Another
warning of inadequate synchronic theory will be given in the form of diacritics
like [+native] which were fashionable in the 1960s (§ 10.16).
As we now turn to the historical methods we must remember that we will
press them beyond the point where speakers themselves stop, because we are
learning how to retrieve history, and not psychological reality in a more limited
frame. Language learners are indeed to a degree internal-reconstruction machines
and comparative-method machines (§ 13.7). It is the linguist's task, especially
in synchrony, to find out where speakers stop using the methods. Thus in the
English examples to follow(§§ 10.7- 10.9) the method goes beyond synchronic
reality, but seems to remain within legitimate synchronic bounds for Finnish and
Lapp(§§ 10.11-10.14).
REFERENCES
9.2 Stern 1931, Vachek 1962; 9.3 Menner 1936, Jespersen 1941, Labov 1970,
Coates 1968; 9.4 Goossens 1969; 9.5 Dressler 1969b; 9.6 Martinet 1958, 1964,
Moulton 1960, 1961, 1970, Sieberer 1964, E. ltkonen 1966, P. Ivic (private
communication); 9.7 Labov 1971; 9.8 Zipf 1965, King 1967, Manczak 1968,
1969, Weijnen 1969, Onishi 1969, Greenberg 1969b; 9.9 J. Harris 1969, Cairns
1969, Vennemann 1971; 9.10 Joos 1952, Fonagy 1956-1957, 1967, Wang 1969,
Chen and Hsieh 1971; 9.11 Labov 1963, 1965; 9.12 Weinreich and Labov and
Herzog 1968, Labov 1970 and in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11, Anshen 1970,
Malkiel 1967; 9.13 Sapir 1921, Scur 1966, Greenberg 1969a; 9.14 Halle 1962,
Stampe 1969, Martinet (ed.) 1968, Graur (ed.) 3.127-200; 9.15 Andersen 1966,
1969, Shapiro 1969, 1970; 9.16 Peirce 1955, Knight 1965, Andersen 1969, 1972,
(lecture" Abductive and deductive change") 1971, RatHer Engell970, Lindblom
1971 , Coates 1968; 9.17 Andersen (lecture) 1971; 9.18 Anttila 1969b; 9.19
Knight 1965.
PART III
COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS
(GENERAL NOTIONS AND
STRUCTURE):
HOW CAN CHANGE
BE REVERSED?
CHAPTER 10
PRELIMINARIES TO THE
HISTORICAL METHODS
Comparative linguistics bases itself on the regularity of

sound change either to classify languages or to reconstruct
earlier stages (§ 1.18). Because sounds develop regularly,
it is possible to use well-defined methods to bring them back
together regularly. These methods are variants of the
normal synchronic methods of establishing sound units,
phonemic and morphophonemic analysis, which will later
be taken into historical contexts and renamed.
PHONEMIC ANALYSIS
[10.1 The Rise of Phonemics] As a countermeasure to the generally

rather inadequate orthographies of most languages, phoneticians, around the
turn ofthe century, developed transcription systems intended to be truly phonetic.
Such alphabets were supposed to accommodate any speech sound encountered
in the physical appearance of any language, and they are still, of course, a
must in linguistic analysis. But it was soon realized that one could never reach
the ultimate logical goal of one symbol for each sound in the sum total of all
known languages. This obstacle results from the fact that nobody pronounces
the "same sound" twice; that is, one would have to have a separate symbol for
each token in all the languages and not only for each type. A transcription that
records as much phonetic detail as possible is said to be narrow. It was further
noticed that no language taken on its own terms required a completely narrow
transcription. Such a transcription could be replaced by a broad one in which
most of the detail could be dropped while still maintaining an unambiguous
representation of the actual pronunciation of the language. The narrow tran-
scription belongs to the realm of general or universal phonetics, phonetics for
its own sake, whereas the principle of the broad transcription is language-
specific. A variant of it has in more recent times also been referred to as systematic
phonetics.
Thus, for a human analyst, a perfect narrow transcription was a dead end,
although (sound) spectrograms (visible speech) now render similar service.
The other end of phonetics, however, has been more amenable to linguistic
treatment. Here we encounter the question of how broad a phonetic transcription
can be without violating the functional distinctions made by the language.
Phonetics in this framework was called functional, and an enormous amount
207
208 CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
of work has been directed toward the principles and procedures for arriving
at this level of phonetics. These principles are generally known as phonemic
analysis, and the functional phonetic surface units as phonemes. Contrary to
general belief, the phoneme was intended as a practical (rather than theoretical)
help in writing down and analyzing the utterances of a language, with a minimum
of symbols and without sacrificing the relevant distinctions, because a key
permits an unambiguous mapping of the phonemes into the actual sounds and
vice versa. A phonemic notation is one that does not write any phonetic detail
that can be predicted from this notation. In other words, phonemic analysis is
a handy storing procedure when we do not want or need to carry around minute
phonetic detail in our operations. The key converts the phonemes back to sound
when necessary. This technique is similar to the dehydration of food, also for
practical purposes: water can be put back when needed. That is, these procedures
do not replace phonetics or water, they just do without them for some
purposes.
[10.2 Contrast and Minimal Pairs] The structure of phonemic analysis

will be very important in the other analytic techniques to be treated in subsequent
sections, and thus it will be useful to paraphrase it here briefly. (The procedures
we shall be discussing are also available in most elementary textbooks of
synchronic linguistics.) As was mentioned above, one correlates sound with
meaning to find out what sounds are used to differentiate meanings. Sounds
that occur in the same environments and distinguish words/morphemes are said
to contrast, for example, English [khrep] cap and [grep] gap. Sounds that occur
in the same environment without meaning or word differentiation, for example,
[grep, greph] gap are noncontrastive and belong to the same phoneme. In this
case, where the final labial of gap can be either aspirated or not, we have a case
of free variation. Often the distribution of the sounds is environmentally
restricted; for example, we have a front (palatal) [l(h] in keep before a front
vowel, a neutral [kh] in car before a low central vowel, and a back liproundish
[kwh] in cool before a back rounded vowel. In this case, we have complementary
distribution. Exchanging one k for another in these words, if for some reason
one would want to, does not make any functional difference in English; all
are members, variants, or (allo-)phones of one phoneme jkj. However, one
would indeed produce unnatural pronunciation, as the reader can eaily verify,
by positioning (placing) his tongue for keep and then pronouncing cool. Similarly,
the bright [I'] in light, the dark [l] in tell, the dorsal [L] in milk, and the voiceless
[!] in play occur in one lateral phoneme /1/ in English, but not so in Russian,
where the bright and dark/'s are not interchangeable, [stol'] 'so', [stol] 'table'-
hence separate phonemes /1'/ and /1/. The h's in hut, hot, hat, and hit are all
quite different, [hA, ha, hre, h1], in fact voiceless nonsyllabic vowels, [-}, <J, ~. !] ;
what is distinctive here is the voiceless glottal friction, its timbre being deter-
mined by the following vowel. There is thus only one phoneme /h/, which has
even more allophones than listed here.
Minimal pairs like cap vs. gap are very helpful to have, and English is full
PRELIMINARIES TO THE HISTORICAL METHODS 209
of them. The same is true of Finnish, in which all eight vowels can be defined
with a minimal octuple:
(1) (2) (3)

tikin 'of a stitch' tykin 'of a cannon' tukin 'of a stock'
tekin 'also ye' tokin 'I push' tokin 'with reindeer herds'
tiikin 'of a quilt' takin 'of a coat'
The situation requires eight different units (see Rotuman, § 4.6).

To sum up, according to one conception phonemes are classes of sounds,
sets of allophones, which contrast with other such classes (sets), for example,
English:
/k/ /1/ /h/
J((h) 1' {} keep leap heap
kW(h) Q coop loop hoop
k<h> L ~ carp (milk) harp
etc. (play)
etc. etc. etc.
This principle of contrast is in itself quite simple and normally leads to

satisfactory results. But in many cases the method (technique) of phonemic
analysis brings the linguist only so far. When the method has given all the
contrasts that it can, he will be completely on his own; he will then probably
do some adjustments in borderline cases on the basis of his criteria of overall
patterning, universals, and system slots, or his experience in general. That is,
the complete final phonemic analyses of two linguists may not agree in detail,
although a rigorous application of the analytic method might give both of them
practically the same results. This final indeterminacy is very important to
remember, not only because it has such a prominent role in linguistic literature,
where a reader must always find out for himself what kind of an analysis has
been used by the authors he consults, but also because it will recur in the purely
historical methods. As examples of these difficulties, let us review some typical
cases where the results of the method are retailored by the linguist.
[10.3 Postediting and the Role of the Linguist] One frequent indeter-
minacy in the area of segmental sounds is 'one or two phonemes' (unit or
cluster)? In English, [tsm] chin contrasts with [dzm] gin, ([thm] tin, [dm] din,
al)d [sm] shin). Because of patterning and other criteria, many linguists phonemi-
cize these as /cin/ and /Jin/, although /c/ never contrasts with the sequence ftsf.
The /c/-notation is still quite unambiguous: initially it is preceded by stress
onset, whereas /t/ and /s/ are separated by one (why choose vs. white shoes).
Here, then, many linguists are happy to remain below the level of strict phone-
mics, even when this stress onset can be written as a juncture or boundary;
2Io CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTics: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
that is, I+ cl vs. It + sl could as well and even better be I+ tsl vs. It + sl.
Often these junctures require grammatical information, and generally they are
used freely in editing the results of the method. In German, there are a few cases
where the palatal and velar spirants contrast, for example, [ku·9~n] Kuhchen
'little cow' and [ku·x~n] Kuchen 'cake, pastry'. The occurrence of the variants
can be predicted grammatically, and one generally writes the morpheme bound-
ary in Kuh + chen, that is, lku· + x~nl. Such pairs are peripheral in German,
it is true, and they always involve the diminutive, for example, Tauchen 'little
rope' vs. tau chen 'dive', Schlauchen 'little sly one' vs. schlauchen 'to use a hose
for filling a barrel', or almost minimal pairs in Pfauchen 'little peacock' vs.
fauchen 'hiss' and Frauchen 'little woman' vs. rauchen 'smoke'. It is also rather
difficult to find a native speaker who would acknowledge all these forms.
Linguists differ greatly in their use of such boundary markers or junctures.
Many factors play a role here, for example, the tradition of the language, or the
linguistic school in which the linguist was trained, or simply the linguist's prefer-
ences for theory or even for some kind of implicit elegance. Thus a junctura!
analysis may be rejected for one language (e.g., English above) and preferred
for another (e.g., German above), even by the same linguist.
The stops in spill, still, and skill are complementary to both lp, t, kl and
lb, d, g/. After [s] in initial position, only a lax unaspirated voiceless stop occurs.
If that's tough and that stuff can be [oretsthAf] and [oretstAf] without indication
of stress onset, as they, in fact, sometimes are, we would seem to have a contrast
in the dentals. Such pronunciations, however, are extremely peripheral, and this
is why one relies on the position of the stress onset, which makes the dentals
complementary: forets't~f/ vs. foret' st~f/; stress onset correlates well with mor-
pheme boundaries that's + tough and that + stuff, because some boundaries
can always be phonetically implemented. In some varieties of English, the pro-
nunciation of stuff is auditorily (at least) identified with duff /d~f/, if the [s]
is somehow eliminated (e.g., through tape erasure). English /d/ is a lax stop in
many dialects, and voice is apparently not the distinctive feature in it. Thus, in
this variety of English, still should be written /sdil/. Very few linguists do it
-apparently for orthographical and practical cross-dialectal reasons.
[10.4) It is possible to perceive five degrees of phonetic vowel length in

English bit, bid, beat, bee, and bead. The method groups them in two functional
units, bit, bid vs. the rest, that is, it tells that the vowels in bit and beat contrast.
It remains for the linguist to interpret the contrast and devise a notation for
writing it. In this particular case, four approaches have been taken: (I) lax /If
vs. tense /if, (2) single /i/ vs. its occurrence twice /ii/, (3) /i/ vs. its occurrence
followed by a length phoneme /i :/,and (4) /i/ vs. a diphthong fiyf. A very famous
problem of English length occurs in those American dialects where both It/
and /d/ are replaced by a medial flap [D]. Now the length difference in bit vs.
bid becomes distinctive, as in [bm~r] bitter vs. [brn~r] bidder, and, similarly, in
writer-rider, matter-madder, latter-ladder, and so on. (Such differences of
length may, in a few dialects, be supported by other minimal pairs, for example,
adze-adds, Polly-Piili, and so on; compare§ 9.14.) The flap itself is complemen-
tary to both ftf and /d/, and its assignment to either one is impossible; thus,
by the strict principles of phonemic analysis, it should be a phoneme by itself,
/D/; compare still, which should be fsdil/ in some dialects, but which, contrary
to such an identification is universally written as jstilf. The importance of the
method is that it pinpoints the differences in [rayo~r] and [ra·yo;)r], for example.
It is at this point that the linguists usually leave the method and rephonemicize
shortness +flap as /t/ and length +flap as /d/, for reasons dictated by the rest
of the grammar, for example, the relationship with jrayt/ vs. fraydf. Then, of
course, many generative phonologists would say that one should not use such
a phonemic method in the first place. Be that as it may, in actual practice they
implicitly use something very similar.
[10.5] Another example of the problems encountered when postediting

the results of the strict phonemic method, and one that also deals with length,
can be taken from the Turku dialect of Finnish. It also involves the flap, which
in the English problem was written with [o] to emphasize entanglement with
dental stops; but, in Finnish, it is a case of r's, and the flap will be written
[r ], while a lengthened r will be written with a macron, [r]. In brief, we have
three degrees of length in the r: a single flap, two to three vibrations, and
several vibrations: [soran] 'ofwar', [soran] 'of gravel', and [soran] 'I oppress';
and [kui-in] 'knitting', [kurin] 'of discipline', and [kurin] 'of nonfat milk'. Of
course, such minimal pairs must always be accounted for, even if we do not
accept the three different r's that result from the use of the blind phonemic
method. Three degrees of length are not general (systematic) in Finnish; so
one can indeed assign the flap to a /d/, and the resulting two degrees of length
are interpreted in terms of approach (2) above, giving us the three forms, now
identical with Standard Finnish sodan, soran, sorran, and so on. These two
dialects have the "same" phoneme /d/ with different phonetics, Standard [d]
and Turku [r]. But three degrees of length are normal in Estonian: [!ina]
'flax', [linna] 'of town', and [linnna] 'into town'; [koli] 'trash', [kooli] 'of
school', and [koooli] 'into school'- no matter how length would be phonemi-
cized in a final analysis. The method merely locates this situation for the linguist,
who must interpret it.
One way of collapsing the number of phonemes resulting from the application
of the strict method is to establish feature phonemes; for example, in the table
of Finnish vowels(§ 10.2) we can combine columns 2 and 3 by positing a special
fronting feature F for 2: Frukin, Ftokin, Ftakin. This F fronts all the back vowels
within one word (the definition of" word" is unnecessary here), for example,
Fruusulla = ryysyllii 'with a rag' vs. ruusulla 'with a rose'. In the case of
English rider we saw that two units, length and flap, were written by one symbol,
fd/, and here we see that one unit can be written by two symbols, F, plus back
vowels. Any survey of the practice of phonemic analysis frequently runs into
cases of this kind.
What has been emphasized in this brief review of phonemic analysis is the
212 COMPARATIVE LiNGUISTICS: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
method, which is there to help the analyst. A perfect narrow transcription is

impossible, but the phonemic method enables us to draw a fairly clear boundary
as an end point to the broadest functional phonetics. We have seen that linguists,
for reasons both theoretical and practical, often do not need such clear bound-
aries. But linguists still must know the method and how far it can take them in
any particular case. The method must remain a servant and should not take
over as the primary goal in normal linguistic investigation.
[10.6 Analysis and Synthesis] The method as presented here is necessarily

analytic. The phoneme was defined above as a class of phone types occurring
in mutually exclusive environments, or sometimes, in the case of free variation,
even in the same environment. This fact stresses the item-and-arrangement
framework in the initial stages of analysis when we aim at the units. This frame-
work takes the items, for example, phones, as independent entities, which shun
each other in complementary environments, like magnetism of the same polarity.
The method lays bare the variants and their environments, which will then be the
targets of synthesis, that is, the rules for mapping the units back to their manifes-
tations, or the process framework. One must add at this point that the phones
of a phoneme must share at least one distinctive feature, one phonetic quality
that is constant in all the allophones of the same phoneme; that is, a phoneme
is also a bundle of such features. In this sense a phoneme is a constant, and this
is why it is labeled with one constant symbol. In other words, in this conception
one emphasizes the constant in the variants and lets all the environmental
differences be assigned to this constant unit when taking it to the environments
where it occurs. Clearly these two ways of looking at variation are different
aspects of one and the same thing. Much confusion has arisen from the fact that
the analytic and synthetic aspects of investigation have not been kept conceptu-
ally separate. Analysis, then, is an item-and-arrangement mechanism that allows
us to establish relevant units. One should not forget that these units are all-
important to synthesis, the process mechanism that assigns rules to these units
and brings them back to the starting point of analysis. Units are impossible
without rules and vice versa (§§ 1.9, 17.6, 22.1 , 22.2). Units are the end points
of analysis and the starting points of synthesis; variants are the starting points of
analysis and the end points of synthesis. Unfortunately, these statements about
analysis and synthesis are rather crude oversimplifications, which, however,
cannot be avoided in an introduction. But they are helpful guidelines for the
beginner. From the point of view of the speaker, the phoneme is perhaps not
always that important, because he is a synthesizer who applies rules starting
with units higher than the phoneme-the morphophonemes-and ends up with
physical sound tokens-the variants, that is, the allophones (compare the end
of§ 4.12), but we must repeat, for the hearer-the analyzer-phonemics seems
to be of greater logical weight, because it is the level of phonology at which the
maximum information for differentiating meanings is given; that is, it is really
functional phonetics, which triggers his decoding machinery. Interestingly
enough, the position of comparative linguistics is parallel to that of the hearer;
PRELIMINARIES TO THE HISTORICAL METHODS 2I3
history produces an output of sound and meaning, and the linguist has to work
the data backward toward the deeper origins. Reconstruction is a predictive
inference; that is, we "generate" part of the past, as it were, and we do this
initially with the analytic item-and-arrangement method, which is the compara-
tive method (Chapter 11).
As a final reminder, it is very useful to remember that a coin has two sides,
that is, that there are different complementary aspects of methods and their
domains in linguistic investigation in general. These two aspects with their
characteristic constituents can be listed in two columns (and these should,
again, be taken only as helpful cardinal points that enable the beginner to
organize his thinking about various aspects of linguistics):
analysis synthesis
item-and-arrangement process
units rules
comparative linguistics historical linguistics
hearer/linguist speaker
induction (see§ 9.16f.) deduction
Some linguists believe that a native hearer analyzes by synthesis only, but the
notion of "analysis-by-synthesis" is too one-sided to be of so much value. It
does, of course, occur to a great degree because hearers are also speakers and
can use contextual information for interpretation. A person who has to start
with pure analysis is a nonnative hearer, a linguist.
This discussion of phonemic analysis is extremely sketchy; its purpose is just
to recall the basic principles of the method. Many linguists, for theoretical
reasons, emphatically reject the kind of analytic phoneme described here, but
we must repeat once more the two main practical reasons why the concept and
the method must be known even to genetic linguists: access to past publications
(written in that framework) and access to the other methods. This will become
clear in the subsequent sections. The better one knows phonemic analysis, the
easier it will be to handle the other analytic methods.
MORPHOPHONEMIC ANALYSIS
[10.7 Inclusion of Grammatical Environments and Sets] In the postediting

examples of the previous sections (§§ 10.3-10.5), we saw that linguists have
generally been ready to let grammatical criteria enter phonemic notations, but
only to a small degree, because phonemics was primarily meant as a kind of
(linguistic) phonetics (for one language). It would defeat its own purpose if
the whole grammar should bear upon it. This does not mean that the grammar
would not somehow be tied to it, but only that in a phonemic notation the aim
is generally to write only details that cannot be predicted from the phonetic
environment. Since we have now seen that all kinds of nonphonetic criteria
usually do creep into phonemics, the question arises as to how much grammatical
information should be allowed at the other end of phonology. The answer is,
2I4 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
clearly, all there is (subject only to psychological reality in synchronic grammar;

see§§ 4.5, 4.8, 6.24, 10.9, 18.17). This aspect of phonology is widely known as
morphophonemics or mor(pho)phono!ogy. A morphophonemic notation mini-
mizes or eliminates altogether the regular or automatic alternations within the
variants of morphemes; it does not indicate any phonetic/phonemic detail that
can be predicted from the rest of the grammar. A phonemic level need not be a
prerequisite here, because it is merely the most systematic phonetic level,
and in fact many linguists skip it ('level' need not be understood literally; it
may stand for any area somehow delimited, e.g., by rules of some kind). These
maximally invariant phonological units of morphophonemics will be called
morphophonemes, but they have been also called (and still are) systematic
phonemes.
The method for arriving at the morphophonemes is the same as that used in
phonemic analysis. Instead of to sound segments, phones, we apply it to sets
of corresponding sound units (phones or phonemes), to units that occur in
related morphs, to variants of the same morpheme. And instead of allowing
only for phonetic conditioning in the distribution of the variants, we also allow
for grammatical conditioning. Generally, however, what the method does is to
contrast such sets to find out which sets are needed to distinguish morphemes.
This means that one writes the morphemes involved with such sets and finds
out whether the sets differentiate meanings or not, exactly as one does in
phonemic analysis to simple sound segments. For example, in English, we have
the phonemic contrasts /iy/ seat:jej set, jayj fine:jij fin, and fey/ vain :jrej van,
but these oppositions do not necessarily hold when we group the phonemes
according to the paradigmatic sets of the language, for example (concentrating
here on the vowels only):
A
IG]ve k~p d~p

~ 1 e ft k e pt d e pth
ser~ne
ser e nity
2
IT] drrnv•
dr i ven
chrnld
ch i ldren
wrnde
w i dth
divrn ne
div i nity
3
[;] sillne
s a nity
opillque
op a city
dill me
d a msel
Sp~n
Sp a niard
br~d
~ r~d (present) br~the v
r ea d (past) br e d br ea th N
2
IT] brn,,
b i t
hrnd,
h i d
etc.
Traditional orthography has been retained, both as a matter of convenience

and because it will give an example of the conservative nature of writing systems
(§ 2.4). The sets of correspondences have been boxed in for maximal clarity
(see § 3.2, and compare § 8.12), and the reader should make himself familiar
with this convention, because it will recur in the following sections. The box
notation is valuable because it makes the set similar to the sound segment
(phone), and thus stresses their structural and functional identity as far as the
method is concerned, although it would not really matter how we wrote these
alternations. This boxed-in set captures the essence of a group that behaves
like a unit.
A close look at group A immediately reveals that no grammatical conditioning
is needed for the alternations, in spite of what has been stressed before, although
the alternations do of course occur in grammatically identical morphs. Morpho-
phonemic alternation can quite well be phonetically conditioned. Here the
diphthongs occur in word-final syllables ending in a single consonant (except
for the I in child), and the short vowels, before a consonant cluster or before
following unstressed syllables. In group B, on the other hand, we seem to have
pure grammatical conditioning, because the consonantal skeleton of these
paradigms is constant (although not quite in /briyo ,..., bre9/, which will be
discussed below), and the vowels alternate only in terms of the grammatical
categories. But appearances are here deceptive, because a comparison of A
and B shows that the groups are complementary in terms of their phonemic
shapes: group B contains words ending in dentals only, and the two categories
occurring with short vowels here have dental stops in A (e.g., kep-t, dep-th).
For example, when the morph ends in a dental stop or spirant, there is no dental
ending, unless the base and the suffix have different manners of articulation
(wid-th). However, the vocalism behaves as if there were consonant clusters in
the second rows of the alternations in B. The expected clusters would be gemi-
nates (double or long stops), which do not occur in this position in the phonetic
manifestation in Modern English. Here, then, the environments of the two groups
are complementary in terms of the sounds and can thus be written in the same
way, for example (tentatively), read-d, breath-th. It is also quite clear that the
boxed-in sets of correspondences are units by themselves and can be written
with one symbol (as is somewhat typical of English orthography), say, E, I, and
A (dEpfdEp-th, hldfhld-d, sAn-ity, and so on; see § 2.4). Exact minimal pairs
are difficult to find, but as a matter of illustration let us use an archaic past
tense rid of ride (which may still be the norm in some dialects). Now we have a
minimal pair with read:
rfil de r~d (present)

r~d r~d (past)
The r- and d-sets are constant, and thus the vowel sets do differentiate meanings
and, consequently, contrast. This becomes clearer once we write the vocalic
sets with single symbols (letters) rid vs. rEd (compare a German minimal pair,
216 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
§ 10.10). This is quite parallel to, say, /pin/ pin vs. /pen/ pen. Thus the past-tense
forms rld-d and rEd-d assume the vocalism ridd and redd, and, finally, a geminate
is simplified, giving /rid/ and fred/ read. (Historically, this analysis of ride/rid
is wrong, because the paradigm derives from the type drivefdrovefdriven.) In
other words, the vowels tell us that there is a morphophonemic dental suffix in
these forms. This suffix has no other manifestation.
These same alternations do seem to occur under grammatical conditioning in,
for example -teenften, life/live V /liv/ (the adjective /layv/ live has the same
vocalism as the noun; the difference in spirants will be treated below), but we
cannot pursue them here, because our purpose is to show the method, not how
far the method can take us.
[10.8] Grammatical conditioning of morphophonemic alternation is

obvious in the English umlaut plurals:
singular
plural
r;;l
~
t~th g~se
t l::J th g l::J se
~ tul~
~ m 1 ce
l,o_u,se
I 1 ce
These cases are so few that one would not necessarily set up special morpho-
phonemic vowels for them (see § 4.5), but more compelling evidence can be
found for the following consonant alternations:
singular wi]fJe kni jfJe sta lffJ

plural wil:Jes kni l:J es sta t::J es
singular ciofilil mou filil pa filil
plural clo~es mou~s pa~s
singular houls]e
plural hou~es
These alternating spirants contrast with the invariant ones in chief/chiefs,
faith/faiths, and so on, so that there has been reason to posit two morpho-
phonemic classes of spirants. Here again one does run into indeterminacy,
but a completely regular pattern is found in
N grie jfJ belie jfJ sa lfl e

v grie C::J e belie C::Je sa C::J e
N too fthl wreafthl brea fthl

v tee ~e wrea~e brea~e
N gla~ ad vi lcl e houls]e ulsJe

v glal:Je advi~e hou~e u~e
The corresponding verb is derived from the underlying noun or adjective by

voicing the final spirant (this inference is, of course, based on the reversal of
what happened, see § 4.2). In these cases, the voiceless variant occurs in the
environment Noun and the voiced one in the environment Verb. Hence they
do not contrast, although there is a clear phonemic opposition between theta
[9] and edh [o] (thigh/thy). Morphophonemically, they tend to be completely
complementary, in that edh occurs in grammatical environments, mainly in
deictics (this, that, hither, and so on); a handful of exceptions like faiths, rhythm,
and edh break the pattern. Clear grammatical conditioning of alternations
occurs in English paradigms like sing/sang/sung, although this particular three-
part alternation itself is limited to the position next to a nasal (swim, begin,
ring, sink, and so on; see Chapter 12).
The method, then, is the same as that of phonemic analysis, as has been
constantly stressed in this discussion. For example, the four sets
::: ~ ~ve ;:~: rn :: ~;:: ~ ~~:ill~~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

ive :: ive
share an /s/, but the "upper" members of the sets make them contrast and
consequently we need four different labels for the sets: ldl, ltl, lkl, and lsi.
When one finds other sets that share members with these, one again tries to
see whether they are variants of the ones already established or independent,
for example,
Greelkl fkl speafkl fkl so lcl ~ety = ~

Gre l:J
ian = l!J spee~ = l!!J so l:J 1al l.!J
The first two sets do not contrast with ~, and the last is a variant of ill ,
although its orthography points to lkl. Note now the structural similarity of
the English phoneme /k/ and its morphophoneme lkl, as exemplified in Figure
10-1.
....."'
.5
en
ss::
S::
~ 8
] ·:;
,E:e
- ·-
0 ()
<:ti
.__,s::
0
~
0.
FIGURE 10-1. The parallelism between the phoneme and the morphopho-
neme.
218 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS; HOW CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
[10.9] In many cases there remain peripheral alternations that are unique
or extremely limited in number. In such cases it does not pay to establish
special morphophonemic symbols, and linguists usually treat them as exceptions
of some kind, for example, something related to suppletion. Many English
speakers do not associate bleak and bleach in their synchronic knowledge of the
language, in spite of the close similarity in meaning and phonetic shape of the
two words. There are other examples of this /k "' ts/ alternation, for example,
break/breach (where the second member is a derived noun), stink/stench (where
the second member is a derived causative), and duke/duchess (where the second
member is a derived feminine). Parallel to these are stick/stitch and drink/drench,
but these are now synchronically separate although historically the same. Of
course, there are also many types of alternation in the vocalism of these forms
but we shall ignore them here. Thus, in a synchronic description, one has to
posit two different forms like lstikl and lstitSI. This has clearly happened, that
is, it has become obligatory, for book and beech, which once were closely
connected in the same way-not to speak of other more opaque cases like
wrinkle 'clever trick' and wrench 'false interpretation' (both from a root
originally meaning 'twist'). Such "exceptions" are a nuisance in a synchronic
grammar, although they show a fair amount of regularity; but they are often
the main source for historical hints in connection with internal reconstruction,
the historical side of morphophonemic analysis (Chapters 12, 18). Thus the
method should always be carried as far as possible, because it turns up handy
stepping-stones into history. For the synchronic grammar, the debris from the
use of this aspect of the method creates an area of considerable reshuffling,
which surpasses that of phonemic analysis. Here, too, one eventually reaches
a level where the services of the method become redundant or useless in the
synchronic context (§ 9.19).
[10.10] · The morphophonemic situation in English is quite typical; com-

pare the phonetic conditioning in German,
singular bunftl bunftl

plural bun~e bun~e
where the sets differentiate minimal pairs and need different labels. Modern
German orthography, in fact, uses invariant symbols for both words, according
to morphophonemic principles, bunt' multicolored' and Bund 'league'. Russian
has a similar situation, both in sound and orthography. But grammatical con-
ditioning is apparent in many German verbal paradigms, for example,
[dl
schnei en sie [dl
en Jdl [tl rei [tl en schel ftl en
geschni ~en geso ~en = l!J vs. ~ = geri ~en geschol ~en
'cut' 'boil' 'ride' 'scold'
Whatever the ultimate assignment of these sets, they contrast and belong to
different morphophonemes (compare English seethe/sodden and ride/ridden).

But in German also one reaches a point when a combination of alternants
ceases to be profitable; for example, it is clear that we have the same alternation
as in schneidenfgeschnitten between the following sets:
'hand'
'trade'
han ill
han d el(n)
vs. han m ieren
han t el
'handle'
'hand bar'
No environment could specify the conditioning of the variants (except within

the first set which is of the Bund/Bunde type). Thus the second pair will probably
contain an unalternating ltl, because otherwise the alternation would have to
be listed by a special feature to secure the occurrence of /t/ or [t]. Surely a itl
to begin with is much simpler.
[10.11 Application to "Exotic" Languages] Students tend to let the

mere appearance of an unfamiliar language paralyze them so that they are
unable to apply the method that they already know quite well. On the other
hand, their native language may also seriously interfere with the method,
because they know the material too well, and the simplistic method looks super-
fluous. Both aspects are important in the training of a linguist. One should
apply the method to one's own language, whose raw materials one can both
master and verify, because the results of the method are valid only to the degree
that the facts to which it is applied are also valid. But the application of the
method to "exotic" languages teaches the linguist not to be afraid of "weird"
shapes. No matter how the language is written and what kind of sequences of
written symbols occur, the method can be applied to them (with the exception
of logographic writing). The case is quite clear with alphabetic writing, because
it represents the sounds rather closely and regularly, even if not perfectly. For
the application of the method, one need not know the exact phonetics of the
language. As examples of "exotic" languages we shall take selections from
Finnish and Lapp. Both are far simpler than English, because in English one
runs so easily into all kinds of peripheral cases like manfmen, bleakfbleach, and
so on, whereas the alternations we shall see in the Finnish and Lapp examples
pervade the whole language with overwhelming regularity.
[10.12] Finnish morphophonemic alternations are on the whole phoneti-

cally/phonologically conditioned. Let us first look at three sets involving the
front vowels /if and fef, and the dentals fs/, ftf, and /d/ (all are clearly phonemes:
sitii 'it' [partitive], seta 'uncle'; suuri 'big', tuuri 'luck', and duuri 'major key'),
as they are arranged in Figure 10-2. These particular words have been chosen
to represent the seven particular sets labeled 1-7, that is, three vowel sets and
four dental sets. They could be multiplied by the dozens and even by the hun-
dreds. Minimal pairs also exist; for example, the last vowel set in nalli 'percussion
cap' is set 3 against 1 in nalle, and the last vowel set in syli 'fathom' is set 2
and the one in syli 'lap' is 3, or further Pete 'Pete' with set 1 and peti with 3,
1 2 3
nom. sg. nalle ve s nei t
part. sg. nail e a ve t 0 tii nei t i a
gen. sg. nail e n ve d en nei d i n
nom. pl. nail e t ve d e t nei d i t
adess. pl. nali e i-lia ve s 0 i-lia nei d e i-lia
4 5
'(teddy)bear' 'water' 'young lady'
pe t i jo d i
pe t i-ii jo d i-a
pe t i-n jo d i-n
pe t i-t jo d i-t
pe t e-i-llii jo d e-i-Ila
6 7
'bed' 'iodine'
FIGURE 10-2. A selection of Finnish front vowel and dental sets (limited to
five forms out of twenty-eight).
and so on. For practical purposes these words have been quoted in the nomina-
tive singular only, because more of the paradigm is supplied in Figure 10-2
through other items. The sets are labeled numerically because the method has
not yet shown which ones, if any, have to be grouped together. Now, because
of such minimal pairs, these three Finnish front vowel sets clearly contrast,
exactly like the dentals in German bunt vs. Bund. Within sets 2 and 3 the alterna-
tion is, of course, environmentally conditioned: in 3 fef occurs only before i,
and /i/ occurs elsewhere; in 2 the vowel is syncopated before the plural i and
the partitive morph -tii, and is replaced by i in final position (nom. sg.); and in I
e is unalternating all the way. Sets 1 and 2 contrast only in stem-final position;
elsewhere we have sets like 1, for example, the first vowels in vesi, neiti, and
peti. This situation reminds us of the English flap problem encountered in
phonemic analysis (§ 10.4), that is, there is a contrast only in one particular
environment, and indeterminacy in the assignment of initial vowels (to either
1 or 2). We shall return to this, but for now let us go by the method, which
gives us three morphophonemes, say, I = Je 1 J, 2 = Je 2 J, 3 = JiJ.
Turning now to the dental sets we can immediately see that 6 and 7 contrast:
6 is unalternating ftj, and 7 unalternating /d/. Set 5 shares both ftf and /d/ and
thus clearly contrasts with both 6 and 7. The alternation is phonetically con-
ditioned: jtf occurs in open syllables, /d/ in closed ones. Thus, from the end,
the sets can be labeled, for example, 7, Jd J, 6, Jt 1 J, and 5, Jt 2 J. There remains
set 4, which shares ftf and /d/ with Jt 2 J (5), but otherwise shows an extra dimen-
sion in having /s/ in addition. Because of this /s/, it has been taken as another
independent set contrasting with Jt 2 J, say Jt 3 J, but a closer look reveals that the
occurrence of /s/ is environmentally conditioned. It occurs only befoie the

morphophoneme le 21 (2), which syncopates before the plural i and turns into
ani in final position. Only these two i's assibilate (in nouns); the conditioning
is thus morphophonemic. In other words, set 4 is a variant of the morpho pho-
neme lt2l (5).
[10.13] The ft "' d/ alternation is part of the consonant gradation (which

is simply alternation between certain consonants). Let us also take examples
from velars, because this material will be important in later discussion as well.
Because the alternation is conditioned by the structure of the syllable in the
beginning of which the sound occurs, we can reduce the sets to only two charac-
teristic members (two is, of course, the minimum number of members in an
alternation), which will be represented by the nominative singular (open syllable)
and genetive singular (closed syllable). Now, all but one of the following sets
share a /k/:
8 8 9 9
nom. sg.
gen. sg.
joilli
jo 0 en
;ill a
i 0 an
su~u
su v un
ky~y
ky v yn
'river' 'age' 'family' 'ability'
10 10 11 12
sylilli
syl j en
jar ill;
jar j en
muilli
mu kin
lii~a
Iii g an
'saliva' 'intelligence' 'mug' 'league'

Again, starting from the end, sets I2 and II clearly contrast, and one can estab-
lish morphophonemes: I2 = lgl and II = lk 1 1. Sets 8-IO share the open-syllable
member with II, but otherwise contrast with the closed-syllable variants and
hence are different. These variants are completely governed by their phonetic
environments, Jj/ occurs between liquids /1, r/ and /e/ (10), /v/ is flanked by
high rounded vowels (9), and nothing occurs in other environments (8, and
others not exemplified here). Hence the sets 8-10 are variants of one unit, say
lk 21. In all these examples, it has been relatively easy to segment the sequences
into sets; that is, one just cuts out the alternating part and keeps the rest of the
word as it is. Basically, we have been cutting at the impressionistic seams between
vowels and consonants. Segmentation need not observe such seams, as is shown
by the long-stop words in which two ways of segmenting are possible:
13
kaftlo
vs. ka~t o or
katltlo
ka~on ka t on katl!J on
'loss' 'roof'
sufkla sukfkla
vs. sur;]k a or
su~an su k an sukl!Jan
'brush' 'sock'
The important fact is that the method does confront the minimal pairs here in
either case. The second analysis definitely seems to be better for sukka, because
it does not require any new machinery (i.e., set 8 includes this environment,
too), and for katto we would get a new variant (13) of the morphophoneme lt2l
(5). All this agrees with the analysis that length in Finnish is taken as a double
occurrence of the single unit.
So far we have been treating Finnish morphophonemic alternations that are
phonetically/phonologically conditioned, just like most of the English alterna-
tions above. But Finnish also has cases parallel to English toothfteethfteethe,
wreath/wreathe, and so on:
tah [tl
o-mme N 'our wish' malkl-is-Hi adj. 'hiiiy' (part.)
tah ~o-m me V 'we wish' (§ 4.23) ma l_!j
-i-sta N 'from the hills'
The surface environments are exactly the same for both alternants; that is,
in terms of the sounds that actually occur, the alternation is induced in clearly
defined grammatical categories. In short, the possessive suffixes (-mme, and so
on) do not induce consonant gradation, and neither does the adjective suffix
-ise- (whose final vowel is le 2 1 and thus drops in the partitive).
[10.14] The morphophonemic alternations known as Lapp consonant

gradation are grammatically conditioned in the rather limited selection we are
going to look at. In Finnish, only certain stops participate in the gradation,
but in Lapp, all consonants are subject to it. The sample in Figure 10-3 is
from East (Skolt) Lapp (most distinctions of a narrow transcription are ignored
here). Simply stripping off diacritics is not a legitimate way of making a narrow
notation broad, but here we resort to it in the name of pedagogy. The transcrip-
tion still looks more forbidding than did the one for Finnish, because it has
more diacritic marks and longer sequences alternate with shorter ones. But
linguists should not be carried away by looks and should concentrate on the
underlying structure. The selection concentrates on only a few consonants, and
most of the vowels have been reproduced very crudely. Thus the nominative
of 'age' and the genitive of 'old woman' are given as iihkke even though there
is actually a slight difference in the first vowels (a slightly higher front a in' age').
Lapp is another language famous for three distinctive degrees of length; for
example, set 18 has koooafkooa and the lative case of the same word is kodoa
(see Estonian in § 10.5), a quantity that recurs in set 19 as well. For length we
can note here only the following cases (which are by no means all those drawn
x
in the handbooks); writing any consonant by x: x (short), (halflong), x (long),
xx (short geminate), xx (halflong geminate), xx (overlong geminate). These
will recur below. Small capitals represent half-voiced stops. Now we are ready
to start the analysis.
Set 16 contrasts with 18, and 17 with 19; the first pair has double stops, the
second has overlong stops in the nominative. The genitives are the same for all
and thus cannot be used for predicting the nominatives. The length difference
in the nominative (16 and 18 vs. 17 and 19) is conditioned by the preceding
Dentals:
14 15 16
inf. ko'OO•D nom. sg. niej~a kielhttla
1 sg. kol d am gen. sg. nie oa kie o
a
'dig at random' 'young lady' 'hand'
17 18 19
kulhftla
kii o a
koiMia
ko o a
o~a
o oa
'six' 'spawn' 'new'
Velars:
20 20 21 22
nom. sg.
gen. sg. j~lh·t tkkla ~~~kl• juol~e
JO yy a so yy a a IJ e juol g e
'river' 'family' 'age' 'leg'
22 22
tol~e t!ol~a
tSol g a
tol g e
'feather' 'saliva'
Corresponding longs:
23 23 24 24
inf. ka lhttl ·eD nom. sg. nuol hitle solhkkla alhkkle
1 sg. ka htt am gen. sg. nuo htt e so hkk a a hkk e
'cover' 'seine' 'sock' 'old woman'
All consonants: 25 26
(other than stops) kiefll] a
n:Jmmla
ne m a kiel!J a
'name' 'tongue'
FIGURE 10-3. A selection of East Lapp consonant alternations.
224 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS: HOW CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
vowel. If the vowel is short (17, 19), the intervocalic stop is overlong; if long
or a diphthong (16, 18), the stop is double. Indeed, this recurs in the rest of
the material as well (20 vs. 21, 25 vs. 26). (Further evidence would show that
such overlong stops occur only in nouns, not verbs, which is another interesting
grammatical conditioning.) Now we can turn to sets 15 (genitive o as in 16-19)
and 14 (i5 as in 15). It is easy to see that 14 and 15 are complementary to 16-17;
[htt] occurs between vowels and [5] after resonants (paii5eD/piildam 'be afraid/
I am afraid', kufoajkuyda (or kuyDa) 'hay patch'), which are also long in the
nominative. These same environments determine the occurrence of [o] and [d]
in the genitive. The consonants turn out to be always long in the nominative,
and, in addition, a voiceless stop is preaspirated. All these dentals can be pre-
dicted from two units, which the method gives us, the morphophoneme It!
(14-17), and ldl (18-19). The same principles hold for the velar sets 20-22 as
well: they are all environmentally conditioned and thus variants of one morpho-
phoneme lkl . The longs are also here best taken as clusters of the single stops,
!ttl (23) and jkk l (24). Also lm l (25) and III (26) are unambiguous starting
points for the nominatives nel'nma (overlong because of the preceding short
vowel, which is long in the genitive only) and kiella (double because of the
preceding diphthong).
Morphophonemic analysis is a method of establishing invariant sound units
in the framework of paradigms or the total machinery of the grammar. We have
seen how easily it eliminated consonant gradation from both Finnish and Lapp.
The (mainly) phonological conditioning in Finnish and the grammatical con-
ditioning in Lapp made no difference to the method. The Lapp situation would
make one seriously suspect that the consonant alternations were originally
determined by phonetic conditioning (compare wreath/wreathe, and so on,
§§ 4.2, 4.5). And, indeed, if monosyllabic words had been included, they would
have shown the genitive marker -n:Ki 'who', Reii-n 'whose' (compare Estonian
maa-n-tee, the only relic of the genitive -n in that language; §§ 4.24, 5.15). Thus
there is a section of vocabulary that retains the original phonological condition-
ing. This section confirms our suspicions. But the point is that morphophonemic
analysis operates without such confirmation quite well; but such historical
guesses need not be included in a pure synchronic context.
(10.15 Postediting As Adjustment Between Units and Rules) When the

method has given the units, one has to devise the mapping rules that define
the shape of the units in each specific environment. That is, one has to use ruks
to come back to where one started out from (§§ 1.9, 10.6, 17.6). For example,
in Finnish (with ordered rules) we have
(I) Drop of je21 after t before partitive -tii and plural-i-: vettii, vetillii
(2) jt 2j-+ /d/ in closed syllable: veden, neidin
(3) !e2!-+ /i/ before #: veti
(4) lt2l-+ /s/ before /i/: vesi, vesillii
(or the like, see§ 6.6)
and in Lapp,
(I) It!-* [D] in nom. sg. after resonants (and finally): nief.va, kolvev
(2) It! in gen. sg. and 1st sg.--* [d] after resonants, [o] intervocalically: koldam,
kieoa, kuoa
(3) Lengthening of consonants and clusters in nom. sg.: kietta, niefDa, koooa,
nuoite, nemma, oooa
(4) Extra lengthening in nouns with a short vowel preceding: nemma, oiioa,
kuita
(5) Lengthening of short vowels in the genitive and 1st sg.: kuoa, nema, koldam
(6) Preaspiration of voiceless stops: kiehtta, nuohitefnuohtte, kuhita [or the
like]
Note that the rules always turn out to rely heavily on the environments that
made the analysis possible in the first place (§ 10.6). As we see, this synthetic
part mirrors the framework of historical linguistics, because sound changes
occur in a strict historical sequence (§§ 6.1-6.3). The difference is that in the
synchronic framework one can take the shortest way even when it violates
our knowledge of the actual history(§§ 6.5-6.6). Often, however, such ordering
of synchronic mapping rules mirror the actual historical changes to some
degree ; for example, there is a fair amount of relative chronology in them. In
the Finnish case, we must first have the raising of e > ito get the right environ-
ment for the assibilation ti > si and so on (§ 6.6).
It has already been mentioned that when the method encounters rare or
unique alternations, for example, English manfmen, one is hardly willing to
construct special vowels for such cases. The alternation in manfmen, however,
is not completely random, since there are other vowel alternations in English.
The case of goose/geese and tooth/teeth is more systematic, because there are
at least two instances of it, but certainly not systematic enough to warrant a
special vowel to carry the alternation (one might rather use an exception feature
like [+umlaut] or the like; see§ 10.16). These words will have to be somehow
listed or marked as" regular" exceptions. The postediting problems of morpho-
phonemic analysis surpass those of phonemic analysis; one hardly ever tries
to apply the method up to its logical conclusion and to adopt its results without
any questions asked in the establishment of morphophonemes. Postediting is
the final touch in which every factor is drawn in and inductive methodology is
mellowed by deductive expectations from universal theory. The results of the
method were not adopted in the framework of the item-and-arrangement model
of listing allomorphs, which in any case did not involve morphophonemes, and
the result was that all items were exceptions in this sense. The logic of the gram-
mar must naturally prevail over the logic of the method (§§ 5.14, 9.19).
(10.16] As an example of postediting the results of the strict method, let

us return to the Finnish morphophonemic e-vowels, dentals, and velars. There
are two ways to adjust the contrast between le 11 and le 2 1 (1 and 2). First, le1l
occurs only in proper names (especially in pet names), acronyms, trade names,
nursery and loanwords, and other such descriptive material (notable exceptions
are itse 'self' and ko!me 'three'). The two vowels merge, if the words with
le 1 1 are marked for a special feature, say, [+affective]. This feature indicates
just all those semantic areas mentioned and it blocks vowel alternation. Or,
second, we may erase le 2 1 from the underlying forms altogether and establish a
boundary marker (juncture) of some kind. At this boundary we can now write
the automatic union vowels i and e where needed. We notice further that
consonant gradation fails to occur in the same categories listed above. By
adopting two features [native] and [foreign], we might have one dental only,
ltl, which would be unalternating /t/ in connection with [-native] and unalter-
nating /d/ with [+foreign]. The same is true of the velars as well, for example,
REALIZED AS
nalle [-native] nal!ejna!!en
vete [+native] vesifveden
peti [-native] petifpetin
joti [+foreign] jodifjodin
liika [+foreign] liigaj!iigan
liika [+native] liikaj!iian
muki [-native] mukifmukin
etc.
Note now that [-native] in this scheme is not the same as [+foreign]. In the
same way, one has used these features to indicate the differences in English
spirants, for example,
PLURALS
chief [-native] chiefs [f]
faith [-native] faiths [El]
knife [+native] knives [v]} .
sheath [+native] sheaths [o) VOICe
Now, in the environment [-native] a spirant fails to voice. One should note
that such features would not necessarily reflect historical borrowing; a histori-
calJy native word like oath has to be listed as [-native] in those varieties of
English in which the plural is jowEls/ (rather than jowozj), to ensure the voiceless
spirant. In a way it creates a situation that is the reverse of the acclimatization
of loans, taking away the official citizenship rights. The feature [+foreign] fails
in those Finnish words with more than one stop that are different with respect
to voicing, for example, toga and Golgata 'Golgotha'. Hence one seems to
need ldl and lgl after alJ, but the voiceless stops can be combined with the use
of features as indicated. All this is quite parallel to what we did to Finnish
tykin, for example, by extracting a feature F(rontness) and writing the word as
Ftukin. Such features as [±foreign] are rather vague as a device for blocking
the operation of certain rules, and they were presented here only as historical
curiosities of a procedure that enjoyed popularity during the mid-1960s. To
block a rule one can use the nonoperation of the rule as the most concrete
feature, for example,
peti [-consonant gradation]
faith [-voicing rule] etc.
That is, rather than create a special feature that ultimately negates a rule we
directly use the negation of that rule. This makes our phonology as concrete
as possible. In the above case, this same desirability prescribes Finnish morpho-
phonemes ldl and jgj. These are now always /d/ and /g/ and no special conversion
rules are required.
Diacritic feature notations like [±foreign] show the extent linguists like to
theorize for their own delight irrespective of "innocent" speakers whose speech
they supposedly describe and explain. A child learns his language without
knowing that borrowing exists; he has no use for history in any form. For him
read/read /riyd-red/ and breed/bred are on the same footing as bite/bit and
ride/rid (original ablaut), and in fact hide/hid is now conjugated exactly the same
as ride (analogy; past passive participle hidden). The child is always right, as
long as his output is accepted, whereas the historical linguist is wrong when he
does similar things in (the [hopefully] initial stages of) his analysis (§§ 9.16,
9.19, 10.7, 18.16, 18.17). It is important to realize that both the language
learner and the linguist must use abduction(§ 9.16), and are thus bound to make
"mistakes" here and there. This aspect is emphasized throughout the book.
[10.17 Conclusion] This rather lengthy paraphrase of synchronic methods

serves many purposes. First, it makes the methods maximally explicit. Second,
the method part of the discussion of morphophonemic analysis serves (as it is)
as an exemplification of internal reconstruction (Chapter 12). And, finally, the
discussion of the postediting problems of morphophonemic analysis highlights
the differences between synchrony and diachrony. This reminds us that the
results of the method must be polished by the linguist himself. It is here that
linguists differ among themselves. Some would accept all the different units
given by the method as different entities in a synchronic grammar. Others would
try to combine some of the units by using various kinds of features, as we have
seen. But from the point of view of internal reconstruction, such different units
can be given different temporal interpretations. Words that contain units that
do not undergo all the rules of the language are often recent loans; what creates
a serious postediting problem in synchronic analysis often has a clear historical
explanation. For example, there is independent evidence that those Finnish
words with unalternating voiceless stops are loans, muki (mug) and peti (bed)
(see § 8.6). They were thus taken into the language after consonant gradation
had ceased to operate as a productive mechanism. Words with voiced stops are
even more recent loans, jodi and liiga (see § 19.4). What is important is that the
method actually gave us three dental units in Finnish, jt1 j, jt 2 j, and jdj, all of
which can be shown to be historically distinct (jt 2 j, inherited, jt1 j, early borrow-
ing, and jdj, late borrowing). They are also synchronically distinct, whether one
228 CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTics: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
collapses the first two with features or not. A notation like lt 1 1 means exactly
the same thing as it i + [-consonant gradation]. Also, those cases of spirants
that do not undergo voicing in English will turn out to be borrowings or other
later developments (analogy). The more familiar one is with synchrony, the
easier history will be, and vice versa. Linguistics is a panchronic discipline
(Figure 1-7).
REFERENCES
General: Bloch 1948 and the references in§ 1.1; 10.4 Schane 1971; 10.6 Sigurd
1970, Schane 1971; 10.9 Wartburg 1931 , Malmberg 1969 ; 10.10 Vennemann
1968; 10.12-10.14 Anttila 1968; 10.14 E. Jtkonen 1941 , 1946, T. I. Itkonen 1958;
10.15-10.16 Anttila 1969a; 10.17 Anttila in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11.
EXERCISE
On the basis of the following additional forms, complete the analysis of Finnish
consonant gradation. Only two characteristic environments are given, the
nominative and genitive singular.
NOM. GEN. NOM. GEN.
kulta ku!!an ' gold' pel)kki pel) kin 'bench'
pelto pe11on 'field' pupu pupun 'bunny'
part a parran 'beard' Kaapo Kaapon 'Gabriel'
sorto sorron 'oppression' }obi Jobin 'job'
rant a rannan 'strand' papu pavun 'bean'
pinta pinnan 'surface' rupi ruren 'scab'
pinna pinnan ' peg' napa naran 'navel'
ruffa ru!!an 'roll' ha!pa halvan 'cheap'
hyrrii hyrran 'top' kifpi kih;en 'shield'
kortti kortin 'card' turpa tun·an 'snout'
tontti font in 'lot' tun•a tunan 'protection'
Riku Rikun 'Dick' korpi korven 'dark forest'
grogi grogin 'drink' kumpu kummun 'small hill'
ku!ku ku!un 'going' rumpu rummun 'drum'
pa!ko palon 'pod' Iampi !am men 'pond'
parku parun ' weeping ' sut:i suven 'summer'
t'irka riran 'office' savu savun 'smoke'
puku purun 'dress/suit' nappi napin 'button'
palo palon 'fire' sappi sapen 'gall'
hol)ka hOI)I)an 'pine' kuppi kupin 'cup'
rul)ko YUIJI)On ' stem' norppa norpan 'marble seal'
ho!kki ho!kin ' cigarette lamppu lampun 'lamp'
holder' tumma tumman 'dark'
For other selections, see Cowan 1971.
CHAPTER 11
THE COMPARATIVE METHOD

(THE CENTRAL CONCEPT)
The comparatiL·e method dominates comparative linguistics,

eeen though it is complementary to other methods. It can
be used for reconstruction (Chapter 18), constructing a
dialect cohesion (§ 13.8), or indicating language relation-
ship (§ 16.9). The chapter concentrates on the structure
and the deficiencies of the method as applied to a few
selected languages in an attempt to reconstruct their earlier
stages.
[11.1 Ingredients of the Method] The comparative method, the central

method in comparative linguistics, adds the dimension of using more than one
language to what we already know from synchronic methods. Here we need
two or more languages, exactly as we needed two or more alternating forms
(grammatical environments) in morphophonemic analysis. That is, the compara-
tive method operates on sets of correspondences, like morphophonemic analysis;
but unlike morphophonemic analysis, which takes the members for its sets
from related morphs (from one paradigm within one language), the comparative
method builds its sets of correspondences out of elements coming from different
languages. But, like phonemic analysis, the comparative method observes
phonetic/phonemic conditioning of variants. The rather definite semantic
identity used in phonemic and morphophonemic analysis can be relaxed in the
comparative method after some initial success in establishing sound units,
but good semantic matching of the forms used is a must in the initial stages of
work. The difficulty is that there are no exact rules for handling semantic change;
the final factor here is necessarily the common sense and the experience of the
individual scholar as they contribute to his handling of the possibilities outlined
in Chapter 7.
[11.2 The Comparative Method: Swedish, English, and German Consonants]

It is best to introduce the method with languages rather closely related, so that
complications can be avoided. Let us take some material from the Germanic
languages Swedish, English, and German and organize the items so that English
is in the middle. This gives us the advantage of showing at a glance the similarity
of English either to Scandinavian or to a sister variant of West Germanic. To
underline the fact that the exact status of the sound units is irrelevant we shall
start out with standard orthography; this will also preserve the reader's famili-
arity with most of the forms. Such writing obscures certain things, for example,
229
230 CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTics: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
that the vocalic nuclei of English pipe and German pfeife, English out and
German aus, Swedish bok and German buch, are phonetically the same. We shall,
however, be looking at the consonants and hence we need remember only that
German tz, z = [ts], v = [f], w = [v], and that double stops in Swedish are
phonetically long but in German only a way of writing a preceding short vowel.
In Swedish also a vowel preceding a double stop is short, and we can thus ignore
length at this point. Let us now observe the following items, which have been
arranged so that their consonants match:
a~ ~
a n
a nn
0 il
s o n
s oh n
we ~
h o. m e
h e1 m
il a~ il u~
h ai r
h aa r
h ou s e
h au s
~ u~
m ou s e
m au s
How to decide which part corresponds to what is an enormous operation

logically. Fortunately we do not need such rigor. It is sufficient to segment at
the boundaries of consonants and vowels, and the principle almost always leads
to satisfactory results. This has been done to the above material, which now gives
us the familiar sets of correspondences. Only the consonantal correspondences
have been boxed in, but they automatically establish the vocalic sets. Such
cartouches, then, are the sound matter of the comparative method. These sets
must recur in material that satisfies the requirement of semantic similarity or
identity. Both aspects are clearly fulfilled in the six Germanic items; all except
the r-set of hair occur at least twice and the meanings of the words are identical
in all three languages. One unique set is not a regular correspondence and does
not lead anywhere. Unique sets can easily be established between any number
of languages, for example,
English fdlay Greek filil e6s Finnish

Latin ~ies Latin ~eus Latin
'god' 'self'
In spite of the semantic identity and the formal similarity of the boxed-in
sounds in the first two items, we do not have regular sets of correspondences;
these are unique. No other items where these recur can be found between these
languages. Thus the requirement of regularity diminishes the possibility of
being misled by chance similarity. Actually, it eliminates chance similarity
altogether, but it is no help in another kind of complication. We said that it is
impossible to find another pair of words where English d corresponds to Latin
d. But note Latin dens 'tooth' and English dentist, where the semantic side is
certainly acceptable and where we have another such set (see §§ 8. 12, 8.13). Or
consider
Fren~h ~ u jgl e ~ o fil ie fgl efll a Gl ~ lnl e Gl ou lchl er lchl a~se

English l!Ju~e l!Jo~y I!Jel.:Jal:JI~ l:Jou~ ~air
THE COMPARATIVE METHOD 231
where we have at least two occurrences of the following correspondences:

z-dz, 1-1, t-t, and s-ts. We have exactly the same regularity as in the above
Germanic case. Here we know, however, that English has borrowed these words
from French, exactly like dentist from Latin. In many cases borrowing cannot
be documented, especially when dealing with greater time depths. Extensive
borrowing easily creates regular sets of correspondence between the source
language and the target language; such situations arise with, for example,
French loans in English, Arabic loans in Turkish, Chinese loans in Japanese
and Korean, Germanic loans in Finnish, Low German loans in Swedish, and
so on (see Figure 8-2, §§ 8.6, 8.9-8.13). The sets are regular (they recur) and
speak for a historical connection and against chance similarity. This historical
connection may be due to either inheritance or borrowing, and it is the linguist's
task to try to separate the two possibilities. One way to guard against borrowing
is to start the comparative method with vocabulary items that come from
semantic spheres not usually borrowed from, that is, basic noncultural vocabu-
lary (body parts, natural objects, animals, plants, pronouns, lower numerals,
and so on; in other words, the so-called Swadesh list is a handy starting point;
see§§ 18.3-18.5, 22.14). In the case of dentist, the basic term tooth reveals both
its learned semantic environment and the proper correspondence relation, that
is, Latin d-English t (edere-eat, dens-tooth, decem-ten).
[11.3] Let us now go back to the six items from the three Germanic
languages. Here we clearly have basic core vocabulary, which seems to guarantee
inheritance. Excluding stops, the Germanic consonant correspondences are
very straightforward, as the cartouches show: each language reflects the same
sound. To apply the comparative method we treat these sets of correspondences
like phones in phonemic analysis, that is, we combine all noncontrasting sets
into one unit; all such sets can be written (labeled) with one and the same
symbol. Thus the m-set and the h-set clearly contrast, because we have the mini-
mal pairs house and mouse. One would not combine m's and h's anyway,
because there is no phonetic justification for it. Phonetically there is more reason
to try to see whether them-set contrasts with then-set (both are nasals). These
sets do occur in the same environments, for example, in final position in son
and home, hence contrast and must be labeled differently. For mnemonic
purposes and reasons of common sense we label the h-sets with *h, the m-sets
with *m, and the n-sets with *n. The asterisk is the traditional indicator for the
fact that the following symbol(s) (letter[s]) is (are) shorthand for a whole car-
touche, a set of correspondences; more generally, * means 'not directly docu-
mented'. In this sense, *h means that we have h in Swedish, h in English, and
h in German, and so on, in other words, what we can read in a set (cartouche).
These sets recur through a great amount of additional material, for example,
in the numbered items of Figure 11-1 (see § 11.4), which supplies evidence for
stops: *m (5), *n (11, 12, 15, 24, 36), and *h (7, 16, 17). Further similar simple
unalternating sets are *r (14, 16, 22, 24, 25, 26, 31, 33) and*/ (2, 5, 6, 8, 13, 21,
34, 36), where the choice of symbol is again obvious, because these contrast with
1 2 4
~0~~
~ iWa aa~p
i p e
ei f e
pp e~
I e
5
a pf e I
6 7
liJu~
8
~ a~a ~ !r!lem
~~
o[;Jma
I oo m
I u m e
10
~ i~a
i v e
e b en
11
ave
a ben ~owe~
~
a~t en
a t er
a ss er
* * *
12 15
~m~.~e 6~r:Jm
l;J l!JeiQ ~a~~
16 17 18 19
ja~ ~a
~ ~
e~t
~
and
ea
e r
r t
z
ea t a
i tz e
ooth
ahn
u~
out
au s
22 23
25
ITl ~~~
~~ei
26
~ ~~g
1ng
i ng
28
~ a~e~
~ o~e~
rn
a th e r o th e r
a~-ar
a y -s
a t e r u e r
tt a g -e
30 31
~~ o~e~
rother
r u d e r
* * *
FIGURE 11-1. Swedish, English, and German consonants lined up for the
comparative method.
THE CoMPARATIVE METHOD 233
32 33 34 35
o~a
rn
k
00
o chen
[
~ a~
a Y ]
o gg en
'rye'
36 38 39
~:~em ~a~e
~
a~en
a w 'saying'
l;Ja~eW ~~Wen a g e
* * *
40 41 42 43
fii1~-er skyl~-er gul~

gold
mil~
mild
fiel d -s shiel d -s
fel d -er schil d -e gol d (es) mil d (e)
44 45 46 47
bin~a
bind
hanrnia
han d le
bor~a
bur d en
mor~
mur d er
bin d en han d eln biir d e mor d (es)
FIGURE 11-1. [Continued]
the units already established (the nasals and *h). So far it has been easy to see
how these sets contrast, because their phonetic makeup has been so obvious
and constant within each set. Now we have to look beyond standard orthography
and remember that the German s in sohn (and 3, 35, 37) is [z] against an [s]
in haus and maus, and an [s] in stein and stuhl (12, 13). In other words, instead
of the orthographic single set s-s-s we have actually three s-sets:
1' 2' 3'
Swedish
English ~s ~s ~s
German s z s
Closer inspection reveals that these sets are complementary, occurring in
mutually exclusive environments: 2' occurs in syllable-initial position before
vowels, 3' before a t-set, and 1' in syllable-final position. Hence they are allosets
of one and the same unit which we can label *s. So it turns out that German
orthography would have given us a shortcut in this matter in any case. For the
application of the method it does not matter whether one applies it to ortho-
graphic units or to phonetic units. It matters only for the correctness of the
results, because sometimes orthography obscures facts (distinctions) that must
be known in order to secure correct results. This phonetic check on the s-sets
proves that at this point the orthography does not obscure relevant phonetic
detail. Orthography is mentioned here in anticipation of those cases where
orthography is all we have.
[11.4] When we turn to stop correspondences, the situation becomes

complicated in comparison with the obvious constant sets we have seen so far.
But, as we shall see, it does not make any difference for the method; rather, it
is only that the challenge is greater (and more typical). Reference will be made
again to the numbered items in the table. It should be noted that in a few cases
the meanings are not exactly the same: shield-Swedish skyit '(shop) sign';
bloom-blomma, blume 'flower'; sip-supa, saufen 'drink heavily'; fowl-fagel,
vogel 'bird'; leap, lopa-laufen 'run'; thing, ding-ting 'court (session)', and a
few others. In every case the meanings are close enough to be accepted without
hesitation. The only doubtful case would be thing-ting, but note Latin causa
'situation, condition, point in an argument, matter, lawsuit' > French chose
'thing', and OE sacu 'lawsuit', German Sache, and Swedish sak 'thing'. As
for the segmentation, it does not matter how it goes in ambiguous cases like 14
and 15, that is, either t-gh-ch followed by t-t-t or 0-gh-ch followed by tt-t-t.
In either case the method is the same and it will reach the same conclusion (see
§ 10.13).
[11.5 Labials) Looking first at the labials we see that Swedish hasp bf v,
English p b f v w, and German pf b f v, but we have six sets of phonemic corre-
spondence (as opposed to the relationships in the traditional orthography) in
Figure 11-2. The numbers indicate the proper environment for the sets, which
can be looked up in Figure 11-1. To facilitate talking about these sets, let us
call the first two p-sets, the next two b-sets, and the last two spirant sets. Once
again, we are going to treat the sets like phones to find out whether they contrast
or not.
In phonemic analysis, phonetic similarity makes two phones potential
candidates for membership in a single phoneme, and the method then checks out
Two sets with

Two sets Two sets continuant articulation
sharingp sharing b all the way through
Swedish p p b v f v
English
German
1, 2 1, 3 4, 5 6, 7 8, 9, 10, 11
25
FIGURE 11-2. Labial sets taken from Figure 11-1 with numbers indicating the
original item.
such cases. As we have already seen with the s-sets, the same is true of the regular
sets of correspondences in connection with the comparative method. Thus with
the labial sets the best strategy is to see first whether the two p-sets contrast.
After all, they are the same in Swedish and English and differ only in German.
Exactly the same situation obtained in the s-sets. We have only to 1efer to the
actual environments given in the table (Figure 11-1), and it is clear that the set
with a German affricate (pf) occurs initially, and medially after short vowels;
the set with a German f, after diphthongs (and long vowels). Of course, the
evidence reproduced here is rather meager, but those who know German will
immediately see that this is indeed true. Hence the two p-sets are complementary,
conditioned variants of one and the same unit, and they can both be represented
with one symbol, say *p. The structure of the b-sets is the reverse of the p-sets,
because here German is the same for both, and Swedish and English differentiate
between stop and continuant articulation. But they are complementary also,
because the first one occurs in initial position and the second medially; they
can thus be written with, say, *b. Since *p and *b occur in the same environments
they also contrast. Another labial set can be found which has stop articulation
in German:
Swedish
English lorn dorn
in lea f dea f
German lau b tau b (devoicing; see§§ 2.4, 6.15)
This set occurs in (syllable-)final position, and thus contrasts clearly with *p
(lopp-leap-lauf, upp-up-auf). The b-sets, however, never occur in this environ-
ment but only in syllable-initial position, and hence this new set is a variant of
*b. Note that English does not supply any information for syllable position,
as both live and leaf are monosyllables, but the other languages do: livafleben
vs. 16vflaub. Swedish and German thus provide the information that explains
the contrast v =If in English live vs. leaf (see § 4.2). This is a typical situation
in the comparative method. Obviously, the method works only when different
languages have undergone different independent changes. English has lost final
vowels to a greater degree than Swedish and German, but it does not matter
here, because the comparative method uses the combined evidence from all the
languages to which it is being applied. Each language can potentially supply
useful information. The combined evidence has been emphasized by boxing in
the sets of correspondences for enhancing the notion of unity derived from
diverse sources (languages). Again, as in the case of the s-sets, we see that German
orthography, for example, laub for [p], is efficient.
As for the spirant sets, they contrast with each other, and with both stop sets.
It is easy to choose a label for the constant f-f-f, namely, *J, but the voiced
one, v-w-v, would seem to suggest either *v or *w. It is perhaps easier to derive
*w > v than *v > w, and hence *w seems to be preferable, both because of
articulatory simplification (bilabial more marked than labiodental) and for
mnemonic reasons (since the German orthography uses w).
We have now treated seven labial sets of correspondences, which were all
regular in the sense that they occurred more than once in this material (which is
just a small selection). These seven sets were made up of four Swedish and
German units, and five English units. This is a general characteristic: the number
of sets of correspondences can be bigger than the highest number of units in
any of the languages. Also, the number of reconstructed units is independent of
the number of sets with which we start out, although it obviously cannot exceed
the number of the sets. For the Germanic labials we got four, *p, *b, *J, *w, a
number very close to the number of units in all three languages. Notice, however,
that the distribution of these reconstructed units is completely different from
those of the units in the source languages.
[11.6 Dentals) The situation with regard to the dental stops and spirants
is more complicated than the one with regard to the labials. The s-sets (where
each language had spirants only) have already been treated. This leaves us-two
units from Swedish (t, d), four from English (t, d, B, o) and three from German
(t, ts, d), but these yield seven sets of correspondences as in Figure 11-3, where
Four sets containing voiced sounds

and/or interdental spirants
..c: ~ s:: Swedish voiced Voiced
Three sets containing VlaJ(';l"d
:.0 'tl E cu
C1.l u .... u German voice- dentals
voiceless sounds only
~
rn~O~ less only
·- C1.l · -
Swe dish t t t t d d d
English
German
12, 13, 16, 17, 10, 19, 22, 23, 14, 27, 25, 26 30, 31
14, 15 18 20, 21 24 28,29
FIGURE 11-3. Dental sets taken from Figure 11-1 with numbers indicating the
original item.
the sets have been organized according to voicing and spirantness. These are
features that we expect to be relevant, because they were important with regard
to the 1abials. The best place to begin is with the three voiceless sets, which are
differentiated only in German (exactly like the threes-sets). The first one (t-t-t)
occurs only after sets with a spirant (at least in German); the second (t-t-ts)
initially and after short vowels (at least in German) or after *r (16); and the
third (t-t-s) after long vowels (at least in Swedish). Thus they are conditioned
variants of the same unit, which we can label *t. The conditioning of the variants
is generally the same as for the labials; both groupings are thereby mutually
supported. In the remaining four sets, both Swedish and German agree for
those sets where German has voiceless stops (t). These two sets are different
o
because of the contrast d =f in English. As for their distribution, the set with
the English spirant (d- o-t) occurs only before a vowel followed by the r-set,
that is, *r. Complementary distribution based on so few examples may of course
always be wrong, but here it is all we can use. With more evidence, for example,
with the information that there are English dialects with [d] infather, we would
be inclined to combine these two sets under *d. Now, the two remaining sets
also have spirants in English. Because they both occur in initial position, they
contrast with each other as well as with *t and *d, which both also occur in the
same environment. The symbols we need to label these contrasts have to be
different from the established stops, and since spirantness is present in English,
spirants should be used. Thus we can label the set t-e-d with *p (thorn rather
than e is appropriate in Germanic, for historical reasons) and d-o-d with *o.
It turns out that the groupings come closest to the English units.
One further dental set involving an English spirant is
Swedish
klii.w-
English in oaewth clo th
German ei d klei d (devoicing; see§§ 2.4, 6.15)
which occurs in syllable-final position only. Thus it is complementary to both

*p and *o, neither of which occurs in this environment. The situation is quite
parallel to the American English flap problem in cases like writer- rider where
[D] is complementary to both jtj and /d/ (§ 10.4). German orthography suggests
*p, and in the labial situation we saw that orthography was right. German
orthography is morphophonemic: it does not indicate the obligatory devoicing
of voiced stops in syllable-final position (which Middle High German orthog-
raphy still did). The use of patterning (from the labials) would thus follow
German orthography and assign the set d-e-t to *jJ. On the other hand, if we
look at the same words in the plural where the dental set is intervocalic in
Swedish and German, we have
Swedish
klii.Wer
English clo th es
German klei d er
This is identical to *6, and must be assigned to it by the method. The result
is that we have reconstructed singulars * Vp, *k/Vp and plurals * Vo- V, *kiVa- V
(where V is a cover symbol for the vocalic nucleus, which will not be further
treated). Such a situation is by no means typologically impossible; in fact, it is
exactly what English morphophonemics shows. But note that we made a selec-
tion from English, since the plural oaths can also occur with [9]. If we had
chosen this form and the plural cloths, we would have gotten a completely
different result- *p for all forms. The sections on morphophonemics showed
that the voiced spirants are regular in old inherited material, and thus we
probably chose the right variant. This shows, however, that dangers lurk at
every stage in our work. Synchronic variation may impose far-reaching effects
on our reconstructions.
So far we have treated the nucleus of the evidence for dental stops. With
further material and similar collation, other sets emerge. Let us look at items
40- 47, where the words have been given in such a form as to avoid German
syllable-final devoicing. This would just complicate the application of the
method, but as we have already seen, it would not block it. We get the following
two additional sets :
A B
Swedish
English
German ill40, 41 rn 42-47
Neither of them occurs in word-initial position, and hence they are potential
candidates for membership in those units that do, that is, *t, *d, *p, *a-in
other words, all the units we have so far established. Both sets A and B contrast
with each other since they both occur after*/ (i.e., set l-1- 1). Hence they contrast
also with *d, which also follows */ (English scold-German schelten). Set B,
being voiced all the way, would now seem to belong to *o, and this leaves
set A as a candidate for *p, which does not otherwise occur word-medially
after*/. This is the direction in which the method points; the evidence, however,
is too scanty for a definite answer.
(11.7 Velars] Finally, let us turn to the material that shows the velar
sets of correspondences, not counting the h-sets, which have already been
dealt with. Swedish supplies k g y (saga 35), and even t; English, k g y w :
(length), and German, k g x. Again the number of sets of correspondences
exceeds the number of the units in any one language, as shown in Figure 11-4.
The k-sets, one of which occurred also in the item cloth(es), are obviously
complementary: k- k- k occurs initially and k-k-x medially and finally. Hence
they can both be labeled with *k. The g-sets provide a more complicated situa-
tion. One, g- g-g, occurs initially only and is thus complementary to the rest,
Two sets Two sets I

I sharing k Five sets sharing g sharing x and t I
Swedish
English
German
32, 4, 32 27, 29 33, 34, 35 8, 38 37, 39 14 15
36
FIGURE 11-4. Velar sets taken from Figure 11-1 with numbers indicating the
original item.
where English participates withy,' 11' (glides), and : (length), no matter how they
are written. It is impossible to establish complementary distribution with this
material at hand, for example, both sets g-y-g and g-11·-g occur after the vowel
set a-[a]-o (8, 33), although there is a tendency for the first to occur after English
front vowels. English orthography strengthens our suspicion that all the medial
g-sets are somehow conditioned variants of the same unit. Length and rounding
is written with a II', and in the meaning 'say', the verb is say (35) and the noun,
saw 'proverb' (39). Similarly, in Swedish, [y] in saga is written with a g, which
occurs as such in siigen. To have such orthographic evidence is, of course,
quite accidental. But when it is available, linguists are free to use any clues it
can supply. Here, then, we have clear evidence for a *g, certainly for initial
position. But for the medial position we cannot be sure whether *g is enough
or whether there lurks another unit in addition or instead.
The two spirant sets seem to contrast with *t and *k, although there is not
enough material for a definite answer. They both occur in syllable-final position
before at-set (*t), and are thus complementary to the h-sets (*h) as well, which
occur only word-initially. Thus these can be combined into one *x (because it
is easier to derive *x > h than *h > x if we assume that x has more friction
and is more marked; of course, such arguments are more practical than valid).
We can see that one must continually revise one's tentative results according
to the new material brought in through the use of the comparative method. It
was convenient in the beginning to establish a symbol *h to cover all the initial
h-sets (i.e., h-h-h). Now that this *h turns out to be complementary to other
sets that include velar spirants (x), one has to combine both under one symbol.
Universal tendencies of phonetic change make *x more preferable phonetically,
although such tendencies are not absolute and *h > xis possible. But phonemi-
cally there is no difference whatsoever: *hand *x mean exactly the same thing
in terms of the relevant distinctions. Both symbols would represent those sets
that contain voiceless spirants and thus contrast with all the stop sets. On the
other hand, one might quite well retain both symbols *x and *h, although they
occur in mutually exclusive environments. This would, of course, be allophonic
writing, which is sometimes used even in comparative linguistics (§§ 11.12,
11.14, 18.9). A fundamental principle of the comparative method is involved
here: it is both simplest and most plausible to assume one conditioned change
in the protolanguage (*x > *h f #-), rather than two (West Germanic and
Swedish) or three (English, German, and Swedish) identical changes in exactly
the same environment (see§§ 2.18, 15.2).
[11.8 Checking the Results of the Method] Three modern varieties of

Germanic, rather than their corresponding older stages, were used above,
because most languages do not have a long history documented in writing.
Usually a linguist must confine his research to languages as they are at the
time he is studying them, or he must at least base his comparative work on
rather recent field work. Of course, it is true that most Indo-European languages
have a long documented history behind them, and this has led to the general
misunderstanding that the comparative linguist works chiefly with old written
records or "dead" languages. Historical linguistics suffers from the same kind
of misunderstanding, since obviously its entire framework is very historical
indeed. This has led to a further misconception-that the comparative method is
valid only for the older Indo-European languages with written records (see §§
1.21, 1.22), with the implication that all "unwritten" languages need another
method. One could easily imagine a situation in which the European languages
were unwritten and, say, the American Indian languages had a long tradition
of writing. Writing is a historical accident depending on the socioeconomic
factors of the culture and not on the particular shape of the language. The three
European languages in this sample were presented in this spirit; this is how
they would appear to a Martian linguist sampling them. Traditional orthography
was retained, but that was ancillary and was not the basis of the actual treatment
(and, of course, such orthographies might also be available to the Martian
linguist).
But more important, the choice of Modern Germanic languages enables
us to check on the results of the comparative method: since the Germanic
languages were already written down a thousand years ago, we can go at least
that far toward the ultimate cutoff point and see how our groupings hold. {This
will be most valuable as a reminder for those situations where documentation
is not available.) Any reconstruction is valid only for those languages that have
been used '(i.e., included in the buildup of the sets); thus the units we have
tentatively reconstructed cannot be called Proto-Germanic, because all the
Germanic languages were not used. They can only be labeled Proto-Swedish-
English-German, or the like. Neither is there any certainty of such an exact
historical unity; it means only that we have a base from which we can derive
all the languages used in the establishment of the proto-units. This always carries
some historical truth; how much is another matter.
Turning now to the oldest records of English, we find that Old English father
and mother did have a [d], j<l!der and modor, and that daughter and night dis-
played a fricative [x], as reconstructed, which was written with the same symbol
as [h]: doh tor and niht. In the first instance, the method hinted at the right
direction , in the second, its result is confirmed. Further, have and live come
from Old English habban and libban, which in fact show b's, although long
ones. Those items that contained sets with German g's and where English was
so diverse all turn out to have orthographic ( g) 's at least, seemingly representing
[y] in back vowel environments and [y] in front environments, for example,
saw < sagu, bow < boga, nail < n<l!gel, rye < ryge, fowl < fugol, and lay <
lecgan, say < secgan (where cg is probably [ddz], that is, an affricate derivable
from g). In other words, Old English almost matches Modern German and
settles the issue in favor of one medial *g. The method by itself was able only
to suggest this.
As for the dentals, Old Swedish also shows voiced interdental spirants. Old
English, on the other hand, displays only a tendency toward complementary
distribution of (p) and ( 5) , the latter occurring only more frequently in voiced
1 2 3 4 5
Check through
Old English A further
and Old High Adjusted check through
Items German forms reconstruction Gothic
thing ping (OHG) no change no change
thorn porn no change no change
brother brooor no change p
burden byr5en no change p
murder mor<Sor ~
no change p
cloth clap 0 6 p
clothes cliiGas no change p
oath iip 6 p
oaths a<Sas
1-------1
no change p
gold gold no change p
bind bintan d no change
mild milti d no change
handle hantalon d no change
FIGURE 11-5. Checking the reconstruction.
environments than not. Depending on the documents, both [o] and [9] (which
are in complementary distribution) can be written with either jJ or o. Old High
German bears witness to a spirant in thing, that is, OHG thing> NG ding
and thiob > dieb 'thief' as ther, dher > der 'the'(§ 11.9). It also "replaces"
some of the Modern German d's with t's. In Figure 11-5 we can now tabulate
our reconstructed spirants, the additional older evidence, and the consequent
correction of the results of the comparative method. Now *p occurs only in
initial position where it contrasts with *o, which, however, occurs in this
environment only in pronouns. As for the set t-d-d (field and shield), we find
older Swedish spellings fiild- and faldh- (sixteenth century). It becomes clear
that there is also a word skold which means 'shield', whereas skylt is a technical
word meaning 'sign'. But also fait is a technical term occurring mainly in
military contexts. OHG scilt shows that shield contains a *d and OHG feld
speaks for a *o in field. Swedish fiilt and skylt still do not fit in these, and the
evidence is in all ways characteristic of a borrowing situation (compare tooth-
dentist). The technical meanings of these two words, together with historical
evidence. pointing to strong contacts between Sweden and the Hanseatic states,
make the borrowing hypothesis attractive; and, as it happens, the Low German
forms are velt and schilt, with exactly the right dentals. These two items are
typical of loans which are not spotted right away but undergo the method and
may lead to chimerical reconstructions.
24z. CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTics: How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
[11.9] We have seen that our method was unable to penetrate completely
all the changes that accumulated during a thousand years. In English, the diffi-
culties arose partly from the changes a > d and d > a, which are very compli-
cated indeed, but more significantly from the fate of medial velars. German
has undergone a tricky change t > d, which is not phonetically regular (i.e.,
OHG skeltan > schelten, but milti > milde). The comparative method rests on
the assumption of regular phonetic change. Irregular change (various types of
analogy and borrowing) immediately blocks its historically correct course. All
three types of change do occur, and often we have no way of sorting them out.
Hence the result of the comparative method is always highly tentative. Further
evidence requires a revision as often as it confirms the earlier results. The
Germanic case shows that in the majority of items the method did give correct
results, which were confirmed by the earlier stages of the languages used. On
the other hand, in the reconstruction of interdental spirants, the older evidence
necessitated a revision.
If we turn now to Gothic, the "oldest" substantially recorded Germanic
language, we would have to make further changes, namely, to collapse *p and
*a into *p (column 5 in Figure 11-5), because now we have, say, the following
two sets:
~
orne and
~
Swedish et broder ed
English orn at brother oath
German orn as bruder eid
Gothic orn ata bropar aips
Gothic supplies just one p where the other languages required two, *p and *o.
English has been written phonemically, in terms of Old English, as p. The
first set occurs word-initially and the second word-medially and -finally, but
also word-initially in pronouns (e.g., du-thou-du-jJu). This grammatical condi-
tioning of the set should be noted, because it is not normal in the comparative
method. Many scholars would rather interpret it as conditioned by weak stress,
or the like, to get a phonetic environment for it. But the change is still completely
regular and thus enables the comparative method to penetrate it. When Gothic
is brought into the picture, all major branches of Germanic are represented and
the result could now be called Proto-Germanic. But note that Gothic is not a
check on our initial use of the method; since a new language is involved, we
have a new reconstruction altogether. We do not have a check on the method
but on the total Germanic evidence. At the same time, the results of the first
application stand up quite well indeed.
We have now seen the method, the reliability of its results, and why one
should always use the earliest evidence available, because then one can eliminate
many cases of unexplainable change. When we do not have early documents,
we apply the method to any other material available. But we always have to
allow for a certain range of confidence in the results. They need never be perfectly
correct historically. They are only correct as a starting point from which we can
derive unambiguously all the languages used in the method; to some degree
this is also historically true. The method is very powerful and very useful, but
not omnipotent.
(11.10 The Number of Units and the Number of Correspondences] We
have seen one important aspect of the comparative method: the number of
reconstructed proto-units is independent (I) of the number of units in any of
the languages being used and (2) of the number of sets of correspondences
among the languages being used. The decisive factor is the number of contrasts
within the sets; that is, all noncontrasting sets are grouped together into one
proto-unit. Theoretically, two units from two languages can form four sets of
correspondences. This we have already seen, as is clear from the following sets,
showing Swedish and German t and d:
a b c d
Swedish
German
Now, neither the two units for each language nor the four sets by themselves
determine the number of proto-units. As already mentioned, only contrasts
count. Sets b, c, and d all occur in initial position, and thus contrast. Set a,
which occurs only after spirants, is thus complementary to the three others.
We know that there is a further set t-ts in initial position, and since this is
voiceless all the way, we would be inclined to assign set a to it. Thus all four
sets, being built up by only two units from each language, do in fact contrast,
and we need four proto-units to account for them. The choice of symbols for
them would be easy for a (and t-ts) = *t and d = *d, but rather tricky forb
and c. A provisional answer might be *t2 and *d2 forb and c, or vice versa, or
else *p and *o (either way). To choose appropriate labels, the linguist would
have to use his sense of patterning and his experience. What is important is
that the method lays out the contrasts, the relevant distinctions needed to derive
the outcomes for both languages; it unveils the relations between the units, but
it does not choose the labels for the units. This has to be done by the linguist.
Thus, although the method is rather simple and mechanistic, the linguist is
needed for the postediting of its product, as has already been noted many
times.
(11.11] We have seen a situation that is very frequent indeed: two units
from two languages building three contrasting sets. Let us look at six items from
European and Syrian Romany (Gypsy), both varieties having an sand an s,
but which form three sets of correspondences:
European Romany lslolsl vu lsl t Isle~ ctefsl

Syrian Romany ~a~ o~t ~at da~
'six' 'lip' 'hundred' 'ten'
m·Pap mamek
European Romany
Syrian Romany rna s
'snake' 'month'
The three sets can now be lifted out as
m~ and
m
This small selection makes it look as if the set s-s occurred only next to a set
e-a. In that case it would be complementary to both s-s and s-s, and we would
look for further items to see whether the hypothesis holds or not. But further
evidence shows that these sets are not complementarily distributed; rather, all
occur in the same environments and thus contrast. Now s-s can be obviously
labeled *s, and s-s as *s. The middle set s-s needs something different, and the
best strategy is to choose a phonetic symbol that is between the two, namely,
a fronto-palatal *s. The important thing, again, is that the three contrasting
sets be labeled differently, that is, by three symbols (at the same time, one tries
to stick as close as possible to the phonetics actually manifested in the material).
In the case of Romany once more we can check the reconstruction, because it
is an offshoot of the ancient language of northern India, a related form of which,
Sanskrit, was recorded quite early. The corresponding Sanskrit words are $0{
'6 ', O${ha ' lip' ($ = s), satam ' 100 ', dasa' 10 ', sarpa 'snake', and miisa 'month'.
These forms go well beyond Proto-Romany, because they point to sounds that
were not preserved in it at all, for example, retroflex f, but they confirm the
existence of three different sibilants. The conclusions of the method were basi-
cally right. But once all of Romany had, for example, replaced t by s, t could
not be recaptured on the basis of Romany alone. This is a limitation of the
comparative method. We need different independent changes in different lan-
guages to be able to reconstruct earlier stages.
Exactly the same configurations of s-sets can be found in correspondences
between South and East Slavic vs. West Slavic, Hebrew vs. Arabic, Georgian
vs. the other Kartvelian languages, and so on. The method requires three
proto-units, and it can (or should) be right, as was actually demonstrable in the
Romany case.
[11.12) Similar to the above cases is the question of the velars in Indo-
European. The most famous isogloss in the world is the one that divides these
languages in two groups, the centum and satem (see Figure 15-2:1). Centum
languages have plain velars and labiovelars (i.e., two units) corresponding to the
satem sibilants and affricates ([s, s, z, dz], for which the cover term 'coronal'
will be used in the diagram) and plain velars (i.e., again two units); but these
form three sets of correspondences:
A B c
Centum velar labiovelar
Satem coronal velar
These sets are now abstract cover symbols whereby voice and "murmur" have
been ignored; that is, they actually embody distinctive features abstracted from
segments in which voice, voicelessness, or murmur co-occur. These three sets
are frequently labeled with three different symbols, for example (using voiceless
stops), by a palatal*" (A; see item TEN§ 11.13/Figure 11-6), a plain velar *k
(B), and a labiovelar *kw (C). Sets A and C occur in the same environments
and a contrast is consequently clear. Set B, however, occurs only after *u and
*s and before *rand *a, that is, u B r (one environment of which must be
s a
present), whereas set A does not show up in these environments. In other words,
sets A and B are environmentally conditioned variants of the same unit, and
can thus be written with one symbol, *k, again using voiceless stops. The
complementary distribution is not quite watertight, however, which is hardly
surprising in a time span of some two thousand years (the reason being apparently
dialect borrowing); and that is why many Indo-Europeanists go on writing the
allophonic variants*" and *k-exactly as we could have done with our Swedish-
English-German *h-and *-x- (§ 11.7). In the selection of words for Indo-Euro-
pean vowels (Figure 11-6), we shall see the three voiced velars, *g (FIELD,
DRIVE), *g (YOKE), and *gw (COME), where, to be sure, *g occurs before *r
against the rule, but *g after *u according to it.
This section shows that the method can be applied to abstracted features and
not to segments only. But such features have to be handled in connection with
meanings. They also complicate the bundling operations for getting back to
the segments. It is much simpler to apply the method first to segments and do
the componential analysis on the reconstructed protosegments; at the same time,
one can look back at the attested phonetics of the daughter forms. The reason
is that one also needs a knowledge of subgrouping for phonetic reconstruction
(§ 18.8f.).
[11.13 The Comparative Method: Indo-European Vowels (and Selected Stops)]

Let us look now at a selection oflndo-European vocabulary items from Sanskrit,
Greek, Latin, and Gothic (which represents Germanic in general). In a few
cases Gothic is necessarily replaced by some other form of Germanic, and twice
by Old Church Slavic, just to keep the sets at four items each (Gothic /e/ is
spelled e and not ai as in the documents themselves). Most of the vowel sets
have been boxed in, which leaves the consonant sets readily legible on either
side of the emphasized vowels. The meanings indicated are approximate
lexical labels. The items have been arranged for a reconstruction of vowels,
which will supply us material for the next chapter. But before treating the vowels
let us look at a few consonantal sets.
1 2 1 3 7 5 c 8 6 14
st~i ;~~~ ;~~ mi

~ !~ ~6 ~~ ~~6mi ~~ ~~~
~
Sanskrit
Greek : : st 1
Latin ger 0 0 a g-6 o v i s st 0 f e r 6
Gothic kr 0 s ON a k-a [Lith. a v i s] st 0 b e r a
'field' 'to drive' 'sheep' 'is' 'to carry'
(acre) (ewe) (bear)
7 E 9 4 9 E 10 B 4 10 A 12
v~· dMva ~:
e0 i theos
vi dua
~~u :~~:m e~~u 1:_;~:s
i u g u r u b-er
st w·
sth a t o s
st a t u s
~~i ~ w~ ~
p a t e r
w i duw6 j u k 0 0 OE r u d-u st a p 0 s fa d a r
'widow' 'yoke' 'red' 'stand-stood' 'father'
11 B 12 11 A 12 G 13 14 23
(dft)dh~(mi)
bhr~
phr a t ~0
e r
t
fr a t e r
m~ ~0
m a
m a
t e r
t
t e r
(ti)th
f
e (mi)
e (ci)
d~n~m
d 6 ron
d6num
br 6 p a r m 6 d a r (ga)d e (ps) OCS[d a r ii 0]
'brother' 'mother' 'do-deed' 'gift'
G 15 23 16 17 18 6 19
dh~m~s
th u m 6 s
fum us
m~•- ~kane
m us
m us no
~jMgeoks~
d~i~
de k a
dec em
OCS[d y m ii 0] OHGm us ns kan t e h un
'smoke-mind' 'mouse' 'one' 'increase' 'ten'
(eke)
20 D 21 22 A
g~tis
b a sis
-v en ti6
-q urn ps
~cccc m~tis
-m a tos
men t-
-m un ds
'come-go' 'un-' 'mind'
FIGURE 11-6. Indo-European sets of correspondences lined up for the
comparative method.
Some of the consonants in Figure 11-6 are as straightforward as in the
Germanic cases above, namely, the sets for *s (Is, STAND, MOUSE), *r (FIELD,
CARRY, RED, FATHER, and SO on), *m (SMOKE, MOUSE, MIND, MOTHER),
*w (SHEEP, WIDOW). Let us now extract the three sets that predominantly
display t's, sets A (FATHER), B (BROTHER, STOOD), and C (IS):
A B c
Sanskrit
Greek
Latin
Germanic
Set C is the constant with which Germanic (in A and B) disagrees. These are
then the areas that need scrutiny. Are the three sets (A-C) complementary or
not? Set C occurs after s, set A in noninitial position before an accented vowel,
and set B after an accented vowel or in initial position. The accent is given by
Greek and Sanskrit. However, set B does occur before the accent in STOOD;
here it is part of a voiceless final cluster in Gothic. (Elsewhere a d does, in fact,
occur, as we have seen in English stood; compare further (home)stead and Swed-
ish stad 'town'.) In MOTHER, Greek and Sanskrit disagree on the place of the
accent, but we have to rely on Sanskrit alone, which matches the Germanic
forms in every case. All three sets are now environmentally conditioned (by
other such sets) and we can label all of them with one symbol, conveniently *t.
Set D is different from B only for Greek, which has s instead of t. But the s is
conditioned by the following i, and hence set D is also a variant of *t (and we
can reconstruct the starting point for Grimm's and Verner's laws,§§ 4.9, 4.10,
6.3).
Or, take set E from WIDOW, F from RED, and G from DO and SMOKE,
which give us sets that are different only because of Latin:
E F G
~
Sanskrit h
Greek th
Germanic d
Latin b
We notice easily (when we survey the total evidence in these languages) that
set G occurs initially, set F medially next to *u or *r, and set E medially else-
where. Once more the method does its service and we can label all the sets
with "one" symbol, say, *dh (we anticipate here, because there are other sets
that require the symbol *d, that is, the initial sets in GIFT and TEN). This then
is how one continues all through the phonology until one reaches units that
can no longer be combined with each other.
[11.14] The vowel sets are numbered with Arabic numerals. The uniform
sets 1, 7, and 9 clearly contrast, and just for mnemonic purposes these are thus
best labeled *a, *i, and *u. Set 3 contrasts with *a in having an o in two lan-
guages, and an o occurs also in sets 2 and 4, which are complementary to set 3
in that they occur in final syllables. The difference between 2 and 4 is confined
to Latin 0 vs. u, of which 0 occurs further without a following s, and only
after r (compare RED, and add sacer00 'sacred', vir00 'man '). Further, this r
shows up as er in this environment. But now we see that 3 does not contrast
with 2/4; their differences are conditioned by the position in the word, as has
already been noted. Hence the sets 2/3/4 do not contrast; they are all complemen-
tary, their distribution being conditioned by their phonetic environments (other
such sets). The most sensible, unambiguous, and mnemonically good symbol
for these sets is *o. In addition, set 23 is also a noncontrasting variant of this
same *o, although it brings in extra variety through Old Church Slavic. Now,
sets 5 and 6 contrast with the already established units in that at least half of
the languages show an e, but they are different within Germanic, which has e
vs. i. The two sets do not contrast between themselves, however, because set 5
is conditioned by set 8 (and other sets not included here), but 5/6 do contrast
with the other sets. For these reasons, then, we label them separately, with *e.
As for set 8, it is a conditioned variant of *i (7), although here we do need
grammatical conditioning in Latin (a final *i drops after stops in verbal endings).
We have now arrived at five short vowels:
(7, 8) i u (9)
(5, 6) e 0 (2, 3, 4)
a
(1)
But we still have not accommodated set 10 (FATHER and STOOD), which can
be paraphrased as 'i in Sanskrit, a elsewhere'. Although the majority of the
languages show a, set 10 clearly contrasts with *a, because of Sanskrit, and it
also contrasts with *i, because of the languages other than Sanskrit. By the same
token it contrasts with all the other vowels as well and thus requires a symbol of
its own. Traditionally, the symbol *a (schwa) has been used, which is between
i and a (and the other vowels as well), and which fits in the middle of the vowel
triangle.
Set 11 has long vowels only, and it thus contrasts with all the short vowels
established, as it does also with sets 13 and 14. The best labels for these are
obviously *a (11), *e (13), and *o (14). Set 12 contains an e in Greek, and e in
Latin, and an a in Gothic, but since half of the set agrees with *e, one must look
closer for a possible ultimate identity. Indeed, 13 occurs in root syllables (i.e.,
we do not count prefixes) and 12 in final syllables before *r. Hence they can
indeed be combined into one unit. Sets 15 and 16 do not contrast between
themselves, because Slavic always has y against u elsewhere, but they obviously
contrast with all the other vowels we have reconstructed, hence *u.
It is now clear that one continues this procedure by taking more and more
material under scrutiny. Here we must leave the systematic handling of the
Indo-European evidence, with a brief reference to what we would encounter
if we continued. We would have to reconstruct an *i for which no material is
included here, as well as i- and u-diphthongs. For the latter, just two items are
given, set 17 for *oi and set 18 for *au. In some cases single vocalic segments
in Sanskrit (and Greek) correspond to a sequence of vowel plus a nasal or
liquid in the other languages, as in sets 19-22. Such sets obviously contrast
with the others already established; but is 19 different from 20, or only its
variant, or vice versa? Sanskrit and Greek agree; Latin and Germanic reverse
m's and n's. But a word-final m does not occur in oldest Germanic, nor an m
before t in Latin. Hence the sets do not contrast and must share one label.
Here Indo-Europeanists combine the Sanskrit and Greek evidence for a single
syllabic segment with that of Latin and Germanic, which point to a nasal, and
write a vocalic *m. Sets 21 and 22 show an irregularity in Latin, wh~re the i
occurs only in this negative prefix. Otherwise, both clearly contrast with *m
by showing an n in Latin and Germanic. Thus the label *tz. By the same token,
one would encounter evidence requiring us to reconstruct *r and */, and, as
in most other vowels, also length: *l]i, *8, *f, and *[. Here we shall completely
ignore diphthongs with a long initial part, for example, *oi.
One reconstructs nonobstruents for Proto-Indo-European as shown in
Figure 11-7 (the boxed-in units have no evidence at all in our selection of data).
Most Indo-European handbooks write these units as given entities. Interestingly
..
c:J
i u w
y
FIGURE 11-7. The inventory of reconstructed Proto-Indo-European vowels

and resonants (evidence for boxed-in items not provided here).
enough, we are again dealing with a crude phonetic alphabet or allophonic

writing, because the consonantal resonants y w m n r l do not contrast with
the corresponding vocalic ones i u 1f1 tz r /. The method enables us to find this
out easily, because the former always occur adjacent to vowels (although the
diphthongs are traditionally spelled *ei, and so on, and the reverse always *yo;
compare English say, lei, but always yes, yell); the latter occur between con-
sonants, and as we saw in TEN, silence counts as a consonant. All this will be
important in the next chapter, where we shall see how internal reconstruction
confirms this result of the comparative method. Students may immediately
think of some cognate sets where the vowel correspondences given here do not
work at all, for example, warm vs. Greek thermos (§ 8.12). But this is due to
ablaut and will be reserved for Chapter 12.
[11.15 The Comparative Method: Finnish and Lapp Consonant Gradations]
In the case of the Finnish and Lapp consonant gradations(§§ 10.12- 10.14), we
saw that in morphophonemic terms there was no gradation at all; it was obliga-
tory and easy to construct invariant units. Because, however, the gradations
in the two languages are so similar, one naturally wonders whether they existed
in the protolanguage underlying the two; and what does the comparative
method do to alternations? Does it also eliminate them? (See § 11.6.) It is
clear that we have to start out from the surface units, phones or phonemes,
which actually do alternate. We get eight sets of correspondences arranged in
Figure 11-8. The long stop words in 8 turn out to be crucial from the phonemic
point of view, because they yield sets A2 and Bl in closed syllables, producing a
contrast with sets A6-7 and B3-7, which also occur in closed syllables. The shape
of the syllable is sometimes obscured in Lapp but is available from Finnish;
1 2 3 4
A Finnish kii~i tie~ iiii nei~i liih[]eii
Lapp kie htt a tie htt eo nieJ fi a liex t aD
'hand' 'to know' 'young 'to leave'
lady'
5 6 7 8
ku~u ku~un liih~ en nuo~a
ko oo a ko 5 a lieu t am nuo hh e
'spawn' 'spawn' 'I leave' 'seine'
(nom.) (gen.)
1 2 3 4
B Finnish
Lapp
jo[JJ i
jo hkk a
jal~a
juoi oe s~[;]un
so yy a
~~JO [;Jen
yy a
'river' 'leg' 'family' 'river'
(gen.) (gen.)
5 6 7 8
!~iin jal~an sylrnen a[;Ja

a IJ e juol g e tSol g a a hk:k e
'age' 'leg' 'saliva' 'old woman'
(gen.) (gen.) (gen.)
I
FIGURE 11-8. Finnish and Lapp consonant correspondences lined up for the
comparative method.
Finnish Lapp
dental velar dental velar
l katto sukka nuohite sohkka sohkka
II kat on kato sukan suka nuohtte kiehtta sohkka
III kadon suan kie<Sa soyya
'roof' 'loss' 'sock' 'brush' 'seine' 'hand' 'sock' 'family'
FIGURE 11-9. The interrelation of phonemes and morphophonemes. Rows

indicate different phonemes and phones within each articulatory set (dental,
velar). Columns indicate different morphophonemes. [Reprinted with slight
modification from Raimo Anttila, "The relation between internal reconstruc-
tion and the comparative method," Ural-Altais~he Jahrbiicher, 40, 159-173
(1968), (© Societas Uralo-Altaica).]
this situation is parallel to the information provided by the accent in Greek and
Sanskrit that supplied environments for grouping consonant sets together. That
is, we have the three-way contrasts as indicated by the rows of Figure 11-9. In
other words, the rows indicate phonemic identity within each language and
articulatory set (i.e., dental and velar in this material), whereas the columns
indicate morphophonemic identity within themselves but morphophonemic
difference with other columns. These columns contain the sets we found to
contrast with each other in the section on morphophonemics, but here they have
been written so that the phonetic/phonemic identity of their members match in
the same rows. The phonemic contrasts between the rows are clear, because
minimal pairs immediately establish them: kattofkato, katonfkadon, tahtommef
tahdomme 'our wish/we wish'. The table, then, is a summary and a visual
comparison between morphophonemics and phonemics and their overlapping.
Using these phonemic contrasts we must group the sets under three contrasting
units within each articulatory set: *t (Al-4), *d (AS-6), *tt (AS), *k (Bl-2),
*g (B3-7), and *kk (B8). It must be remembered that the three units (within
each articulatory group) arrived at here depend on the material used, and in no
way mirror the number of units one would have to posit with fuller evidence.
The method can never go beyond the material to which it is being applied. Only
if the selection happens to represent the total population adequately will the
result of the method have wider validity. It is always helpful, therefore, to
expand the selection until it includes all the evidence.
What is of interest in this particular Finnish-Lapp selection is that the
comparative method does assign consonant gradation to most of the words
used, as we see by writing the reconstructed units in their proper environments,
for example, (nom.) *kat V, (gen.) *kiiden 'hand', and (nom.) *suku, (gen.)
*sugun 'family', and so on. However, in one item, where both languages have
alternation, the comparative method eliminates it, (nom.) *kudu, (gen.) *kudun
'spawn'. This would be true of all those consonants that alternate in Lapp,
but not in Finnish (e.g., m, n, !, and so on). We should expect this here, however
(i.e., Finnish has no alternation but provides the phonetic environments for
the Lapp alternation)-unlike the case where both languages participate.
[11.16] We have seen that in both phonemic and morphophonemic

analysis the method could be deadlocked in cases where a unit occurred in one
particular environment and was complementary to two other units, so its assign-
ment to either one was rather arbitrary or impossible. Now, the comparative
method can be subject to exactly the same indeterminacy, as we see in set 7A,
which is complementary both to the sets comprising *t and to those of *d,
because it is the only set occurring in a cluster with a spirant set (10):
9 4 11 12 10 7 11
Finnish ~a lhJ ftljel
f0l a ~a rhlldJiel n
Lapp lie~ L:J ~ ~0 he~ l:J ~m
'to leave' 'I leave'
The only indication of gradation comes from the spirant set 10, which is comple-
mentary to 9 in that it occurs as a first member of a cluster that begins a closed
syllable. Thus both can be combined under the symbol *x, and A7 occurs after
this where it starts a closed syllable. If one now arbitrarily assigned A7 to *d,
we would get consonant gradation for this paradigm, and if we connected it
with *t, there would be no gradation in this cluster *xt. In this case, then, one
would have to compile all the relevant material before one could reach an
unambiguous conclusion. As for set 12, with a little extra evidence it would
be easy to see that it is a variant of *t.
We observed in the application of the comparative method to this Finnish
and Lapp gradating material phonetic conditioning of the distribution of the
sets of correspondences, which is one of its characteristics. The method did
sort out the material so that it gave consonant gradation in the protolanguage
for the majority of the cases. Unfortunately, the method does not tell us whether
this result is correct! It is a well-known axiom that the comparative method is
powerless if two (or more) languages undergo the same change after the split-off
point. That is, it is conceivable that the protolanguage had a certain tendency
toward allophonic variation in terms of open and closed syllables, with no
phonemic im portance, and that this tendency increased with time, ultimately
giving the attested gradations. This process is called drift (§ 9.13), and the
comparative method assigns its results automatically to the protolanguage,
against the actual historical facts. What makes the comparative method work
is that different languages usually undergo different changes, as we saw from
the Indo-Eu ropean material above. Another cause of great uneasiness in this
matter of reconstructing consonant gradation is the crucial role played by the
long-stop words, as has been mentioned. They are rather infrequent, which
raises the question whether they arose after the period of unity. Here, also,
the actual history and the result of the method need not agree at all.
[11.17] But there are even situations in which a change in one language
can deadlock the method or derail it, as far as the real history is concerned.
The Finnish i "' e alternation could easily be eliminated through morpho-
phonemic analysis, exactly like the consonant gradation (§ 10.12). If we want to
apply the comparative method to this material to see whether the alternation
should be reconstructed in the protolanguage, a dead end is the consequence
of the fact that both Finnish i and e correspond to Lapp a, for example, set 11
above and .
13 14 14
ka kas~· 'hand' neit~· 'miss', etc.
ill hkke
'age'
kiehtt a niejr> a
Sets 13 and 14 are complementary, and sets 11 and 14 both occur in the same
environment (medially) and thus contrast, the method now requiring two
units, *e (II) and *i (14), for example, (nom.) *kiiti, (gen.) *kiiden 'hand'.
The vowel alternation turns out to be the same as in Finnish. From these
reconstructed forms one can unambiguously derive the Lapp vowels, but there
is no guarantee whatsoever that Lapp ever had the alternation also. From the
time that Finnish (all of Baltic Finnic) shows the change of final *-e > -i, the
method assigns the result (i "' e alternation) also to the protolanguage.
Thus in both cases (consonant gradation and i "' e alternation) the comparative
method gives us alternation, if we use surface phonology (phonemes or phones),
but no guarantee of exact historical truth. This contrasts sharply with the
results yielded by the Indo-European material. But even in cases where the
method yields uncertain historical facts, it still gives us a possible starting point
from which the languages used can be unambiguously derived. And of course
such starting points will always be historically true in some sense.
[11.18 Checking the Results on Finnish and Lapp Reconstructions] In the

case of Germanic and Romany, we could go to earlier records to check our
reconstructions (at least in part) in order to gain confidence in the performance
of the comparative method. One should never forget the fact that reconstructions
are valid only for the material used, either in terms of selection or the number of
languages; and since Finnish and Skolt Lapp are not the only representatives
of their family, we can use wider comparative checking.
Additional material may require readjustment of earlier results, and since
our samples were so restricted, we could hardly expect that they would allow
us to recapture everything. Let us mention a few points. The Lapp genitive
nieoa is completely anomalous; if it were regular one would expect a paradigm
nief/5af*nieida or *nieiDa (like noaj/5afnoaida [noaiDa] 'witch'). 'Miss, young
lady' represents a semantic area that often attracts irregular change (§ 9.8),
and such an irregularity should not have been included in the reconstruction
at this stage. Further, Finnish neitifneidin was not originally an i-stem, because
dialects and the Kalevala (the Finnish national epic, the model of Hiawatha)
show an e-stern, like kiisi/kiiden. The old paradigm was thus of the type *neisi/
*neiden, and such a nominative lurks in the Karelian compounds neiz-akka,
neiz-akku 'old maid' (with akka 'old woman'; compare English compounds
husband and shepherd, which contain old shapes, § 5.15). The i-stems are late,
and found in Proto-Baltic Finnic only; our application of the method, therefore,
had to rely on Finnish. The lateness of the Finnish paradigm also explains
the lack of assibilation in the i-stems, that is, difference in chronology (§ 4.29).
But note that in spite of the Lapp anomaly, the reconstruction of consonantism
was basically right.
Forms like liihteiifliihden 'to leave/! leave' did not have consonant gradation
in Early Baltic Finnic in the cluster *kt: *liikte-oiikf*liikte-m. After the change
*k > h gradation was analogically extended to the word. In Lapp all words
are subject to gradation in one way or another, and the Proto-Lapp paradigm
went *lekta-oekf*leyiii-m. This is a perfect example of independent drift in
both languages, triggered by the common kernel of at least phonetic consonant
gradation (see§ 9.13). In such cases the comparative method is helpless.
(11.19] In Chapter 12 we extend comparative reconstruction by internal

reconstruction. Since we have left so much material unused (from Finnish and
Lapp) we can usc it to test the result of the comparative method with internal
reconstruction. If a Finnish word has two sets of consonants expected to be
subject to gradation, the stem has only the weak grade in the first set, whether
the syllable is open or closed. Thus from kiisi/kiide-n 'hand' and pukufpuvu-n
'suit' we have
nominative ka.de-.ton pu.vu-.ton
genitive ka.de-t.ta.ma-n pu.vu-t.to.ma-n
'handless' 'suitless'
where the period indicates syllable boundaries, and the hyphen, morpheme
boundaries. The genitives are as expected because the syllables .det. and .vut.
are closed ( < .tel., (u).kut.), but in the nominative .de. and .vu. are anomalous,
because here one would expect .te. and .ku., respectively. But since the genitives
show that the single t of the -ton/ton '-less' must be derived from the underlying
double tt of the suffix 1-ttoma-1, one must assume that a double It was still
present in the nominative at the time when single stops gradated. The order
of gradation is thus (ignoring vowel harmony):
NOMINATIVE GENITIVE
(I) underlying lkate-ttomal Ikate-ttoma-n I
(2) gradation of single stop kadettoma kadettoman
(3) drop of final vowel kadettom kadettoman
(4) gradation of double stop kadetom kadettoman
And then at some point, final m > n. Thus Finnish still shows a clear hierarchy
in the gradation of single and double stops. Finno-Ugric scholars use this
information correctly in assuming that the double gradation is later than *t - *d
and *k "' *g, and they generally write a phonetic difference, for example, *tt -
*lt, *kk "' *kk. The method could not, of course, go beyond the material it was
applied to. Because it had to rely on Finnish (and Lapp) disyllabic stems only,
its result was too much like Finnish (all evidence not considered here). The
moral of this is that everything in a language must be subjected to different
methods for solid reconstruction, and even so, many indeterminacies will
remain. But our treatment can be only so detailed, as our main purpose is to
get a feeling of what is involved in applying the methods and how reliable they
are.
[11.20 Conclusion] All the methods (phonemic analysis, morphopho-

nemic analysis, internal reconstruction, the comparative method) have now been
treated, and the discussion of them will go on in the next chapter, which forms an
integral whole with this one. In this chapter, we have seen how the operation
of the comparative method rests on two factors: the arbitrariness of the linguistic
sign and regular phonetic change. Now, if two or more languages show regular
correspondences between themselves in items where the meanings are the same
or similar, that is, if there are diagrammatic relations between different languages,
it means that there must be only one underlying colligation of sound and
meaning (the linkup of the linguistic sign). The differences in the attested sound
segments therefore depend on regular phonetic change, which has changed the
sounds of the original linguistic sign; and often the meaning has also changed.
This surface diversity is not at all different from dialectal variation, which also
does not affect the sign aspect; that is, in cases like /iyo-:Jr/ vs. /ayo-:Jr/ either
there is clearly only one colligation of form and meaning, although the form
does not manifest itself in exactly the same shape (see Chapter 12). Whenever
an innovation that does not involve regular phonetic change enters the language,
the comparative method staggers, or can even be derailed. The principal stumbling
blocks are either all kinds of analogy, which often make the signs more iconic
in relation to the rest of the grammar, or irregular sound change, which can
also be iconic with respect to sounds of nature. That is, when the symbolic
aspect of the linguistic sign is tampered with, the comparative method runs into
trouble. Regular sound change retains the conventional arbitrary co/ligation of
sound and meaning intact; although the shapes change, they change regularly.
The fact that comparative linguistics depends chiefly on the symbolic sign was
stressed in the background (§ 1.17). This chapter has shown how and why.
The actual act of establishing reconstructed units is generally not visible in
our standard handbooks and historical grammars, although they are all based
on such comparative work. The handbooks invariably start with the starred
forms and map them to the attested forms; that is, they use the framework of
historical linguistics, which is the reverse of what we have done in this chapter.
Thus one writes that a sound *x gives yin language M and z in language N,
and so on. We have seen in this chapter that the comparative method gives us
the starting point of Grimm's and Verner's laws, and that it also automatically
provides the rules for them, that is,
Proto-Indo-European *t in voiceless clusters gives t in Germanic, jJ word

initially and medially after stressed vowel, and o elsewhere.
In other words, we just back-project the environments that provided us the

reasons for combining various sets of correspondences. Of course we have seen
earlier that this change is more general: (I) the feature closure (occlusion)
remains when it co-occurs with the feature voicelessness after a segment contain-
ing voicelessness (when we do not have a double stop, for example, *tt > ss in
Germanic), (2) it changes into a feature fricative initially and medially after
stress (Grimm's law), and (3) the feature voicelessness is replaced by voice,
when it co-occurs with fricativeness (Verner's law) (§§ 4.9, 4.10, 6.3, 11.13).
The formulation of these rules (1-3) is not superior in theoretical terms to the
establishment of the starting points. Both are by-products of each other, that
is, complementary. Regular sound change makes comparison possible, and
comparison then establishes the starting points, at the same time giving the
mapping rules, that is, the sound changes that made it work. Since there is no
choice but to believe in the complementarity of units and rules, and since
the rules have already been treated in Part II, we can leave the matter here.
Sound change is the rule part of the comparative method. Historical and
comparative linguistics are opposite sides of the same coin.
REFERENCES
General: Meillet 1967a, 1926, Hoenigswald 1950, 1960a, Pike 1957, Thieme
1964, Anttila 1968, Devoto 1969, Katicic 1970, Voyles 1971, Allen 1953, Ellis
1966; 11.8 Moulton 1954; 11.12 Krahe 1970, Voyles 1971; 11.13-11.14 Krahe
1970, Szemerenyi 1970; 11.18 E. Itkonen (private communication); 11.19 Leppik
1968, Anttila 1969a.
EXERCISES
For practicing the comparative method the instructor can devise artificial
material of any complexity necessary. Such exercises are provided here as models.
Another procedure, which allows for comparison with the actual "history,"
is to split the class in two and to hand each part a word list. Depending on the
number of languages needed each group is further divided, letting students in
each section introduce changes one after the other. When sufficient change has
accumulated the two groups can switch lists. The original starting point and
the relative chronology are now documented and one can check afterward
how close the reconstruction comes. For selections from real languages, see
Cowan 1971.
THE CoMPARATIVE METHOD 257
1. Artificial. Apply the comparative method to the following data, concen-

trating only on the dentals. Numbers identify meanings.
LANGUAGE A LANGUAGE B
top 1 dip 3 tob 1 des 5
tuk 2 dop 4 tuk 2 duo 6
tes 5 diu 7 tip 3 diu 7
tuo 6 doo 8 top 4 doo 8
2. Artificial. Reconstruct the protoforms for the following forms from two
languages, A and B. Assume that any item in the list could be matched by
many others.
A B A B
1. dim dim 2. eo io
3. oen oin 4. te ti
5. dim din 6. onep onit
7. med med 8. nae nai
9. IJO IJO 10. UlJa UlJa
11. utu utu 12. oap oap
13. pep pit 14. keo keu
15. akot akut 16. IJoka IJuka
3. Artificial. Reconstruct the protoforms for the following items from two
languages. The meanings are again given with numbers only. Arrows indicate
tones, each language having two, a falling and a rising one. The tone is written
after the form, although its domain is the whole word.
A B A B
1. lJUip t lJOep t 2. pau!J t paon-l-
3. tOl) t ton t 4. tim t dent
5. kopt gopt 6. keum-l- keon-l-
7. pant ban t 8. kolJ t gont
9. mip-l- mep-l- 10. neb-l- nebt
11. tud t dod-l- 12. poig-l- poeg-l-
13. lJUm t lJOn t 14. nuom-l- noon+
15. tag t tagt 16. pe!J t pent
!7. pott bott 18. tik t tek t
19. nak-l- nakt 20. mont mont
21. kott gott 22. kaumt gaon-l-
23. toug-l- toog t 24. pumt bon-l-
25. koq kott
4. Artificial. Reconstruct the protoforms for the following items from two
languages. Note that now you have to pass semantic judgments and weed out
258 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS; HOW CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
borrowings. If no meaning is given for language B, it is the same as in A.
A B
1. kiup 'sweetheart' hipu 'witch'
2. taul 'mother' palu
3. tomp 'horse' pomfi 'foal'
4. sapp 'bread' sappi
5. kruuv 'raw' hruuvi
6. riusp 'peg' riusfi 'pole'
7. ras 'glass' rasi
8. proupp 'eye' froppu 'window'
9. top 'wound' top
10. krukr 'crane' hruhri
11. vipp 'loan' vippi 'theft'
12. ramiur 'walk' ramiru
13. soik 'high' soiho
14. siok 'small' sioha
15. tau! 'painting' paulu
16. kour 'gold' koru
17. pou 'boy' pau 'table'
18. rasp 'three' rasfi
19. suuk 'lip' suhu
20. kauk 'five' kouk 'grandmother'
21. kop 'cigar' kop
22. tiut 'window' pipu 'door'
23. sik 'taxes' sik 'burden'
24. mafu 'peasant' mafu 'farmer'
25. vautt 'berry' vattu
26. nius 'rye' nisu
27. soik 'round' soihe 'oval'
28. ras 'box' rase 'chest'
5. Artificial. Reconstruct the protoforms for the following items from three
languages. Assume that the material does not contain borrowings, and so on.
Numbers stand for meanings.
A B c
1. gukura kuxra kiigra
2. Iipar lifri Iiabri
3. gaukaura kauxra kaugra
4. rutsu rupsu rutsu
5. rapina rafna raibna
6. gipina kifna kibna
7. de teke teke
8. gies kixsu kieksu
9. be pis pefsi peipsi

10. hulina hulna huilla
11. barina parna pairra
12. rolina rolna roilla
13. din tixnu tignu
14. dekila texla teigla
15. lopar lofri loabri
16. bilova pilva piolla
17. lir liru liru
18. beke peke peke
19. be peke peke
20. velilr velri veulli
21. buar puxri puagri
22. dikin tixnu tignu
23. go una koxna kougna
6. Real. (This material, reproduced here courtesy of William E. Welmers,

was transcribed in the field in 1949.) Reconstruct the phonemic system from
the evidence given from two Jukun dialects or languages (southeastern part of
Northern Nigeria). The material is taken from the towns of Takum and Wukari.
The following digraphs are to be taken as unit phonemes: /mb, nd, I)g; kp, gb;
ts, dzf. The tones are marked the following way: acute = high tone, macron =
mid tone, grave = low tone, circumflex = glide from high to low, vertical
stroke = glide from mid to low. A tilde indicates nasalization. All vowels
adjacent to jm, n, IJ/ may be considered nasalized, but not vowels adjacent to
/mb, nd, TJgf.
TAKUM WUKARI TAKUM WUKARI

do d5 'area above' ze nde ze nde 'agree'
IJgo T:jg6 'anger' fo fo 'arrive at'
s6(piru) tsii 'ashes' mbye mbye 'ask'
yfik~ yfik~ 'back' bara ba 'bag'
tisye titye 'basket' syi tyi 'be'
vo vo 'beg' kwaki kwakyi 'big'
mba mba 'give birth to' z6 dzwfi 'bite'
pe pe 'be black' sa sa 'blood'
we we 'blow a horn' ve ve 'blow (of
wind)'
diri di 'body' ne ne 'boil'
.1.
yito to 'a bow' wo w5 'hard
breathing'
kye kye 'be bright' wiidyi widyi 'buffalo'
mi mi 'build' sere tse 'a bundle'
hwe hwe 'buy' bii. bii. 'call'
260 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS! How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
kora ko 'canoe' ko ko 'care for'

so tswa 'carry on the hwa hwa 'carve'
head'
p! p[ 'catch' puU pik! 'change'
k[ k[ 'change, turn bii bii 'characterized
around' by'
kana ki 'charcoal' zo dzwa 'chew and
swallow'
kuna kwi 'chicken' kuru ku 'chief'
~ ~
wu wu 'child' si ke tsi ke 'close, cover'
tukpa tukpa 'cloth' bi bi 'come'
se tye 'corn beer' furu fu 'corn beer
before
fermentation'
ki ki 'corpse' hwe hwe 'count'
be be 'cover, wrap' ne na 'cow'
kya kya 'cross' za za 'crush, grind'
kuto kuto 'a cry' ge ge 'cut'
ta suma ta syuma 'be damp' z6 dyo 'dancing'
wii hii 'die' tu tu 'be difficult'
ka ka 'dig' fu fu 'dig up'
wo wo 'dip, bathe' ko ko 'dip'
dyt dyi 'dirt' zana zi 'dish'
sa tsa 'do' be ba 'dog'
wa wa 'drink' ka ka 'drive away'
worn we 'be dry' so" ts5 'ears'
dyi dyi 'eat' kyana ky~ 'egg'
kumivo kunuvo 'elbow' wliyi wiyi 'elephant'
ka ka 'enter' z6 zo 'eyes'
ku ko 'fall' (tree, ta ta 'fall' (rain)
person)
dara da 'farm' ko kwa 'be fat'
vyo vyo 'fellow country- nii nii 'fight'
man'
klvo kyivo T: 'finger' kana ka 'finger ring'
W: 'fingernail'
dye dye 'fish' piru pyu 'fire'
as6na atswana 'five' fa fa 'flay'
ki kyf 'a fly' ba ba 'follow'
kira kyi 'mashed food' bara be 'foot, leg'
yura hyii 'forest' yu ndyo 'forge, pound'
ayena ayena 'four' zo dyo 'friend'
pye
... pye
...
'front' fe fe 'fry'
mo mo 'be full' fura fi 'sheltered

gathering
place'
ya yi 'give to' ya ya 'go'
te til 'go down' kpa syf kpa su 'go forward'
ne ne 'go up' bin a byI 'goat'
syid5 tyid8 'God' sa sa 'be good'
vini vini 'be all gone, na na 'greet'
finish'
wo hwa 'grind' dyina dye 'ground'
za za 'guinea corn' we hwe 'hair'
vo vo 'hand, arm' s5 ts5 'hang up'
IJa IJa 'hate' bii bii T: 'with'
W: 'have'
kii kii 'he, she, it' syina tyi 'head'
fo fO 'feel, hear' ndo nda 'be heavy'
da da 'hit' d~ de 'honey'
ne ne 'hoe' pora pyo 'hole
(through)'
syi kp6tyi kp6 'hold on!' viina vi 'horse'
Hina ta 'house' apami apana 'how many?'
mb6ra mbo 'hunger' nil nil 'husband'
tami tami 'hyena' m. m 'I'
funa fi 'inside' ba ba 'join'
kw~ kwe 'justice' gba bwa 'kill,
kunube kunube 'knee' ke u 'kneel'
kuna kwi 'knife' yi yi 'know'
we hwe 'be large' zii zii 'leave'
fi fyi 'leopard' na na 'lie down'
syfdi ty:ldi 'life, soul' dy~kuru z~ku 'lion'
sona tsw~ 'a load' ki ki 'be located at'
ya ya 'look for' dye dya 'get lost'
wuwe hOhwe 'a lot' mbya mbya 'make'
wiinu wunu 'man' ti ti 'market'
sylnd6 ty:lndo 'master' kuna kw:l 'millstone'
be be 'money' kaki kakyi 'kind of
monkey'
sona s5 'moon, month' kuna kwe 'mountain'
nu nii 'mouth' dyina ze"' 'name'
hw~ hwa 'neck' tama tam a 'right now'
du du 'obtain' biru byu 'oil'
' ,.
ka u 'be old' azu azu 'one'
numa numa 'only' pu po 'open'
T AKUM WUKARI TAKUM WUKARI

ze ze 'be opposed to' mi mye 'outdoors'
s~ s~ 'own' zu zu 'pass'
wa zu wa zu 'pass by' hwa hwa 'pay'
fyek~ fyek~ 'peanuts' bandii bandii '(one's)
people'
'person' wu" WO 'pick up (little
things)'
bira bye 'place' na na 'plant (by
hoeing after
sowing)'
ta ta 'plant' goiJgo goiJgo 'plantains'
para pe 'pot' we we 'pour in'
ya ya 'praise' te te 'press'
gbe gbe 'pull' wft wft 'pull away'
gbe gbe 'pull out' te te 'push'
s~ s~ 'put down' syagba tyagba 'quiver'
su tyu 'rain' y6 y6 'be red'
IJa' wo... IJa wo 'rest' bye bye 'ripen'
niiJa nu 'river' w6 w5 'roast'
dana de 'root' zuru dyu 'rope'
so so 'be rotten' pa pa 'rub'
sye sye 'run' sye syo 'a running'
mana rna 'salt' v5 vu 'sand'
da da 'say' kpa pa 'scrape'
hwa hwa 'scratch' me mbya 'see'
do do 'sesame seed' to tswa 'set (a trap)'
asyipi atyipyi 'seven' ko kwa 'sew'
gM gbft 'shatter' dyi dyi 'be sharp'
duiJa (a)dii 'sheep' ta ta 'show'
wiiza wiiza 'sibling' dora do 'sickness'
so tso 'sing' asyidyi atyidyi 'six'
na mi 'sleeping' vyepiru vyepyu 'smoke'
ya ya 'sow' so tso 'spear'
ki kyo 'split' be ba 'spoil'
pe pe 'spread to dry' se tse 'stand'
vi vyi 'steal' ban a M 'stone'
kyona ky5 'stranger' gbam gbii 'strong'
yunu yunu 'sun, day' za za 'sweep'
go go 'be tall' ya ya 'tear'
ad up adzwe 'ten' tiri tiri 'there'
be be 'they' ga ga 'think'
asara atsara 'three' ta ta 'throw'
se tse 'tie' ni ni 'be tired'

dyimi dyimi 'today' aky~ aky~ 'tomorrow'
IJgo IJgo 'be tough' ka ka 'town (wall)'
yin a hi 'tree' fi fyi 'trouble'
IJga IJga 'try' fa fa 'turn over'
apina apyina 'two' fs fe 'untie'
se se 'until' so bar a sube 'upper leg'
re fe 'wake up' kye kye 'walk'
ky~ kyo 'walking' syo tyo 'want'
kana ke 'war' tii tso 'wash'
zape dyape 'water' i I 'we'
zo dzo 'weave' ake ake 'what?'
mbu mbU 'be white' wa wa 'wife'
wo wo 'wind' wuwa wuwa 'woman'
dyira dyi 'word' buso bUt so 'work' (noun)
son a tswe 'the world' te te 'hurt'
f6 f6 'a wound' sura si 'yams'
dyi dyu 'year' ana ana 'yesterday'
u u 'you (sg.)' ni ni 'you (pl)'
ri ri (progressive ra ra (completed
action) action)
mba mba (negative) ka ka (with neg.
hortative)
su so (in phrases mgba gye m gba gye ' (a greeting)'
meaning 'set
down')
CHAPTER 12
INTERNAL RECONSTRUCTION
The metamorphosis of morphophonemic analysis into

internal reconstruction is shown with examples that come
originally from a historical frame.
[12.1 Gothic and Germanic Verbal Ablaut] Internal reconstruction is

already known to the reader, as it is exactly the same as morphophonemic
analysis. Only the emphasis of the two is different: morphophonemic analysis
brushes aside unproductive "irregular" alternations, whereas internal recon-
struction concentrates on them (§ 10.9). As far as the method itself is concerned,
there would be no necessity for further exemplification, but we shall use it once
more to retrace one of the most famous cases of its application, the Indo-
European laryngeal theory. It is a topic for which students seem to have an
unabated interest, and it is indeed illustrative. We shall lead into the theory by
the application of internal reconstruction to the Gothic strong verb (i.e., the
type sing-sang-sung, exhibiting "ablaut").
We rewrite Gothic ei [i·] as ii to do justice to the actual sound and then look
at the vocalic nuclei of the verbs bite, choose, and bind, according to our familiar
sets of correspondences, boxed in along the seams of the flanking consonants:
'BITE' 'CHOOSE' 'BIND'
lJ~
pres.
pret. sg. b ai t k~s~
k au s
b~ndan
b a nd
pret. pl. b i tum k u sum b u ndum
p.p.p. b i tans k u sans b u ndans
The first two sets are of the type in divine/divinity vs. sanefsanity, or of course
like bite/bitten; that is, a diphthong alternates with a short vowel. They obviously
contrast; but then we notice that the i and u, respectively, run through the whole
set, suggesting a different segmentation:
b~· itan
b a it
k~· usan
k a us
b~· ndan
b a nd
b 0 itum k 0 usum b u ndum
b 0 itans k 0 usans b u ndans
Now we see that the first two diphthongs contrast on account of i and u and
not the alternating vowel, which now resembles the vowel set in bind. We had
264
INTERNAL RECONSTRUCTION 265
exactly the same situation with Finnish katto and sukka (§ 10.13). We further
note that the set i-a-u-u as in bind, occurs only before nasals and therefore, is
conditioned by the set n-n-n-n; it is thus a variant of i-a-0-0, however we
would label it. What happened in the above case was that the vowel alternation
tended to fuse with its environment, thus creating more possibilities for seg-
mentation. Rather than carry out internal reconstruction in this familiar way
to establish all the contrasting alternations, we shall concentrate on the environ-
ments of the variants of this one unit, that is, i, a, and nothing. In this way our
internal reconstruction has a slightly different emphasis from that presented in
Chapter 10. Such a treatment of vowels and environments means the study of
canonical forms (favorite sound shapes of morphemes, e.g., eve, evee,
evev, and so on), and we shall see that the essence of the laryngeal theory is
also a fusion of the alternating vowel and its environment. Thus this chapter
will not be superfluous after the previous one, since it will show a new side to the
flexibility of internal reconstruction.
To facilitate this new aim we simply turn around the above arrangement by
ninety degrees, which gives us
PRES. PRET. SG. PRET. PL. P.P.P.
I.
II.
b~itan
k i usan bmit
k a us
bitum
kusum
bitans
kusans
III. b i ndan b a nd bluJndum b lu]
ndans
In other words, lexical meanings are represented by rows, the grammatical

ones, by columns. Thus we can segment the formal markers that correspond.
The first column shows the same vowel i all the way, the second, a (ignoring
the unified infinitive ending -an), whereas the last two columns do not share
sound units except, again, the endings -um 'we' and -ans. The vowels i and a
alternate in clearly defined grammatical categories and thus represent in a
characteristic fashion one and the same morphophoneme. The rows within
themselves share the same sequence of sound units within the roots namely,
b-it, k-us, and b-nd. The only problem is in the last two columns of row 3, which
breaks the pattern by showing an extra u. This is a typical situation in morpho-
phonemic analysis, alias internal reconstruction. We use widespread regularities
against which we evaluate apparent aberrations. According to the regular
pattern in rows 1 and 2, the "aberrant" root shape of row 3 should be an
"expected" bnd. Such a sequence does not occur in the surface phonology of
Gothic at all. This is a hopeful sign indeed, and now one has to test whether
bund can be derived from lbndl. We are dealing with a restricted environment,
n between stops, and the answer is clear: an underlying lnl between consonants
inserts a u in front of it to yield the actually occurring sequence bund. In other
words, vocalicity is written into an extra segment, because n does not accom-
modate it directly, as i and u do, of course. Another characteristic of morpho-
phonemic analysis/internal reconstruction has now come out. We strip off
everything that can be put back unambiguously in terms of the paradigms

(grammatical environments) and/or phonetic environments. Also m, r, and I
share this particular behavior with n. If we label all four with R and other
consonants with C, we can state that, instead of the structurally defined sequence
CRC, we get CuRC. Now, including also i and u under the cover symbol R
(although u-insertion does not operate on these) we get a uniform paradigmatic
alternation for all three verbs: CiRC ""' CaRC ""' CRC. Internal reconstruction
has resolved surface diversity into underlying unity, that is, one canonical form.
(12.2] Even without all the Germanic evidence, it is interesting to compare

this result of internal reconstruction with that of the comparative method. Not
only vowels, but also consonants alternate, for example,
Gothic k~an kaus kuls]um ku ls]ans

OE cE.l:lan ceas cul:Jon co l:Jen
The set s- s contrasts with s-r, because both occur medially, and they require
different labels, *sand *z, or so (see§ 4.10). Internal reconstruction in Gothic
gave no hint of this. We have seen the internally reconstructed Pre-Gothic
ablaut pattern CiRC""' CaRC""' CRC; the comparative method provides a
different version:
CiiC CiC
CinC Cue
CeRC CaRC CuRC
where R means the resonants not already specified above it. Thus for inter-
consonantal n m r I, the vocalicity segment u existed already in Proto-Germanic;
and the present vowel was generally e, not i, which occurred only before another
i and n. Only the past tense forms CaRC match for both methods. If we now
apply internal reconstruction once more to the result of the comparative
method, we can easily eliminate the "aberrant" i-forms, since they occur
only with i and n. And the "extra" u in CuRC can be stripped off again. The
result is a pattern CeRC ""' CaRC ""' CRC, a combination of both comparative
and internal evidence. The principal contribution of the comparative evidence
was the present-tense vocalism e. Gothic also has e (written ai), but only before
rand h (wairpan 'to throw', saihwan 'to see', and, in the previous chapter, we
saw hairan 'carry' and taihun 'ten'); i never occurs before r and h, so e is only
a variant of i (actually there is one exception, hiri! 'come here!').
(12.3 Proto-Indo-European Ablaut and the Laryngeal Theory] Our

Gothic example provides a handy door to Indo-European ablaut alternations
and the laryngeal theory. In the previous chapter we saw how the comparative
method yielded an inventory of sound units (§ I 1.14). Such inventories imme-
diately establish relationship, but in themselves, otherwise, their value is limited.
One has to show how the units fit into the total grammatical machinery of the
language. The comparative method was applied to miscellaneous vocabulary

items to give us the vowels. We ignored systematic alternations such as sing ~
sang "' sung in English or Germanic in general (except for Gothic). The other
languages used in the method, Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin, have very similar
mechanisms. Thus there is no doubt that they all inherited this feature from
Proto-Indo-European. Consequently, one must organize the reconstructed units
according to paradigmatic sets, as was done with Gothic. In other words, one
applies the morphophonemic analysis to the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European
units.
We have seen that phonemic contrasts like fey/ vs. /ref (vain/van) are not
always functionally contrastive when morphs are grouped into paradigmatic
sets. This, of course, is the basic feature of morphophonemic analysis. We
reconstructed an *e and an *o for Proto-Indo-European (the latter corresponds
to Germanic a), but from the Gothic example we saw that their reflexes alter-
nated within paradigms (*e > Gothic i in presents and *o > Gothic a in
preterites). Similarly, in Proto-Indo-European, *e ,..., *o, reflected, for example,
in Latin genitive ped-is and Greek genitive pod-6s 'foot'. The vowel may also be
completely lacking, for example, Sanskrit upa-bd-a 'foot-stamping' (*pd
assimilates automatically into *bd). In other words, *e alternates with *o, and
both of them with nothing. The vowel alternation is thus:
1. e,..., o,..., 0 (also Latin sed-eo 'I sit', sod-iilis 'companion',
*ni-zd-os > nidus 'nest'; English sit, sat, ne-st
'*sitting-down [place]')
This is ablaut. Essentially there is nothing more to it (with the exception of the
environments for the variants, which we shall discuss shortly); it is only this
simple alternation in terms of paradigms or words belonging together in deriva-
tion of some kind. It should be remembered that the few examples given here
are just a suggestion of the actual material to which the comparative method was
· applied; but the method gave us the units that we handle and organize here.
Obviously the total evidence cannot be reproduced in this book. When possible,
we let Greek stand in for Proto-Indo-European vocalism. (The previous chapter
showed that Greek agreed almost to the dot with our reconstructed units.)
This is only an expedient, since Greek of course is Greek and not Proto-Indo-
European.
When this alternating unit e ,..., o ,..., 0 occurs next to a resonant we have the
same situation as in the Gothic case:
2. ei ,..., oi ,..., i (Greek pres. leipo, perf. teloipa, a or. elipon 'leave')
eu ,..., ou "'U (fut. eletlsomai, perf. ei!d!outha, aor. d!uthon 'come')
er ,..., or "'! (pres. derkomai, perf. dedorka, aor. edrakon 'see')
el ,..., of "'I (pres. ste/16, noun st6/os, perf. estalmai 'send')
em ,..., om "'lfl (pres. nemo, noun nome 'divide'; Gothic niman ,..., nam ,...,
numans 'take')
en ,..., on ~~ (minos • mind'' perf. memona, p. p. p. -matos 'think')
268 CoMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS; How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
The difference from pattern 1 is that when the vowel disappears, the resonant
carries the syllable by becoming vocalic. But note, this happens only when the
resonant is interconsonantal, as in the cases here. Otherwise, the distribution of
allophonics (using again Rasa cover symbol for all six resonants) is
V-C C-C C-V V-V

R =ywr
R F. R R
lmn
often iur i ur i 1J r i 1J r
written lmn ! f!11) lmn lmn
An example is Greek ace. patera, -patora, gen. patr6s (with *r), but dat. pl.
patnisi (with *r, because it is flanked by consonants) 'father'. We see that
pattern 2 contains exactly the same vowel alternation as 1, namely, e,..., o ,..., @.
Only the phonetic environments are different, mainly because of the allophonics
of the resonants. The resonant may also precede the alternation e ,..., o ,..., @,
for example, Re "' Ro "' F./R (Greek pres. tdp6, noun tropos, aor. etrapon
'turn'), and the resonant takes on the syllabicity when the vowel is gone,
exactly as above.
This is the overwhelming regularity against which divergencies have to be
coordinated and evaluated.
There is a pattern to the distribution of the vowels, otherwise it would not
be morphophonemic at all. Characteristically-to name only a few categories-
e occurs in presents and s-stem nouns, o in prefects and o-f a- stem nouns, and no
vowel at all in past passive participles, ti-stems, and certain aorists. Now,
Proto-Indo-European has long vowels too; and when we group the long vowels
according to these same categories, we get pattern 3:
I. e 0 (i}
2. eR oR F.
3. e 6 a (Greek pres. tithemi; noun thomas 'place ' ; Latinfaci6 'do')
a 6 a (pres. phiimi; noun phon~; ph/isis ' speak')
6 6 a (pres. dfdomi; noun do ron; Latin datus 'give')
In other words, except for a few isolated cases like *path 'father', the vowel *a
alternates with long vowels. We remember also from the reconstructed inventory
that *a is the only vowel without a corresponding long (Figure 11-7). And here
it occurs in formations where only resonants show up and the other vowels do
not. Such striking complementary distribution always points to ultimate same-
ness, and Saussure was the first linguist to juxtapose patterns 2 and 3. The
first row of pattern 3 shows the same vowels as 2, and when we strip them away
we are left with the frames
2. R R ~ R R
3. - a length length a
That is, length occurs in those categories where the resonants of pattern 2 are
consonantal, and *a, where the resonants are vocalic. Equally important is the
fact that the long syllabic resonants occur in morphemes that elsewhere have
*a's,
2. eR oR ~
3. e 0 a
{Sanskrit noun bhavitar, p.p.p. bhuta 'to be',
4. eRa oRa jJ. janitar, p.p.p.jata 'be born'
When the vowels are subtracted from 3 and 4 we get
3. - a
4. Ra Ra ~
But since the term R is a constant throughout line 4, we can ignore it for the
time being; eliminating it from the table, we get a startling configuration
3. - a length length a
4. a a a a length
which clearly shows that *a and length are strictly complementary. The only
correct conclusion is that length and *a represent one and the same thing. It is
further clear from the collocations above that this unit patterns exactly like the
resonants, and Saussure therefore posited a consonant *H (we do not use his
orthography), which gives a *a in interconsonantal position (parallel to ~) and
length in postvocalic position, that is,
V-C C-C C-V V-V
H= length a 0 0
There is nothing peculiar in a morphophoneme like this. In principle it is not

different from the vowel in, for example, English sane/sanity, which also appears
under two phonetic shapes. Or similarly, the frf is manifested as retroflexion
and length in words like bird in American English, and as a spirant in words
like dread. (We shall return below to the prevocalic position, where *H gives 0.)
[12.4] Thus the anomaly of the vowel *a and length could be eliminated
by evaluating it against the regular pattern 2:
2. eR oR R
3'.
oH
oH
4'. eRH oRH RH
This analysis is further supported by the fact that length does not occur with the
consonants either (on the morphophonemic level) in Proto-Indo-European.
The current tendency in Indo-European linguistics is to remain with this
analysis. But there is one irregularity in the otherwise perfect pattern: the e-
column has one *a and one *o, in categories where hundreds of *e-vowels
occur. They can be eliminated only by assigning the vowel color to the *H's.
That is, instead of three vowels and one *H, we have one vowel and three
*H's: *H1o *H 2 , and *H 3 , of which *H 2 assimilates an adjacent *e into an *a,
and *H 3 assimilates an *e into an *o before lengthening operates. Mnemoni-
cally, the best way of writing these *H's is *E, *A, and *0. Now the pattern is
perfect in terms of the vowels:
3". eE oE E
eA oA A
eO oO 0
Only the vowel *e is affected by *A and *0; in all other environments these
units lengthen the preceding vowel, whatever it is, for example, also the vocalic
resonant *f!..
Proto-Indo-European root structure happily accommodates our three units
*E, *A, and *0. The majority of Indo-European roots begin with a consonant
and end in a consonant, for example, *bher- 'carry', *gwem- 'come', and
*sed- 'sit'. Pattern 3' reinterprets the long vowel roots like dhe- as this same
type: dheH- = dheE-, that is, CeC-. On the other hand, there is only a handful
of roots beginning with a vowel, and here also we frequently encounter the
anomalous vowels *a and *o; for example, *es- 'be', *ag- 'drive', *aug- 'in-
crease', and *okw- 'eye' (Latin oculus). Of these initial vowels, the *a and *o
are remarkable in that they ablaut exactly like our *eA and *eO; that is, there
is alternation *a ,...., *o, but *o as in *okw- is always *o. Here we do not need the
lengthening power of the *H's, but since they lengthen only postvocalically,
we can safely put them into the initial position, where they assimilate the
following vowel before dropping out: *Ees-, *Aeg-, *Aeug- and *Oekw-. Thus
even though the H is not physically there in the attested forms its imprint is
left on the next vowel. Now we can derive the comparatively reconstructed
vowels from the internally reconstructed sequences in three steps:
1. ASSIMILATION 2. LENGTHENING 3. LOSS

eA > aA eE >e Ee >e
eO> oO a A >ii Aa >a
Ae > Aa oO > 6 Oo > o
Oe > Oo ~H> ~ HIJ..>lJ..
These correspond to the two reconstructive steps: extraction of length (as *H)
and extraction of vowel color (in two steps, both pre- and postvocalically).
This analysis does not mean that all surface long vowels contain an *H, but
only those that alternate with a *a. (There is also a morphological process for
deriving long vowels from short ones in certain grammatical environments, but
we can ignore it here; compare the Modern English fvj's in to dh·e and to thiere.
The first represents a lvl, the second an lfi.)
We established these *H-sounds purely in terms of the internal structure of
Proto-Indo-European. Thus their exact phonetic nature is not known, although
their position (as consonants) in the sound system of Proto-Indo-European is.
The necessity of these structural entities is traditionally called the laryngeal
theory. The name sounds unnecessarily pompous. First of all, 'theory' merely
means the hypothesis that is the end result of internal reconstruction. This
hypothesis adequately explains various apparent surface exceptions to the
overwhelming regularity of Indo-European roots. Semitic languages have a
number of laryngal and pharyngal sounds, which by an odd chain of events
provided a basis for making guesses about the phonetics of these *H's; hence
the term laryngeal. The two most general speculations about the phonetic
features of the *H's are *E = q (glottal stop), *A = h, and *0 = y£wl ([labia]
velar voiced spirant); or, that they are just a class of spirants, *x, agreeing with
*/(, *k, and *kw (§ 11 .12), that is, *x, *x, and *xw (a real laryngeal interpretation
on the Arabic model would be "rough breathing" [h], tense emphatic laryngeal
spirant [1)], and lax emphatic laryngeal spirant ['i]). Three spirants in addition
to *s does not sound unreasonable in the rich inventory of Proto-Indo-European
stops; in fact, it is typologically very attractive:
p t K k kW
(b) d g g gw
bh dh gh gh gwh
s IX X xw I
But note that this would point toward independent plain and palatal velar
series after all (and *x is better attested than *k, *g, or *gh). Anyway, it has
always been clear that the term" laryngeal" is a misnomer, if it includes velar
consonants. The important thing to keep clearly in mind is that the phonetics is
pure conjecture.
Thus we see that the laryngeal theory is just a small part of Proto-Indo-
European ablaut, where other sounds interfered with vowels. One hears it said
that the 'theory' is untenable both for its substance and for its method. Both
criticisms are clearly wrong. The substance is very impressive indeed-only a
272 COMPARATIVE LINGUISTICS; How CAN CHANGE BE REVERSED?
small selection was taken for treatment here-and the method is the best there
is: internal reconstruction, alias morphophonemic analysis. Of course, different
scholars bring the method to different depths. As has already been mentioned,
many remain happy with one *H = *h; postulating the three *H's (*E, *A, *0)
still represents a central position, as it were; and others go on splitting the
*H's further (even to as many as ten!). But it seems that we need three and
certainly at least one. In our present discussion this particular hypothesis has
explained four' anomalies': (1) the curious status of *a, (2) length, (3) unexpected
*a and *o in certain positions, and (4) roots with initial vowels. We have to
stop here, but it can be at least mentioned that there are further difficulties that
are resolved by the laryngeals, for example, (5) the Proto-Indo-European
voiceless aspirate stops ( = *C + H), (6) the so-called Brugmann's law in
Sanskrit, and (7) the Proto-Indo-European prevocalic vocalic resonants. (That
is, contrary to the usual distribution of allophonics, one reconstructed sequences
like *C.(?.-V. But these typically occur only where the evidence points to the
preconsonantal shape *CJJ,.H-C. Thus the aberrant sequence is actually *C.(?.H-V,
in which a prevocalic, or an intervocalic,* H drops out.) Certainly an explanation
that takes care of so many different phenomena cannot be doubted, but these
last points must be left to Indo-European linguistics for a full treatment. We
have seen the principle, and that will do here.
[12.5 Independent Confirmation] Saussure published his internal recon-

struction of the laryngeals in 1879 (at the age of 21 !). In 1915 Hittite was
discovered, and in 1927 it was noticed that its lz-sounds corresponded rather
well with one of the structurally posited *H's (Latin and Greek standing in for
Proto-Indo-European):
TRADITIONAL LARYNGEAL RECONSTRUCTION HITTITE

EVIDENCE OF VOWEL EVIDENCE
Latin malum 'apple' eA malzlan
piiscofpiivi 'protect' eA pahsanzi
Greek anti' against' Ae hanti
argis 'white' Ae hark is
tile- 'place' e£ te-
es- 'be' Ee es-
Thus further comparative evidence, which was not available at the time of the
internal reconstruction, confirms a substantial part of the results. There is at
least one h, and it occurs exactly in the positions assumed. Problems do exist,
however : namely, that *E has no reflex beyond the fact that *e remains as e
(but compare Germanic, where the Indo-European accent leaves no evidence
beyond the alternation of d and p). Thus Hittite apparently confirms the exis-
tence of two laryngeals at least (possibly even three). Hittite orthography has a
rather poor fit with the sounds of the language, which adds difficulties. But we
can leave all this to Hittitologists and Indo-Europeanists. The important point
is that Saussure's reconstruction was confirmed. (Laryngeal studies have

mushroomed, often leaving all reason behind in their seeing of laryngeals
everywhere and in their having them do everything. That, however, is no longer
the method, but its misuse.) Further evidence for three laryngeals has been seen
in Greek, where the outcome of *a is sometimes e oro (and not a alone), with
no analogical models to fall back on as explanation, for example, anemos
'wind' vs. Sanskrit aniti 'he breathes' < *AenE- (see§ 11.19). But even without
this point the theory was already solidly validated. The results of comparative
linguistics have considerable predictive power (see§ 1.24). In this sense, perhaps
'theory' is the right term, although 'hypothesis' does the same service.
(12.6 Conclusion] This and the previous chapters together form a

single whole, the realm of the method, as it were. The chapter on the com-
parative method was preceded by synchronic preliminaries, and this one will
be followed by the comparative method in a synchronic frame (§§ 13.7, 13.8).
The argument that morphophonemic analysis and internal reconstruction are the
same method seems to have been contradicted by their separate treatment in two
chapters. This was done for various practical reasons, but also to emphasize
the distinction between synchrony and diachrony, and the different means of
getting at the data. Thus Part Ill covers all the columns of Figure 1-7, as well
as the first three rows, witt ' an occasional reference to the last. Surely this
demonstrates once more the basic unity of different linguistic fields ·a nd the
methods of analysis. The comparative method was applied to contemporaneous
Finnish and Lapp, to three Indo-European languages lifted from a philological
frame, and to one Indo-European language reconstructed partially from modern
languages and checked by philologically preserved older stages. Internal recon-
struction was applied to present-day data and, under the guise of the' laryngeal
theory', to historical material, but on the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European
it was applied as a synchronic analysis. Thus the result is both synchronic
and historical (Pre-Indo-European) from our point of view. Louis Hje.'rnslev
was the first to maintain that internal reconstruction is never "historical,"
because whatever can be captured on the basis of one language is synchron-
ically present in that language. All we get is a higher level of abstraction, in
other words, morphophonemes.
Further examples of internal reconstruction were presented in Chapter 4,
by way of illustrating sound change; since internal reconstruction applies to
sound change in the reverse direction, the examples can serve just as aptly as
internal reconstruction (e.g., Latin rhotacism and Rotuman umlauts;§§ 4.3, 4.6).
REFERENCES
General: Hoenigswald 1946, 1960b, Marchand 1956, Chafe 1959, Kurylowicz
1964 and in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11, Anttila 1968 and in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f.
vol. 11; 12.1 Vennemann 1968; 12.3 Saussure 1879, Hjelmslev 1970, Winter ( ed.)
1965, Lindeman 1970, Szemen!nyi 1970; 12.4 Keiler 1970.
CHAPTER 13
CONCLUSION TO THE METHODS
Both the unity and the complementarity of the methods are

brought out by diagrammatic summing up of the material
used earlier. Genetic linguistics is shown to be part of
panchronic linguistics (Figure 1-7).
[13.1 Priority and Powers of Penetration of the Historical Methods] There

is widespread agreement that internal reconstruction should be undertaken
before the application of the comparative method, because this would eliminate
the effects of the most recent changes which obscure earlier layers. In many
cases this order of application is justified, but there is the danger that internal
reconstruction antedates the split-off point which is the goal of the comparative
method. The Finnish material that we have been using is a perfect case in point.
By internal reconstruction (or morphophonemic analysis) one arrives at a
Finnish shape rete- 'water', from which forms showing consonant gradation
(presumably "younger" than the base-form vete-) can be derived. But this is
practically identical to Uralic *wete, with no consonant alternation. On the
other hand, comparison of Finnish and Lapp suggests that their common
ancestor (Early Baltic Finnic or the like) had some sort of consonant gradation.
That is, the internal reconstruction of Finnish has here produced a form that
antedates the time depth that can be claimed for the comparison of Finnish with
Lapp; if internal reconstruction were to be applied in this fashion to Finnish
and Lapp before any comparison of the languages was undertaken, the resulting
comparative reconstructions of Early Baltic Finnic would not suggest con-
sonant gradation. (Of course, the striking similarity between vete- and *wete
is largely chance; most words do not resemble their protoforms so closely,
especially at such a time depth.)
The methods do not observe an inherent order of application; rather, the
particular state of the languages used and the particular task at hand decide
what method should be called upon. Because of the indeterminacy of the time
depth of internal reconstruction compared with the temporal homogeneity
given by the comparative method, their respective results must be labeled
differently. Internal reconstruction gives pre-forms, which can reach to any
depth from a given point of reference (e.g. , English or Finnish), whereas the
comparative method produces proto-forms, which cluster around a split-off
point, a node in a family tree. Thus pre- refers to anything preceding a node,
proto- to a node itself (e.g., Proto-Germanic). The end of a branch is also a
node, although it is just a split-off point for dialects (see §§ 13. 7, 13.8). Internal
274
CONCLUSION TO THE METHODS 275
reconstruction on a protolanguage (e.g., Proto-Indo-European) is possible;

one simply applies it to the result of the comparative method. One could even
say that this is the proper order of application, because the comparative method
gives us the surface structure (phonemes, and in some cases even phones),
which has to be integrated with the rest of the grammar through morphopho-
nemic analysis alias internal reconstruction. Thus, for optimal analytic clarity,
linguists alternate between the two methods-if the family tree of the languages
being used permits this-going farther and farther into the past (see§ 11.18).
However, experienced comparatists tend to use both methods at the same time,
which can be confusing to beginning linguists when they consult works done
in that mode. Still, the correct way is to take these two methods as complemen-
tary. The power of internal reconstruction proceeds from its utilization of the
total grammar of one language, which, among other things, enables us to unravel
many kinds of structure-determined changes (analogy). But from another
angle the comparative method is more powerful: it does not depend on the
existence of morphophonemic alternations, and it can retrieve mergers within
given languages, provided that different languages have undergone different
mergers. The reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European stops gave us an eloquent
example of this (§ 11.13). The penetrating and retrieving powers of the two
methods are simply not directly comparable, because the methods are comple-
mentary. The weight to be given to either one of them depends on what one
wants to find out, and the results achieved will depend on more factors than the
mere method (e.g., the structure of the languages). Usually one wants to find out
anything one can, and therefore one ultimately uses both methods. But as
already indicated above, in a situation where we want to find out if a proto-
language has an alternation, the role of internal reconstruction is nil, because
its raison d'etre is elimination of alternation without any regard to the nodes in
the tree (nodes automatically mean comparative evidence from other languages).
[13.2) We saw a clear case of the different results of the methods when
reconstructing the Gothic and Germanic verbal ablaut (§ 12.2). We started
from Gothic forms (R = i u m n r I; exceptions are mentioned first; that is,
when r is listed above R, it is excluded from the cover symbol):
h i
Cere cue
A. CiRC CaRC CuRC
Internal reconstruction on Gothic gave us Pre-Gothic:
B. CiRC CaRC CRC
The result of the comparative method on all the Germanic languages ended in
Proto-Germanic:
i i
CinC cue
C. CeRC CaRC CuRC
We see how the comparative method yields surface forms (i.e., A and C are
very similar in structure). Internal reconstruction again on Proto-Germanic
gave Pre-Germanic:
D. CeRC CaRC CRC
Whenever internal reconstruction operates, the result is minimal surface variety

(B and D). Graphically we can compare the different time depths of the methods
in Figure 13-1. The straight row of boxes represents Proto-Germanic, the
raising steps, Pre-Gothic. We see that in the first column Pre-Gothic does not
reach Proto-Germanic, in the middle column it does, and in the last column it
penetrates beyond Proto-Germanic, all the way to Proto-Indo-European, and
even Pre-Indo-European. As for Proto-Germanic, CeRC is also Proto-Indo-
European, whereas CaRC is not; but this can be proved only through further
comparative evidence. The different time depths yielded by the two methods
come out clearly. This situation is characteristic.
CRC
Pre-Gothic
i
CM CeRC [CuC]
CaRC
i
[CinC] CuRC Proto-Germanic
IR CiRC
FIGURE 13-1. Relative time depths of internal reconstruction and the

comparative method.
[13.3] Schematically we can also compare and visualize the results of the
two methods in terms of the Finnish and Lapp dentals used above (§§ 10.12,
10.14, 11.15, 11.16). Figure 13-2 roughly indicates the boundaries of the units
(internally reconstructed ones are written with small capitals, and alternations
are shown by curved lines). The diagram is drawn for the disyllabic stems used
in the reconstruction and ignores the adjustment of§ 11.19, which, however, is
indicated in parentheses. Boundaries labeled a, b, and c coincide in the columns
as indicated, but others do not. It is also interesting to note that a and b set off
vocabulary items involving morphophonemic longs. Both methods happen to
give the same number of units, but only if we include a Finnish D = Jdl in
column 2, based on one word only, (nom.) sydiinf(gen.) sydiimen 'heart' (Lapp
tsiioejtsaJoam), because clear loans like jodifjodin 'iodine' must be discarded,
although synchronically they are also n-words. If we now accept sydiin as a
genuine relic of an unalternating *d, we immediately uncover an abundance of
CoNCLUSION TO THE METHODS 277
1 2 3 4 5
Finnish IR CM IR Lapp
tt tt hit
a J
r TI' r TI' I r a
J Jl
(h) II htt / /
I
b [ ]
ltl-
I
I
I
- b
t D
r---
r T r c
J I J,;
t~ ~s 6/
I
......____ I
I
I
J
r T
1/ d r
d J
D 66
d
I
r
J
-------
D 66
pre- proto- pre-
FIGURE 13-2. Relative difference in the results of internal reconstruction

and the comparative method. Lines a, b, and c indicate boundaries among
vocabulary items. Curved lines represent alternations. Note the alternations
in column 5, which skip one whole box (§ 10.14), and the parenthetical
material in column 3, which represents a modification through internal
reconstruction (§ 11.19) [Reprinted with slight modification from Raimo
Anttila, "The relation between internal reconstruction and the comparative
method," Ural-Altaische Jahrbiicher, 40, 159-173 (1968) (©Societas Uralo-
Altaica).]
analogical cases in Finnish. That is, this relic supports the reconstruction of
. *kuduj*kudun 'spawn' without alternation and shows that the Finnish outcome
kutufkudun has shifted to the type vesifveden and neitifneidin, and so on. Such a
(single) relic often gives important information; here it enables us to distinguish
between analogic change and sound change. But this revelation is possible only
by combining internal and comparative evidence; that is, the comparative
evidence (Finnish syllable structure) showed that the Lapp length alternation
was secondary in, for example, nemmajnema 'name', kiellajkiela 'tongue',
and koooajkooa 'spawn', and that (because of the lack of Lapp stop/continuant
alternation) the Finnish gradation in kutujkudun was a Finnish development.
The one relic sydiin strongly supports this interpretation. This situation is
characteristic, and linguists would always like to see such matching in the re-
sults of the two methods.
[13.4] Our discussion has demonstrated the basic complementarity of the

methods. Their different characteristics have led to contemplation of the
reality of the methods, and linguists have generally tended to form two groups:
those who favor internal reconstruction and distrust the comparative method,
and vice versa. The question about reality is, in short, this: Is internal recon-
struction, with its more abstract, structural domain (the total grammar),
more real than the basically lower-level heuristic device of the comparative
method? Or are the more concrete surface phenomena closer to reality? But
again, such questions imply the complementarity of the methods. In recent
times internal reconstruction has tended to be the prime concern of linguists,
but, even in these cases, comparative evidence is freely used for confirmation of
the inferences made. This, of course, reveals again the fundamental comple-
mentarity of the methods. Taking the two as heads and tails of one coin ends
unnecessary methodological feuds. Before flipping the coin the linguist can name
the side that he believes will be most profitable for him.
[13.5 The Structure and Domain of the Methods] Although the methods
are independent of each other as far as application is concerned, we have clearly
seen that their mechanisms are identical. All of them-phonemic analysis, the
comparative method, and morphophonemic analysis/internal reconstruction-
handle some kind of sound units in connection with meaning, whether it is
lexical (as mainly in the comparative method), grammatical (morphophonemic
analysis/internal reconstruction), or both (phonemic analysis, but also the
comparative method). Also, some kind of conditioning is stated, either phonetic
(phonemic analysis, the comparative method) or phonetic/grammatical (mor-
phophonemic analysis/internal reconstruction), either within one language
(phonemic analysis, morphophonemic analysis/internal reconstruction) or with
conditioning shifting from language to language (the comparative method).
This last fact is an automatic consequence of the makeup of the sound units of
the comparative method, namely, sets compiled from different languages.
Because the structures of the methods are equivalent, their respective outputs
are also equivalent. All methods give ultimate units from which there is a one-
way mapping relation to the lower units (or to units in different languages)-
in short, to the units from which one started. This mapping relation is generally
expressed as a given rule component of the grammar. For example, the result of
the comparative method, the protophoneme, can be mapped (rewritten) into
the attested sounds depending (first) on the particular language, and (second)
on the particular environment in the language. The morphophoneme or the
prephoneme (the result of internal reconstruction) can be mapped into phone-
(me)s depending on the particular grammatical and/or phonological environ-
ment. The more severe (strictly phonetic) constraints of phonemic analysis give
units (phonemes) with a bidirectional (one-to-one) mapping relation with lower
units (phones), that is, the situation known as the biuniqueness relation. Be-
cause the structure of the methods is the same, it will be illustrative to feed
different units and conditioning environments into it and see where the differ-
CONCLUSION TO THE METHODS 279
Input - Output
History
Number of Phonetic Condition- Name of Name of vs. des-
languages units ing procedure units cription
Pre-
IR H
Single Gramma- e phoneme
------ t- - - - - - -
tical ·aIn"' t------
Morpho-
Sets of .: morpho-
a corre- f CJ phonemic phoneme D
sponding ~ analysis
b.O
sound
-... ------ ------ ------
.5 proto-
-
units Vl CM phoneme H
In
Many
=Q Pandia-
d e Phonetic u !ectal dia- D
phoneme
c analysis
Single Phones
Phonemic phoneme D
analysis
a b
FIGURE 13-3. The interrelationship of various methods of establishing

sound units. [Reprinted with slight modification from Raimo Anttila, "The
relation between internal reconstruction and the comparative method,"
Ural-Altaische Jahrbiicher, 40, 159-173 (1968) (©Societas Uralo-Aitaica).
ences originate. Figure 13-3 summarizes our discussion of the three procedures;
their common mechanism is called 'contrasting mechanism'. The diagram is
not an algorithm that would automatically produce a certain output, given the
input, but rather a convenient approximation of what linguists do. Since
the mechanism is the same for all the procedures, all differences originate in the
input, which has three compartments (the columns), each allowing for two
possibilities. Now, supplied with information on the number of languages, the
makeup of phonetic units (sets or phones), and the nature of the conditioning
allowed, the 'machine' finds out whether these units contrast or not, that is,
whether these units differentiate meanings or not. All units that do not contrast
in this way are grouped together by the machine, and the linguist can label such
groups with one symbol. Characteristically, the machine handles the following
combinations:
1
· : ~ j = internal reconstruction, morphophonemic analysis
2. a e c = phonetically conditioned morphophonemics
3. de f = comparative method on morphophonemes
4. de c = comparative method, pandialectal analysis
5. a b c = phonemic analysis
The graphic comparison in Figure 13-3 clearly brings out the interlocking and
overlapping of the procedures. Box a is listed twice so that the diagram can show
the three most usual combinations in as many rows. The units given by the
output will then have a one-way mapping relation back to box b, and the output
units can be fed again into the machine, for example, by putting the phonemes
back into boxes e and b. Thus one usually applies the comparative method (4)
to phonemes (result of 5). The exact linguistic status of these units is not so
essential, and for Lapp we made no appeal to such questions. The essence
of Finnish consonant gradation and most English alternations, for example, is
phonetically conditioned morphophonemics (2). Internal reconstruction (I)
was applied to selections from attested languages, but it can also be applied to
a reconstructed protolanguage (result of 4), as is shown by the laryngeal theory.
Or if we applied it to the reconstructed column 3 of Figure 13-2, we would get
the same result as column 4, the Lapp state of affairs (in other words, Pre-Lapp
clearly penetrates Early Baltic Finnic). If we apply the comparative method
(4) to the morphophonemes (result of 1) of the languages used, the result (3) is
similar to internal reconstruction. This is again made quite clear by Figure
13-2. Applying it to the material underlying columns 2 and 4 we would again
end up with column 4, the Lapp state of affairs. Here then, the order of applica-
tion does not make any difference; the comparative method on columns 1 and
5 gives column 3, and internal reconstruction on it gives column 4; or, internal
reconstruction on columns 1 and 5 gives columns 2 and 4, and comparative
method on these gives column 4. The reason for this homogeneity is of course
the grammatical conditioning which always operates somewhere in the sequence
of applications of the two methods. We can even keep the usual comparative
method but allow for grammatical conditioning of the sets. Let us use three
varieties of Lapp and Baltic Finnic that have dropped the final-n of the genitive,
which had induced phonologically conditioned consonant gradation. After the
drop of -n, gradation is grammatically conditioned in all the languages:
Lapp juoiw- e juolille

Estonian jal g 0 nom. jal 0 a gen. 'leg'
Finnish jal k a jal 0 a
The two velar sets do not contrast, if categorial information is used; one occurs
in connection with the nominath·e, the other with the genitive, and we can
reconstruct one velar, say *k, for both sets. If we were using phonetic condition-
ing, the method would automatically assign grammatically conditioned con-
sonant gradation to the protolanguage as soon as the last language dropped the
final -n. This would be an instance of multiple merger (exactly the same change
in all the language here), which is not recoverable by the comparative method;
the well-defined grammatical environment, however, might make us suspect
what actually happened-compare English wreath/wreathe (/8 ,...., of). The
point is that once the characteristic grammatical conditioning of internal
reconstruction is used, even the comparative method gives us a morphophonemic

result.
(13.6] We have already mentioned that Figure 13-3 is not an algorithm,

but perhaps a more neat than real summary of actual practice. The input
section contains some serious problems, especially for the comparative method.
There is no way of distinguishing discrete languages, which would bear the
required independent witness to the protolanguage, from dialects. But in
favorable situations, dialects can be used (e.g., Baltic Finnic and Romance), and
the whole matter is parallel to the permitted flexibility in the exact status of the
sound units. But more serious is the necessity of weeding secondary material
out of the input; that is, all kinds of screening operations and decisions have to
be made before the automatic mechanism is allowed to operate. This is the most
important area for future investigation: the development of criteria for pre-
screening. Important steps for formalizing box e of Figure 13-3 have been taken,
although we have been segmenting our material at such implicitly convenient
boundaries as between consonants and vowels. For the methods themselves
this is enough, but the notion of the sound correspondence is not a simple unit,
but a rather complex one, a result of a quantification of the empirically given
statistical continuum, which is also true of the obligatory meaning correspon-
dence. Even if, so far, it is perhaps not possible to give a wholly formalized
description of the procedure of establishing sound correspondences, it should
be made explicit at least to the degree that linguists will become aware that what
they take as given is no simple matter. Linguists usually arrive at a convenient
segmentation by an implicit trial-and-error method, which is based on their
experience in handling linguistic material for historical purposes. One tries to
minimize both the proto-units and the rules that derive the attested forms from
these. The rules play a very important role in the final establishment of proto-
units; they are often the decisive factor for postediting the results given by the
methods. It is interesting to note that similar segmentation difficulties occur also
in phonemic analysis (box b), as in whether a phonetic segment or sequence is
one or two phonemes, a unit or a cluster. Other prescreening decisions must
also be made here, for example, whether loans (Fremdworter) in any particular
language necessitate a different phonological system from that of inherited items
and acclimatized loans (Lehnworter), or the coexistence of two phonemic
systems.
Figure 13-3 also emphasizes the unity of all kinds of historical and synchronic
investigations; they are different aspects of the same material (see Figure 1-7).
The diagram lists the almost complete overlapping of the ultimate units arrived
at by internal reconstruction and morphophonemic analysis. The units have
been the concern of these analytic methods, and not the mapping rules, although
both represent the two fundamental aspects of any kind of phonology and
both are subject to change. The mapping rules are the arena of the controversy
between historical and descriptive order and represent a prime target of con-
temporary research (§§ 6.1, 6.5, 6.6). But the same problem exists for the
underlying units, that is, how to decide between a synchronic and diachronic
interpretation; such criteria must be developed for the units and not only for the
rules. Even in the absence of an algorithm here, at least there is agreement that
these notions must be kept strictly separate, because they serve different pur-
poses; this is why we label the units differently, although the names might not
be the best possible ones. Thorough philological screening is important for
the recovery of real history, and, interestingly enough, in etymological work
we often have the same dichotomy as in units vs. rules, namely, the origin
versus the history of an item. Both are important for their own sakes(§ 17.6).
Both historical methods, then, give us ultimate units as starting points for
various mapping rules. There has been a choice available in the presentation of
material: for example, some scholars tend to favor the units, reconstructed
protophonemes (independent sound correspondences); others take the units
as given and use a set of ordered rules, as many of the scholars favoring the
proto-units have done in practice.
[13.7 Pandialcctal Analysis] We have seen the structural identity of

internal reconstruction and morphophonemic analysis. The purpose or the use
of the method dictates the final evaluation as either history or description. This
decision rests with the linguist and not with the method. This situation is neatly
summed up in Figure 13-3, in that the input does not recognize a difference
between history and description (diachrony versus synchrony), whereas the
output does. The dashed-line division of the highest row of boxes in the
output section has been frequently referred to in the preceding discussion, but
not the same division between history and description (H/D) in connection
with the comparative method. The comparative method is also a descriptive
method by which speakers handle dialect differences (see Chapter 3). In any
speech community there are always dialect differences, be they between age
groups, social strata, or whatever. Since the speaker must accommodate this
situation in his knowledge of the use of the language, he has to apply a mecha-
nism like the comparative method in the learning stages. A child will learn the
regular correspondences between his speech and that of, say, his grandparents,
his teaGher, and so on. His grammar will incorporate all these differences,
whether this process is explicit or implicit (as it normally is). This same situation
obtains when communication is established between regional variants. Speakers
devise a receptor mechanism for understanding the sounds of the new dialect,
because they normally go on speaking their own way. But the psychological
reality of the interdialectal sound correspondences comes out clearly in hyper-
corrections(§§ 3.3, 5.3, 9.10). These occur when the speakers make an effort to
switch from their end of the correspondences to the other. If their end of the
correspondences supplies only one unit for two or more interdialectal corre-
spondences, the speakers are in potential trouble in their dialect switches. For
example, a speaker of a dialect of English where final [IJ]'s following an unstress-
ed vowel have been replaced by [n]'s (comin', goin') learns that two sets of
correspondences hold between his dialect and the other one, that is, n-n and
The first one presents no difficulties, but the second one does, because it is
11-IJ.
highly characterized; the speaker has to learn something new. He has to learn
every single morpheme where he must replace his [n] with an [IJ]. There is no
simple mapping relation (rule) from his dialect to the other one, as there is in
the reverse case: a speaker with [IJ]'S can always replace them with [n]'s, once
he has learned this correspondence. It is easy to learn that all verbal forms in
-in(g) are affected. But the speaker who has to travel the one-to-many scale
tends to overdo the "difficult" (characterized) part in cases that he has not yet
thoroughly learned. Results are then "mistakes" like coffing and chicking.
Such mistakes show that sound correspondences are clearly (one would like
to say consciously) handled. The mistake is not due to method but to its appli-
cation; the speaker makes an unjustified shortcut and secures an outcome that
would look more like the target dialect. In other words, he lets some kind of
proportional analogy enter his handling of the sound correspondences(§§ 5.1-
5.3). The use of such analogy is quite characteristic of other language learning
situations also, as we have seen. Such interference is expected, because as a
synchronic mechanism the comparative method is only part of the machinery of
the speaker. In comparative linguistics, however, the method is used, as it were,
in "sterile" laboratory conditions and it can be kept from being contaminated
by other factors, at least to a much greater degree.
Thus English speakers who communicate across the American and British
dialect boundary acquire the knowledge of the following (and many other)
correspondences (we have to assume that these speakers know nothing about
writing):
A B
). re· re· mass, cad, etc.
2. re· a· dance, half, etc.
3. a· a· father, balm, etc.
4. a·.~ a· barn, harm 'foamy yeast', etc.
5. a ;') pot, hot, etc.
6. D t writer, latter, etc}
(§ 10.4)
7. D d rider, ladder, etc.
Structurally the situation is exactly the same as between mutually unintelligible
but related languages. One cannot map one way from A into B because of sets
I and 2, and 6 and 7-and not from B to A either, because of sets 2 and 4. In a
pandialectal grammar one would then, sometimes, have to rely on the distinc-
tions in American English and sometimes on those in British English. We can
now set up pandialectal units that differ from both outcomes, but from which
there is of course an unambiguous one-way mapping relation to both A(merican)
and B(ritish), for example, (I) ce, (2) ce·, (3) a· (these first three sets cover two
units in each language; compare§§ 11.11, 11.12), (4)a ·r, (5)a( = ;,), (6)!,(7)
d. This setup is now a dialect cohesion (§ 13.8) that connects the two varieties
of English, exactly as the reconstructed units connect the outcomes of two
(or more) related languages.
[13.8] The result of this pandialectal analysis can be called dialect cohe-
sion, and this is the synchronic counterpart of a reconstructed phonological
system. The units of dialect cohesion have been called diaphonemes in Figure
13-3. Thus we must add another characteristic combination for the method of
treating sound units; a e c = pandialectal analysis. Structurally it contrasts
with the comparative method in that its sets of correspondences have a different
source; they are different dialects rather than different languages or different
grammatical environments in one and the same language or dialect (as in
internal reconstruction/morphophonemic analysis). It is a truism that one
cannot draw a boundary between two dialects of the same language and two
closely related but different languages. Thus it is also reasonable that the method
is the same in both areas. It is the linguist's task to try to determine when such a
dialect cohesion has no more synchronic validity but must be given a historical
explanation in terms of reconstructed protoforms. This partly depends on the
cultural situation and the alertness of the speakers, and of course we must
exclude professional linguists altogether (see§ 18.17). Children speaking, say,
Swedish and German (not to speak of more closely related dialectal varieties
like Bulgarian and Macedonian or the Scandinavian "languages") may quite
well develop a fair number of synchronic correspondences between the two,
without being able to give any historical explanation to them (and in most
cases the correct explanation is actually borrowing rather than inheritance).
The most startling case is reported for Lapp and Finnish. Although we have
seen very clear correspondences between the two languages, the languages are
definitely not mutually intelligible. They are as much apart as English and
German in this respect. Still, Lapp children can map Lapp words into Finnish
and vice versa, exactly as between dialects. Obviously they master the sets of
correspondences, though here again they cannot give them a historical inter-
pretation. Thus once more, this time in connection with the comparative
method, we get an indication of unity within linguistics, in terms of the methods
used in diachrony and synchrony.
Since we have also seen that regular sound change depends on dialect inter-
action, and that sets of correspondences depend on regular sound change, we
see even more reason for the structural parallelism between dialect cohesion
and the comparative method. Such dialect cohesion guides regular sound change
(Chapters 3, 9). The comparative method, on the other hand, starts at the other
end of the material and works backward in time. It is natural that both aspects
have the same basic structure.
The acceptance of the comparative method in descriptive linguistics has been
hindered by a fallacious concentration on uniform idiolectal grammars. Histori-
cal linguistics shows, however, that diversity is a must if we want to understand
change. And it is also a logical necessity, since these fictional unified speakers at
least understand other varieties of the language (see Figure 1-7).
A final remark on Figure 13-3. Phonemic analysis is the only method that
remains unpaired with a historical aspect, and we have indeed seen that changes
generally do not occur by phonemes (com pare § 4.12). When phonemic changes
CONCLUSION TO THE METHODS z8s
occur, they are most often the results of other changes. But phonemic analysis
is the school where the basic mechanism of the other methods can best be
learned; it is here that the structure of all these methods is displayed with
maximal clarity and simplicity.
REFERENCES
General: Hermann 1907, R. Hall 1950, Anttila 1968; 13.4 Hjelmslev 1970;
13.6 Katicic 1966, 1970; 13.7 Dyen 1963, Bailey 1969, Anttila 1969a; 13.8 Dyen
1963, 1969, Anttila 1969a.
PART IV
LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION:
A SYNTHESIS OF VARIOUS
LINGUISTIC AND CULTURAL
NOTIONS
CHAPTER 14
DIALECT GEOGRAPHY
The geographical distribution of linguistic variants may

give clues to the relative age of the items. Because dialect
relations have many similarities to reco.1structed proto-
languages, they throw much light onto our historical
inferences. Finally, this and the subsequent chapters will
show that genetic linguistics is not passe, but full of sub-
stantive issues, which must be integrated with facts from
the social setting.
(14.1 Variation and Spatial Distribution] Dialectology, the study of

linguistic variation, is central to many branches of linguistics. In fact, there is no
uniform invariant system as far as natural language is concerned. When opera-
ting with idealized uniformity linguists are using a working hypothesis only (see
Figure 1-7). In the same fashion, a dialect is an entity based on a particular
social selection of features. Language and dialect are relative concepts without
necessarily clear boundaries; this is true of many other linguistic notions as well
(e.g., the sign types). But they are psychologically and socially real concepts,
acknowledged by laymen in various ways. Culture often includes areas that
cannot be "scientifically" defined, for example, astrology and mythological
concepts, and there is nothing peculiar in the notion of dialect being a "clear"
concept of" folk science" rather than strict linguistics. A social definition is of
course also scientific, even though it is not measurable in the same way as units
in physics or chemistry. In linguistics, a dialect might be defined differently in
different situations, depending on features thought relevant for the task or
situation at hand. In other words, linguists follow the same practice as the naive
speakers, although what they think relevant may be different from the folk
notion; both use the existence of variation as the basis of definition. It has
become clear that change depends on variation and the interplay of dialects,
and dialectological aspects have been constantly mentioned (Figure 1-7;
Chapters 3, 8, 9; §§ 1.20, 2.6, 5.3, 7.8, 13.7, 13.8). If dialectology in its socio-
linguistic aspect provides us with the basis for explaining change, it has also
rendered many other services for reconstruction through linguistic or dialect
geography.
Chapters 3 and 9 demonstrated the chief methods of writing variation. The
most basic presentation is a list of correspondence sets, but the same information
presented in a graph represents social variation succinctly (Figure 3-1); it is a
map of social stratification. Alternatively, one can use numerical parameters
289
290 LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION: A SYNTHESIS
without drawing graphs (e.g., the centralization on Martha's Vineyard,§ 9.11).

We have already introduced maps showing the geographical distribution of
meanings for forms (Korn and Opper, Figure 9-2), but we have not seen the
reverse-the distribution of forms for given meanings-and we have not yet
seen maps of phonological features. (A review of Chapter 3 will help in reading
this one.)
(14.2 The Rise and Impact of Dialect Geography] In 1876 August Leskien
published his famous slogan that sound laws have no exceptions, J. Winteler
published the first rigorous dialect monograph, and Sophus Bugge deciphered
the runes. The last half of the 1870s was the beginning of modern linguistics in
many respects. Also in 1876, Georg Wenker wanted to prove Leskien's claim by
checking it with the High German consonant shift (e.g., Dorpf Dorf 'village',
datfdas 'that', and makenfmachen 'make'; the first item in each pair is Low
German, agreeing with English thorp, that, and make). Proof was supposed to
come from the "pure" folk dialects, because the standard and the city dialects
were often obviously mixtures of the surrounding dialects. Wenker expected to
find a sharp boundary, on one side of which High German sounds prevailed,
on the other Low German; in other words, he hoped to find sharp dialect
boundaries in general. He failed in this, but found the isoglosses instead. An
isogloss is a line that separates an item a from not-a whether this is a word, a
phonetic or syntactic peculiarity, or whatever. An isogloss therefore allows us to
reconstruct the spread of any linguistic feature, and dialect boundaries are
defined by isoglosses, either one or more. The boundaries for the above items
show the widest separation along the river Rhine. The isogloss between datfdas
crosses the river south of Coblenz, that of Dorpf Dorf south of Bonn, that of
makenfmachen between Dusseldorf and Cologne, and the isogfoss for ik/ich
'I' reaches the farthest north, crossing the river at Urdingen. This is the famous
Rhenish Fan (an obligatory example in any book on the topic, although we
shall break the rule in not reproducing the map). The lines form a fan-like
picture, since they merge into a common stem farther east; the situation
shows that every word has its own spread. Wenker had discovered dialect
geography.
Also in 1876, two Frenchmen, independently of Wenker, wanted to find the
boundary line for Provencal vs. French. With a questionnaire of twenty words
they walked zigzag along the expected boundary; like Wenker, they found iso-
glosses, or dialect geography, rather than a neat dialect boundary. Ferdinand
Wrede extended the German study into every German-speaking village in
Europe (44,000 points), and Jules Gillieron organized what became the French
dialect atlas. Wrede had to rely on questionnaires filled out by school teachers,
whereas in France the field work was carried out (in some 640 localities) by
Edmond Edmont, a student of Abbe Rousselot, the most famous phonetician
of the day. The German survey could at least give reliable information on
syntax, which the French survey did not include at all. Other projects have
DIALECT GEOGRAPHY 291
built on the French and German (and other) experiences; for example, the New
England field workers were instructed by Jakob Jud and Paul Scheuermeier,
who had worked with Karl Jaberg on the Italian atlas. Hans Kurath, the director
of the linguistic atlas of the United States and Canada, prepared a questionnaire
of I ,000 questions. A historian picked the towns so that connections with
England could be studied as well, and twenty hours were spent with one infor-
mant, four to a locality, thus permitting investigation of age differences, and so
on. The survey began with nine field workers, but it eventually became clear
that one is better than nine, and subsequent areas were investigated by G. S.
Lowman, and after his death, by Raven McDavid. After the publication of
the New England dialect maps the survey was published in list form to cut
costs.
The results have been the same in principle everywhere: that there is always
variation, which has been described in Part II, and that there need not be
"clear" dialect boundaries (i.e., tight bundles of isoglosses). Every feature can
have its own spread. This seemed to be a complete denial of the regularity of
sound change, and the maxim sound laws admit of no exceptions (Leskien) was
replaced by every word has its own history (Gillieron, Schuchardt), especially in
the Romance field. Both positions of course have truth in them; it is too opti-
mistic to expect that only one principle would contain the whole truth about such
a complicated phenomenon as language change. The first maxim relies on a
successful result of sound change, the second stresses the spread of change,
which takes place in terms of individual words, grammatical categories, social
layers, and so on (see § 9.10, 9.11). But most important of all, the maxim
specifies words, which easily come and go, and do indeed have unique histories
(Chapter 17). The same is true of morphological elements in general, although
it is most obviously true of words. The spread of a change depends on social
forces, which can shift before a particular change has attained regularity. The
isoglosses also clearly show the role of communication and social interaction in
change. Isogloss bundles tend to cluster along barriers that impede communica-
tion, for example, mountains, swamps, lakes, and political or religious bound-
aries. Many of the German dialect boundaries follow medieval diocese limits,
splitting even single towns, and we have seen that social dialects are different
within the same geographical spot (Chapter 3). In other words, different beliefs
act "like mountains between people." From a different point of vit:w, isogloss
bundles can be looked at as lines of weakness in the network of oral communica-
tion. Although dialect geography at the outset was atomistic in orientation
(i.e., it studied single items), it led to valuable results, especially when coupled
with the study of the distribution of cultural artifacts. Cultural diffusion is
another aspect of communication. The combination of linguistic and ethno-
graphic data is known as the WiMer und Sachen technique (words and things).
The value of this method is particularly great in studying semantic change;
often we must know the exact cultural context to understand it (see Chapter 7).
The Worter-Sachen method is one aspect of philology and etymology; it is a
prerequisite for solid reconstruction (see Chapter 17), and must be employed
whenever possible.
(14.3 Structural Dialectology] An extreme structuralist position denies

structural dialectology, because when a system is defined solely by its internal
relations, its items cannot be compared with those of other systems because
they are likewise defined by their internal relations. Only systems could be
compared with other total systems. But it is obvious that speakers and hearers
can handle rather different dialects or parts of dialects without impairing com-
munication, and equally obvious that this is usually done by taking such systems
as variations of one underlying system. To solve this dilemma the so-called
overall pattern has been suggested. This notion is best seen in phonology. An
overall pattern is basically the grand total of all the sound units in the dialects.
It is not really different from a general table like Figure 1-3, except that it is
more limited in scope. Of course such an arsenal is practical and necessary, but
it does not help in comparing systems, even if it gives a handy basis for positing
a core pattern, an intersection of shared elements between any number of dialects.
The difficulty was solved by looking outside the single sound segment in one
dialect, into the sound correspondences between dialects. Such correspondences
are the basic cross-dialectal sound units as has become clear in the preceding
parts (see, in particular, Chapters 3, 9 and§§ 13.7, 13.8). Each contrasting set of
correspondences defines a diaphoneme, and the system can be called a diasystem,
the result of this pandialectal analysis (Figure 13-3). We have seen a fragment of
a diasystem, from which one could derive British and American English(§ 13.7);
but because no full system was developed, it was called dialect cohesion. A
diasystem is a wider term than dialect cohesion because even unrelated languages
may be combined under it. Certain kinds of bilingualism are thought to be of
this type; that is, the speaker constructs a common underlying diasystem from
which he derives both languages (§ 8.15). Such a diasystem has an extreme
amount of unsystematic formal variation (synonymy), and we have already seen
that switching from a diasystem to one language can be regarded as a move
toward 'one meaning, one form'. Universal grammar, which studies the shared
elements of all languages, endeavors to establish a universal diasystem for all
languages of the world. All the particular languages are then derived from it
with language-specific rules. The term 'dialect cohesion' is used in this book
for a system that comprises sound correspondences, and this is the counterpart
to reconstructed phonologies (§§ 13. 7, 13.8). A 'diasystem' is a wider term
covering any other relations as well. Dialect cohesion is one kind of diasystem.
Reconstructions or protolanguages are historical diasystems.
(14.4] Recently linguists have been trying to devise a common diasystem

for all the dialects and to describe the dialect differences with a common rule
pool, that is, an overall rule pattern. Let us look at a classical example from the
Atlantic states involving the diphthongs Jaij and Jau j which we have already
seen in Martha's Vineyard (§ 9.11). The vowels in the following four words in
four localities are
CHARLESTON, NEW BERN, WINCHESTER, ROANOKE

S.C. N.C. VA. VICINITY, VA.
five down [n] [au] [n:] [re·u] [a·e] [re·u] [ai] [reu]
twice out [;JI] [;Ju] [n:] [reu] [;JI) [;JU) [;Ji] [reu]
For the realization of the first element of the diphthongs one needs mainly
the two rules: (1) a~af- vowel+ voiceless consonant, and (2) a~a?f-u.
This is the common rule pool in this sample: Charleston needs only (I) and New
Bern only (2); Winchester applies first (1), which of course gives the same lower
row as in Charleston, and then (2), which can now apply only in the upper
right-hand corner, making it the same as in New Bern; and the Roanoke
vicinity undergoes first (2) and then (1), that is, it has the same rules as Winches-
ter, but in reverse order. It has been possible to characterize four dialects with
only two rules and a specification of their order of application (of course, other
rules would be necessary for the facts not yet taken care of). The German Ding
case (§ 6.15) and the Finnish teeq case (§ 6.17) showed exactly the same situation
for dialect characterization with different rules or different rule order. If all the
rules in the overall rule pool can be hierarchically ordered in a scale from
top to bottom, dialects can be specified on the basis of where they appear on the
scale, as shown in Figure 14-1. When no reordering of rules occurs, one can
Dialect 1
Dialect 2
Dialect 3 ~-----------------1
Dialect 4
~--------------1
Rules 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
(Top) (Bottom)
FIGURE 14-1. Four dialects characterized by a pool of twelve rules.
simply state that dialect 3 takes all the rules from R 1 on (but skipping two),
dialect 2 from R 2 to R 10, dialect 4 would apply R 5 before R 4, and so on.
There seems to be more order in this than in defining a dialect with a bundle of
isoglosses (e.g., D 1 [I 1, I 3, I 7]), but of course it is basically the same concept.
It has even been suggested that the name dialect be replaced by 'climacolect ',
to agree with such rule scales (C.-J. Bailey). Note that these rules apply to the
underlying common units, diaphonemes or whatever one wants to call them.
We have seen many times already that such units and rules are complementary
concepts. It is not enough that two dialects share most of their rules; they have
to have common units as well (e.g., words, morphemes, and so on). The phono-
logical rules for two different languages in a convergence area may be about the
same, but no dialect cohesion can be constructed by the speakers if there are no
regular sets of correspondences (diaphonemes) (see§§ 13.7, 13.8).
[14.5 Stratigraphy and Seriation] Dialectology enables us to understand

linguistic change (Chapter 9, § 13.8) and social interaction, but it also tells us
that we need not assume dialect-free protolanguages, because the comparative
method gives us only a partial dialect cohesion. We can never reconstruct a
real proto language, a complete diasystem. But in the form of dialect geography,
dialectology provides information on relative chronology.
Innovations within one grammar can leave the old forms intact in certain
categories, or in corners of the grammar (see § 5. I 5). Similarly, innovations in
prestige dialects may never reach the periphery of the dialect continuum. In
dialect geography one speaks of a focal (central) and a relic (marginal) area. If a
focal area radiates subsequent innovations, their geographical spread may
show the corresponding stratification. Figure 14-2 shows the distribution for
the French words for 'mare', the outcomes of Latin iiimentum, cabal!a and equa
(see § 7.2). The fact that the equa forms are separated by the caballa territory
shows that equa represents the relic. But the cabal!a territory itself is split in two
by the iumentum area and represents a relic with respect to that. Relics char-
acteristically cluster around the periphery of Parisian influence. The innovation
of the French prothetic vowel (excrescence of e; § 4. I I) has left small pockets
around the French borders (Figure 14-2). The development of Latin k before a
(see § 4.4) shows different spreads for different words (compare the Rhenish
Fan); for example, keval 'horse' has only a small pocket in Catalonia and a
bigger one north of Paris. Generally, however, the k-lines cluster along bound-
aries running roughly from south of the Channel Jslands- Regneville- Beauvais-
Fourmies in the north, and Bordeaux-Aurillac-Mende-Villefort-Bollene-
Saint-Paul in the south. North of this southern line there is a belt of areas with
ts, ts (or st). Such a configuration confirms the relative chronology of (1) k,
(2) ts, and (3) s.
These stratigraphic configurations are quite general. Another good example
is the distribution of the outcomes of the medial cluster *md of Proto-Lapp
(Figure 14-3). At the extreme ends we have md, which can be taken as the oldest
state of affairs, then comes bd, and finally wd and gd. The map cannot give any
clues as to the relative age of the last two. Our inference that wd is later than bd
in the extreme north is confirmed by documentary evidence.
(14.6] Stratigraphy is a method borrowed from geology (see § 22.7) by

archaeology, and from both by linguistic geography. Linguistic stratigraphy
in the French case was completely substantiated by other evidence (comparative
and historical), and stratigraphy for its part confirmed another method we may
call linguistic seriation. In archaeology, seriation is a method utilizing a gradual
change of style or fashion, which permits a relative arrangement of objects in
caballa > cavale ~ sk- without prothesis
11111 11111 equa > ega ~ k- in caballu > keval
The area of jument (and similar forms) is
complementary to and 1111111111
FIGURE 14-2. Geographical stratification of some items in France showing

clustering of relics in the lateral areas. [The forms for 'mare' reprinted by
permission with slight modification from Albert Dauzat, La geographie
linguistique, Paris, 1922 (© Ernest Flammarion),]
LINGUlSTIC RECONSTRUCTION! A SYNTHESIS
r---------------------------------------------------,
earlier
y,arents
Sea
II':~
Finland\\
:
:
~
~
: U.S.S.R
md
\ ...·•
·:
FIGURE 14-3. The distribution of the outcomes of Proto-Lapp *mdin North-

ern Fenno-Scandia and Kola Peninsula. [Reprinted with slight modification
from Erkki Itkonen, Kieli ja sen tutkimus. Helsinki and Porvoo, Soderstrom,
1966 (by permission of the author).]
a temporal sequence (like, for example, the withering of a structure in evolu-

tionary biology). What we know about sound change permits similar scales.
For instance, if three languages have corresponding k, IS, and s, our experience
tells us that a change s > k is highly unlikely, and so is Is > k, even if s > Is
might be more probable. This also underlines the fact that experience is a
crucial factor in actual reconstruction. We would be led to posit the following
relative age: (1) k, (2) IS, and (3) s. Certain sound changes nearly always go one
way only, for example, s > h, h > @, u > ii, and ii > i, along with various
assimilations, as in kt > tt and pt > tt. A change h > s is reported from
Ryukyu Japanese, but on the whole the statement stands. According to these
principles one could reconstruct the antecedent of Italian sette and Modern
Greek [efta] 'seven' the following way. In the initial, one would take Italian s-
as original, because Greek can be derived naturally from it (*s > *h > @).
As for the medial consonants, Greek ft is older than Italian tt, which can be
derived from the former by assimilation. This seriation gives *seftV, a form
that falls short of the PIE *seplfrz; but at least it has a voiceless labial + tin the
middle. Words generally get shortened rather than lengthened by sound change;
thus English kiss vs. German kiissen would suggest a protoform more like
German than English on two counts, ii > i, and -en > @. Swedish kyssa
[tsiissa] has a final vowel and therefore holds an intermediate position between
German and English, but its ts is newer than either English or German. Indeed,
Old English has cyssan (c = k, y = ii), where the ending is a + n, which is
older than German a <e). The whole truth is that the vowel was *a in the ante-
cedent form, and the umlaut was triggered by *j, that is, *kussjan. Reconstruction
can never go beyond the evidence used (see§§ II .8, I 1.18), but seriation pointed
toward the right direction of change. Similar universal linguistic trends exist
in morphology, syntax, and semantics, and they can be used for seriation
chronology. We have seen that a free word is older than a corresponding bound
suffix(§ 7.13), because we can derive the suffix with wearing from a longer word
(§ 9.8). This would not work the other way. Similarly, certain semantic changes
tend to go one way, for example, 'to weigh' > 'to think' (see§ 7.11). Pronouns
give conjunctions, but not the other way around (§ 7.13). Unfortunately, we
know very little about such universals of change, although these indications
are suggestive (see§ 16.8).
[14.7 Areal Linguistics] In other words, we have again run into the
notion of correspondences and mapping relations, which are central to (genetic)
linguistics. These were able to establish direction of borrowing (§§ 8.6, 8.13).
If there is unambiguous two-way mapping within the members of the corre-
spondences, no priority can be stated. But a one-way mapping relation establishes
direction, as above. And when one cannot map either way, one reconstructs a
diasystem from which there is a one-way mapping relation to all the systems used
in the reconstruction. And whenever correspondences and mapping are involved,
some kind of comparing/contrasting is being carried out. The French dialect
maps, of which Figure 14-2 is a sample, not only led to results in dialectology in
general, but also to a whole school of linguistics known as areal linguistics,
practiced mainly in Italy, in which the units of comparison are languages,
dialects, forms, or sounds from them. With three areal norms one can in many
cases establish the relative ch~onology of the two sides of an isogloss line.
1. The earlier form is preserved in the more isolated area, for example, the
mountainous Auvergne region in Figure 14-2.
2. Lateral areas preserve the older forms, which also was obvious in Figure
14-2.
3. The larger area shows the original form, except when the minor area is the
more isolated one, or when the minor area represents the sum of lateral areas.
For example, by comparing the dental spirant of English mother against the t
in Latin miiter, Greek mdter, Sanskrit matd, and Russian mat' (see Figure 11-6),
one would conclude that t was the original sound, if English cannot be taken as
an isolated or lateral area. English is geographically lateral or isolated, but
there is no further evidence for the others' having innovated together. These
norms are handy rules of thumb, but like other methods of analysis they can
lead to incorrect interpretations; especially when coupled with the principle of
linguistic seriation in its many aspects, reliable hypotheses can often be put
forward. (For example, in the example of the English dental spirant just given,
LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION: A SYNTHESIS
any hypothesis that t is earlier than () would receive strong support from the
seriation principle, because t > () is considerably more likely than () > t.)
Note that seriation itself is not a rigid principle all the way through various
subsections of grammar. In a borrowing situation one could map from the
language in which the form was motivated (iconic) into the one where it was not
(§ 8.6). But if the same situation, anomaly versus regularity, obtains across an
isogloss, it is the anomalous form that is generally older. If two dialects have
plurals like kine vs. coH·s, the former is the older one. Within the same grammar,
plurals like men and mice are likewise older than boys and horses. We have here
variations of the principle of !ectio difficilior (§ 2.17), a principle that helps in
establishing chronology. Linguistic seriation is another manifestation of it.
Areal linguistics claims that the traditional comparative method or comparison
between languages was just its forerunner, because the latter also projected
into the past forms and sounds (e.g., *tin mother) which exist synchronically in
(at least some corner of) the investigated area. Only when complex corre-
spondence relations are used (i.e., in establishing diaforms that do not exist
anywhere as such [*seft V]), is comparative linguistics different from areal
linguistics. Whether one wants to build a separate doctrine of areal linguistics
in addition to dialect geography or not, the importance of spatial distributions
for genetic linguistics cannot be questioned. We shall also see how dialect
geography does further service for comparative linguistics in helping to establish
relationship models (Chapter 15).
[14.8 Transition Area and Diasystem] Since dialects grade gradually

into others, feature by feature, transition is the general phenomenon. In general
every village mediates between other villages on its sides. But if two major
dialect areas have a buffer zone between themselves as a mediator, transition
dialect (or language) is a convenient term. Thus one recognizes an intermediary
area called Franco-Provenr;al between Provenr;al and French, and Catalan is
today a transition language between Provenr;al and Spanish. Transition areas
can be defined by the sharing of rules as well as by other items; that is, a dialect
with rule I and another with rule 2 have a buffer zone with both rules 1 and 2.
Such a geographical situation might even explain different rule order in a
concrete fashion (see § 9. I 4). Suppose that rules I and 2 spread from opposite
directions until they finally overlap. In the transition area closer to I, rule I
would have come earlier than rule 2, and vice versa. The dialects would now
be defined by the following conglomerations: [I ]-[I, 2]-[2, I ]-[2]. A situa-
tion like this was presented from several southern Atlantic states, and there
might be some geographic justification to it, although the transition area is not
physically in the middle (§ I4.4). Note that rule I in Charleston meant a in the
second row, and rule 2 in New Bern te in the second column. Winchester and
the Roanoke vicinity have both a's and te's: when rule I wins out, te occurs only
in the upper right corner; when rule 2 wins out, a occurs in the lower left corner
(§ I4.4).
In vocabulary such transition dialects often produce contaminations; for
example, Low German he and High German er give her 'he'. The two forms
may combine to give a compound; for example, Onne (onion) and Lauch (leek)
yield On lauch 'onion' (Niederrhein). A transition dialect can thus be a mixture
of two or more dialects, and resemble the convergence situation. It can be an
intermediate stage in seriation as the French ts case shows, or it may represent
the most conservative area and be closest to the original state of affairs. Western
and eastern Cheremis dialects are separated by speech forms which the speakers
themselves call 'middle language', which is rather close to Proto-Cheremis. The
reason is that the innovations from two focal areas have not overlapped totally,
but have left most of the earlier state of affairs untouched in between. We then
have inheritance rather than convergence. A parallel case was seen in the mean-
ings of Korn in the southwestern German-speaking area. The buffer zone retained
the original meaning whereas both sides had innovated (Figure 9-2).
Note now that a dialect cohesion or diasystem can be taken as a kind of
transition dialect similar to an intermediate machine language in machine
translation; a diasystem also helps the mapping of systems into others. In the
case of the partial dialect cohesion devised for British and American English
(§§ 13.7, 13.8), we come close to some existing conservative dialects. Diasystems
need not have any geographical representation whatsoever, and their historical
accuracy in mirroring protostages can be limited. Paradoxically, the wider apart
the dialects/languages are for which the diasystem is being (re)constructed,
the better the chances are for capturing actual history as well. In dialect geo-
graphy as well, confident reconstruction requires discontinuity, as in the case of
lateral areas. Areal and relational aspects of reconstruction and language
always require close scrutiny, before the final interpretation is made by the
linguist.
REFERENCES
General: Gamillscheg 1928, Bottiglioni 1954, Serech I954, Saporta I965,

Francescato I965, Saltarelli 1966, Risch I966, Bolinger I968, Alatis (ed.) 1969,
Goossens I 969, Dahlstedt I 970, Graur (ed.) 2. I - 225; 14.1 Reichstein I 960;
14.2 Bach I934; 14.3 Weinreich I954, Pulgram 1959, 196I, I964, Kohler I967,
Moulton I968, Rensch in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. II, Katicic I970; 14.4 Kurath
and McDavid I961, Keyser 1963, Saporta I965, Bailey I969, Fasold I970;
14.6 Bonfante I945, I946; 14.7 Bartoli 1925, R. Hall I964, Winter in Sebeok
(ed.) 1963f. vol. II; 14.8 E. Itkonen 1966, Goossens 1969.
CHAPTER 15
ALTERNATIVE RELATIONSHIP MODELS
Efforts toward simple models of language relationship

have led to two ways of drawing pictures, because here also
there are two sides, units and rules, which are complementary.
[15.1 Language Families and Family Trees] The variation inherent in

language is so complex that a complete diasystem represented in a single diagram
is impossible, at least for a human reader. Various sets of correspondences
have given us mapping relations for particular items, and these have shown
relationship as well. With dialects, relationship has traditionally seemed obvious,
whereas metaphorical expressions have been developed for related languages.
Languages connected by sets of correspondences form a language family. Thus
all the Romance languages are sisters, and therefore daughters of Latin, the
parent or mother language, from which they are descended. 'Related' is a
technical term, exactly like the equivalent 'cognate', meaning that the items
were once identical. Family terminology is of course as imprecise as the term
'dialect', as long as we do not know its defining items. More precision was
introduced by the presentation of relationship through a genealogical tree
which shows part of the (assumed) history as well. The tree diagram was inheri-
ted from the plotting of Classical population migrations, for example, Greek
colonization, with the original colonies founding offshoots of their own; but
it got important support from textual criticism (§§ 2.17, 2.18) and biology. It
is of course now widely used for all kinds of derivational mapping relations, as
in the derivation of sentences, in which capacity it is perhaps now best known.
The longest-studied language families are Indo-European, Uralic, and Semitic,
and they have contributed enormously to the methodology of genetic linguistics.
Because so many Uralic languages have been quoted in this text, it seems
appropriate to use the Uralic family tree as an example (also, the first known
formulation of genetic relationship involved Uralic languages, Hungarian and
Lapp). The Uralic family tree is given in Figure 15-1, and it is of the type already
shown in Figure 2-2. A tree like this shows many facts at a glance. Each node
defines itself by the lower nodes. Thus Uralic is a cover term for the whole
family since it is the highest node, but more immediately it is defined as the sum
of Finno-Ugric and Samoyed (divided into a northern and a southern group).
For many practical considerations, Samoyed is still often ignored and the family
is just called Finno-Ugric, it, in its turn, being defined by Finnic and Ugric,
and so on. 'Finno-Ugric ' is typical of the compound names used when no
geographical or other term has become current. Uralic is so named because the
languages are spoken on either side of the Ural Mountains, that is, it names the
300
ALTERNATIVE RELATIONSHIP MODELS 301
Yurak Samoyed
Samoyed Tavgi
Uralic
(c. 4000 B.C.) Selqup
[Kamassian]
[etc.]
Finno- Ugric
Ugric
(c. 3000 B.C.)
Permian
Votyak
Zyrien
Finnic
(c. 1500 B.C.) Mordvin
Cheremis
Baltic Lapp (split c. A.D. 750) East Lapp

Finnic
(c. 500 B.C.)
Finnish Livian
South
Karelian Veps Votian Estonian
FIGURE 15-1. A family tree of the Uralic languages. [Based on Robert
Austerlitz's lecture notes, reproduced by permission.]
middle point. 'Indo-European', on the other hand, is based on the spread from
Europe to India, that is, it is named by its end points. The tree is also a handy
measure of relative closeness. All these languages of course have dialects,
so that one could go on adding finer and finer branches, which is one advantage
of the tree diagram. Note that the Baltic Finnic node has two nuclei. The problem
is the exact position of Lapp, but since it is so closely related to Baltic Finnic,
it seems plausible that it branched off from the upper nucleus, called Early
Baltic Finnic. Now, Lapp is usually referred to as Lapp, although the diversity
within it is far greater than within Baltic Finnic. This is why the three subgroups
are written out. On the other hand, the Baltic Finnic languages are generally
enumerated separately even though they are best regarded as dialects of the
same language. Some obscure old social reasons are seemingly responsible for
this radically different treatment of Lapp and Baltic Finnic; compare the general
American attitude (which is only now receding) that the Negro dialects are not
language at all.
[15.2 How to Draw Trees: Subgrouping) The family tree given here did
not draw itself. It is the result of painstaking scrutiny of the actual linguistic
facts, and moreover linguists disagree among themselves here and there,
because "facts" can be interpreted in different ways. It is relatively easy to
establish a family of languages, for example, all the Uralic languages in the
diagram. This is given by regular sets of correspondences. But correspondences
put all the units of each language on equal footing, and can do no more than
group the languages into a brush formation (one node), not a tree. Similarly,
it is relatively easy to see which (e.g., Classical) manuscripts represent the same
story (see§§ 2. I 7, 2.18), but determining the sequence of copying is much trickier
and often indeterminate in detail. When a number of manuscripts have the
same unusual mistake, it is clear (or rather, it is the simplest hypothesis) that the
mistake was copied from the original. The probability of repeating the mistake
independently so many times is practically nonexistent. All the extant mistakes
are thus continuations of the original mistake. In dialect geography we saw that
the same logic is used for the interpretation of lateral areas. The same form in
discontinuous localities does not speak for an independent origin for each
locality, but argues that they continue an original unity (when there was one
area only). Now, this is the principle in drawing family trees for languages. If
two or more languages share a feature which is unlikely to have occurred
spontaneously in each of them, this feature must have arisen once only, when
these languages were one and the same. The more features pile up in this way
for a particular group of languages, the firmer the conclusion is that these
languages represent an original unity, which is represented by a node in the
family tree. But note now that the establishment of a language family uses the
same principle, in terms of the linguistic sign: the colligation between meaning
and form is arbitrary, and if any two or more languages have compatible forms
(ascertained on the basis of sound correspondences) linked with compatible
meanings, and if borrowing is not likely, it is simplest to hypothesize that we
have relationship, that is, a language family, which will be represented by a node
in the tree. This is an important criterion for subgrouping, in spite of the danger
of interference from borrowing. The more morphological signs (grammatical
markers) are involved, the better guarantee we have against borrowing.
Let us now refer back to the Uralic family tree. It was mentioned that the
Baltic Finnic languages are so close to each other that they can be taken as
dialects of one language; their variety is roughly on the order of the Romance or
Slavic languages. The total grammar of the Baltic Finnic languages is essentially
identical. Hundreds of basic vocabulary items are shared as well. There is no
possibility that all this could be accidental, and thus we assume that the gram-
mars and the vocabulary arose once only, and that the slight differences are due
to later change in each form. Let us mention one specific Baltic Finnic innova-
tion, a change that breaks away from tradition (or a "common mistake"): all
the languages have undergone the change of final -e# > -i (§§ 4.29, 6.6, 10.12,
11.17). All these languages and Lapp (except for Veps, Livian, and a variety of
Southern Lapp) have consonant gradation, and this is one of the features
defining Early Baltic Finnic, although it is not really certain in what form, if any,
it existed in the protolanguage (§§ 11.15-11.19).
The same situation as in Baltic Finnic obtains in Germanic. Here again the
grammars are obviously very similar, as well as the vocabulary (§§ 11.2-11.8).
Even the linguistically uninitiated notice the necessity for a common node in
the tree, however they word it. Consider, for example, the Germanic strong
verb system (§§ 12.1, 12.2), essentially the same everywhere. It is utterly impos-
sible that each language would have independently carried out the following
innovations: shift of the Proto-Indo-European perfect into (1) a preterite, or
(2) a few auxiliary "presents" (e.g., can, may, shall), and (3) the formation of
the weak conjugation (with the preterite formed with dental stops). Or take the
Germanic innovation of replacing the Proto-Indo-European syllabic resonant
by a back vowel -plus the corresponding consonantal resonant, *lJ. > uR (in
certain environments we have subsequent umlauts u > o). Again it is more
reasonable to assume that this happened only once, in the protolanguage,
rather than many times. As these common innovations keep accumulating, our
analysis and our reasons for positing a common node become vindicated.
(15.3 Family Trees and Comparative Linguistics] What has emerged is

that the drawing of family trees is one aspect of comparative linguistics. It is a
way of formalizing the rule part of the dichotomy between units and rules. This
dichotomy has been observed throughout this text (Part II dealt largely with
rules, Part III, largely with units, but the mapping rules were especially empha-
sized in§§ 10.6, 10.15, I 1.20, 12.4, 13.6). A family tree tries to convey in gross
outline the basic mapping rules that bring the highest level reconstructions back
to the attested forms. The principle of minimizing both units and rules neces-
sitates that some rules are applied high enough, to work once only, in a node
that splits only later. A 'shared innovation' has been recently rephrased as a
shared rule, but the new term does not reflect any real change in substance.
In the early days of family-tree construction one chose one particular innovation
after another, exactly as one does with synchronic trees of derivation. The result
was always bifurcations, that is, binary splits. This is how August Fick drew the
Indo-European family tree, and this was made popular by August Schleicher.
Schleicher first split Proto-Indo-European into Aryan-Greco-ltalo-Celtic vs.
Slavo-Germanic. The former was then divided into Indo-Iranian vs. Greco-Italo-
Celtic, the latter into Germanic vs. Balto-Siavic. Greco-Italo-Celtic gave Italo-
Celtic and Greek. Albanian somehow sprang from the stem of Greek, and as
for the remaining two-part names, their final splits are obvious. A binary
split is, of course, possible, and in fact the Uralic tree has many of them (some
linguists posit even more than indicated in Figure 15-1). This is also why the
Finnic node has two nuclei. It can be split in two by lowering Volga Finnic
down the stem. But to limit oneself to binary splits only is too stiff a requirement;
this became quite clear when dealing with closer relationships, where adjacent
dialects share features (e.g., the Baltic Finnic languages or the Germanic
languages). It is impossible, without being arbitrary, to give priority to some
features, and the "tree" remains a brush-like formation with one node only.
This is also how one has to draw the Indo-European family tree for the following
subgroups: Indo-Iranian, Armenian, Greek, Italic, Celtic, Germanic, Balto-
Slavic, Albanian, Anatolian, and Tocharian.
The drawing of trees is of course based on actual linguistic differences-in
fact, isoglosses, as in dialect geography. Instead of indicating the isogloss line
between two items, say, a I b, one concentrates on the actual derivation of the
items, a 1\ b, because this can show history and the aim of the tree is to show
derivational history, that is, the actual splits. Now, such splits need not be
absolute, because borrowing is always possible; in a convergence situation
borrowing can be quite considerable in every part o.f the grammar. Rather than
draw splits often based on arbitrary selections of features and of dubious chro-
nology, Johannes Schmidt proposed (1872) that changes be represented like the
mesh of chain mail, or like circular ripples on water, which spread outward
from the point of origin of the change. He called this way of handling the
relationship the wave theory. A few years later, when dialect geography was well
established, it became apparent that it was not mere theory, because this was the
way an isogloss map behaved. Of course the choice of isoglosses for this new
purpose can be as arbitrary as the selection of innovations in drawing trees.
Trees can represent splits, waves the actual spread of features. Both ways of
representing relationship can of course be as bad or good as the linguists make
them, within the limits imposed by the models themselves.
[15.4 Wave Theory] When no particular linguistic innovation can be

given chronological priority, subgrouping results in a brush-like tree without
depth (one node). In such a situation an isogloss map gives much more infor-
mation because it spells out the overlapping items, and isogloss bundles indicate
the relative strength of boundaries. Figure 15-2 includes twenty-four isoglosses
of different value, in the spirit of Schmidt's proposal. The exact value of the
isoglosses is irrelevant for our purposes, because we are looking at a principle.
Note, however, that phonetic isoglosses are included, which makes isogloss 1 just
1 2
3 6
17
------, I
I
I
I
Baltic Slavic I
:17
6 11
9
8
Tocharian
24 §
G~~j
·aQJ
E
1-<
()
7_t__:£!QJ -~ <
u
-
til
..... 4
Greek
, ____ -
I
23 9 23 13 14
12 16 10 8 14
25 1 4
FIGURE 15-2. A dialect map of the Indo-European languages.
DEFINITIONS OF THE ISOGLOSSES

1. centum I satem [right] (§ 11.12) 15. secondary endings (without no. 10 -i)
2. -ss- I -st-, -tt- [right] [below] (§ 19.10)
3. aoa I a, iio I 6 [inside] 16. feminine nouns with masculine e:.d-
4. eao I a [inside] ings [inside]
5. s I h [inside] 17. -ad 'ablative' I 'genitive' [inside]
6. CVRC I CRVC [inside](§ 4.18) 18. new tense system from perfect
7. kw I p [inside](§§ 18.13, 18.16) [inside] (Chapter 12)
8. e- 1~'past' [left, outside](§ 19.10) 19. umlaut [inside] (§ 4.5)
9. -osyo 'genitive' [right, inside] 20. -ww-, -jj- I stop + w, j [outside]
10. -r I -i 'present' [right, outside] 21. -ggj- I -ddj- [right] (no. 20)
(§ 19.10) 22. laryngeals as h's [inside] (§ 12.4)
11. -m- I -bh- 'case marker' [below] 23. uncontracted reflexes of sequence
12. -to- I -mo- 'ordinal' [below] *yH [inside]
13. -u 'imperative' [inside](§ 19.10) 24. unit pronouns I particles + enclitic
14. proti I poti 'preposition' [inside] pronouns [inside] (§§ 19.8, 19.9)
one among many, although it is the most celebrated line in Indo-European

linguistics. The isoglosses were not chosen with an eye on isogloss 1, and thus
it is interesting to note that the bundle containing isogloss I is weaker (contains
fewer lines) than many other bundles. The diagram is a dialect map without
exact geography, although there is a high degree of correspondence to the
geographic situation in which these languages were first attested and are situated
in relation to each other. The isogloss bundles define the subgroups, the areas
that remain in between, but for practical reasons one normally picks a name for
them. In this diagram the names have been given by the end points of the family
tree. One can read the defining characteristics of each subgroup by scanning the
actual isoglosses. The diagram is not intended to maintain that these twenty-four
isoglosses are the isoglosses needed to define the subgroups; it merely shows
how the situation looks when one keeps adding isoglosses. One of the most
startling bundles is between Italic and Greek. One usually gets the notion that
Latin and Greek are very closely related, because for historical and cultural
reasons they are studied together (see§ 16.12). In this sample more isoglosses
separate than unite them. Greek is the most heavily wrapped subgroup here;
let us single it out for a demonstration of how one can use dialect geography in
the service of comparative linguistics.
In theory, all isoglosses are equally important, but, for defining purposes,
some must be regarded as more fundamental than others. Unique relics are parti-
cularly interesting: for example, Greek seems to have preserved the sequence *yH
without contraction to *i as elsewhere in Indo-European (except for Hittite and
perhaps Tocharian; see §§ 12.4, 12.5). Greek develops yajia from *yH (e.g.,
Greek pherousa < *-ontya vs. Sanskrit bharanti 'the carrying one' (fern.) and
Greek priasthai 'to buy' vs. Sanskrit kri!Jlimi 'I buy'). Another relic feature
would be that Greek preserves the original five-vowel system (§ 11.14). These
two isoglosses would now separate "Greek" from the other dialects, and when
they are added to the ones already in Figure 15-2, the independent status of
Greek is strengthened. But these isoglosses still do not tell when "Greek"
became Greek; because they define relics in "Greek," they define a Proto-
Indo-European dialect as well. Time depth is completely lacking. If relics can
be used to define general characteristics, certain innovations give footholds for
relative chronology. In Greek, one way of forming a perfect is with a suffix -k-,
which occurs already in Homer but is absent in the other Indo-European
languages. The k- perfects could now be used for defining the starting point
of Greek. But, of course, there is always the danger that an innovation might be
as old as the protolanguage. In such cases the relative chronology would be
wrong, but it would still serve as a characterization of the dialect against others.
The diagram includes a few isoglosses that affect only single subgroups or
part of them (6, 19, 20, 21). Some of the wider isoglosses affect just parts of
certain subgroups (5, 7, 12, 14). This is exactly what a real dialect map looks
like: it shows how, in favorable cases, dialectal differences can be reconstructed,
because it is to be expected that some of the isoglosses represent divisions in the
protolanguage (e.g., 11), although others can have diffused later from group to
group.
It is interesting to note that Tocharian and Hittite turn out to occupy a
central position in the map, although they were attested in the peripheries of
Indo-European territory (Chinese Turkestan and Anatolia, respectively). But
there is no contradiction, because seriation shows that Tocharian and Hittite
occupy the conservative side of the isoglosses involved-they generally do not
share innovations with other subgroups. Thus it is likely that they had already
left the original homeland when most of the innovations were occurring in the
central area. Areal notions work out quite well for isogloss 10, -r being retained
in lateral areas. In short, Figure 15-2 has many of the characteristics of a real
dialect map, which strengthens the validity of such a diagram.
[15.5 Synthesis of the Models] The problem with the family-tree model
was that it did not spell out the actual linguistic items defining the nodes. It did
not allow for diffusion either, and this then led to the wave-theory model. And
now we see that the isogloss map has a problem in handling chronology. It
spells out the isoglosses, but they are all on the same flat surface without chrono-
logical depth. Seriation can be used, but only for one isogloss at a time, atom-
istically and without relation to other isoglosses. In short, this leads us back
to family trees, which show time depth. This is an indication of the comple-
mentarity of the two models, a view championed by Leskien. Both diagrams
are visual aids which show, in a single picture, interrelationships within the
whole family or its subgroups. Models are, of course, icons of these relations,
but since models represent certain hypotheses, they are icons of hypotheses.
Overliteral interpretation is the greatest danger, since a picture (diagram) of a
hypothesis cannot be more accurate than the hypothesis itself. It should also be
no wonder that pictures of the same object, taken at different angles, look
different, although they have a substantial common core. And both pictures
tend to be fuzzy as well, because the object is vague as a consequence of many
historical gaps.
How would one now lift up a tree out of the flat map of Figure 15-2? One
must give priority to some isoglosses over others. Schleicher's tree (§ 15.3)
would seem to take isogloss II as the first basic division, then numbers 17 and
4, and so on. It is not claimed that Schleicher used these very isoglosses for his
tree, but the isoglosses provided in Figure 15-2 would enable one to set up
Schleicher's tree. On the other hand, if isogloss I is given highest priority, we get
the most famous subgrouping into centum and satem languages, west and east,
and this is again a two-way split, as always in Schleicher's tree. Isoglosses 22 and
24 gave rise to another two-way classification: Hittite (or Anatolian) versus the
rest of Indo-European. To stress the very deep-cutting nature of this cleavage
(22, 24, and others not given here) a name Indo-Hittite has been proposed for
the family. The term has aroused almost unbelievable rage in some linguists,
although the facts have not changed at all. The dialect map remains exactly as
before; the new name just emphasizes certain isoglosses. In this sense the Indo-
Hittite hypothesis is based on internal analysis. Of course new names often
stress old facts from a new angle; for example, rule manipulation supersedes
analogy in this way. There is traditional justification in keeping old names. It
*XYZ
0
X y z
--
0
FIGURE 15-3. Combinations of trees and isoglosses. [Reprinted by per-

mission from Franklin C. Southworth, "Family-tree diagrams," Language,
40, 557-565 (1964) (© Linguistic Society of America).}
could be rather difficult (not to say pointless) to ban the word horse and replace
it with, say, hay burner, just to stress the fact that horses eat hay. The term
horse can and does cover that as well, and similarly every Indo-Europeanist
knows that he can go on using the name Indo-European irrespective of the actual
isoglosses that split the family.
If we choose isogloss 23 as the earliest division, we get a two-way split between
Tocharian, Hittite, and Greek versus the rest. One could now postulate that after
Hittite had left the scene, Tocharian and Greek vocalized *yH (Greek yajia,
Tocharian yii), and this would give another two-way split. The fact is, however,
that the only solid two-way tree remains the Indo-Hittite one, that is, the one
based on isogloss 24. If one does not like the name or the tree, the fact still
remains that Hittite is the most aberrant dialect of Indo-European.
There is one unfortunate gap in the procedure of converting a map into a
tree. There is no single way of deciding which isogloss is basic. This is why so
much controversy arises. Linguists go basically by their feelings or intuitions,
even to the point of trying to justify the correctness of linguistic theories. Such
intuitions often brand the work of other linguists as "wrong" or "uninterest-
ing." No wonder the Indo-Hittite hypothesis has not been "settled."
F. C. Southworth has ~uggested a notation that would combine the family
tree and wave diagrams. In Figure 15-3:1 we have four isoglosses (a, b, c, and
d) defining three languages (X, Y, and Z) without time depth. This map can be
converted into a family tree (Figure 15-3: 2) if we assume that dis earlier than a
or b. This tree can be made more detailed by indicating successive stages with
bumps in the branches and by stretching the isoglosses through the time axis:
the higher an isogloss reaches, the earlier it pitched in (Figure 15-3: 3). But the
tree is of course different if isogloss a is the earlier one (Figure 15-3: 4). Two
different trees now represent two different histories for the isogloss situation
(Figure 15-3:1 ). Southworth also suggests converting the isoglosses into an
envelope around the family tree (Figure 15-3: 5-8). If an early split is not
bridged over by later isoglosses, the envelope will indicate the split accordingly
(Figure 15-3: 5). But if the early split is connected by later changes, the notch in
the envelope is shallow (Figure 15-3: 6). This now makes the distance between
the highest node and the second branching significant (in Figure 15-3, compare
combinations 5 and 6). In a brush-like tree (Figure 15-3:7, 8) the branching
distance remains the same, but the different depths of the envelope notches
indicate the absence or presence of isogloss overlap.
REFERENCES
15.1 Hoenigswald 1963, Maher 1970d, Austerlitz (private communication)

and 1968, Collinder 1965, 1955-1960; 15.2 Brugmann 1884, Chretien 1963,
Hoenigswald 1966; 15.4 Brugmann 1884, Meillet 1967b, Porzig 1954, Birnbaum
and Puhvel (eds.) 1966, Krahe 1970; 15.5 Pulgram 1953, Hofler 1958, South-
worth 1964.
CHAPTER 16
CLASSIFICATION OF LANGUAGES
The chapter re'Ciews briefly the almost hit-or-miss character

of early typo/ogizing, although typological classification is
never perfect or absolute. This contrasts with the absolute
nature of genealogical classification. Without typology,
however, genetic linguistics would be impossible.
(16.1 The Necessity of Typology] Linguists look at language from any

point of view ranging between two extreme poles. At one end each language
is unique; at the other, all languages are the same. Both polar extremes deny
the feasibility of typological classification, although the universalist approach
delineates natural language from other sign systems. The problem is the same in
all social and cultural sciences: the phenomena we study never show up in pure
form. Every such event occurs in the concrete form of particular, historically
conditioned cultures, languages, and so on. Individual men and communities
do not dwell alone in incommensurate worlds of their unique experiences; they
communicate with each other. The general human experience is that we sense
simultaneously the unique and the universal in our fellowmen. This type of
study is necessarily, therefore, a syncriticaljcomparative one. To study culture
or language we must study cultures and languages. In linguistics it has always
been clear that certain languages resemble each other more than certain others,
as shown by dialectology and genetic relationship, for example. English dialects
form a group that is distinct from German dialects, and the Germanic languages
pattern correspondingly with respect to the Romance languages, and so on.
And in convergence areas languages share features that unite them in structure
in contradistinction to the outsiders.
(16.2 The Development of Morphological Typology and Typological Classifi-

cation of Languages] Along with the genetic study of language there was
always a keen interest in the typological classification of languages. Samples and
descriptions of different languages were collected in the seventeenth century
and at the beginning of the eighteenth century classificatory schemes started to
develop.
Friedrich von Schlegel divided languages into two groups, fiective vs. affixive.
The term 'flection' was ambiguous because it meant not only root modifica-
tion (sing-sang), as intended, but also inflection, which can be of the affixing
type (cat-s). 'Affixive' referred to particles (the paw of the cat) as well as affixes;
it encompassed any material outside the root or its modification. Friedrich's
310
CLASSIFICATION OF LANGUAGES 311
older brother August expanded this scheme into a tripartite one: (1) languages
without structure (Chinese), (2) languages with affixes (Turkish), (3) languages
with flection (Indo-European; goosefgeese, singfsangfsung, and so on). A fourth
type was added later by A. F. Pott: the incorporating languages (Eskimo).
This type means that the language incorporates into one word what is a sentence
in the other types, for example, Oneida kA.tsyuq 'fish' and kftsyaks 'I eat fish',
swcl'yat 'berry' and kahy6kwas 'I am picking berries out of water' (i.e., 'cran-
berries'). Noun objects and adverbial phrases are incorporated into the verb.
In these examples it looks as if the free nouns were completely suppletive to the
incorporated objects, but actually the same base is embedded in both, because
the "free forms" also have obligatory prefixes and suffixes. Incorporation need
not involve suppletion. The three-way division remained the basic one, under the
terms: (I) isolating (coined by W. v. Humboldt), (2) agglutinating, and (3)
flectional, although there were attempts at further segmentation. Thus F. Misteli
made use of six types (by splitting the first two of the above grouping into two):
(I) incorporating, (2) root-isolating, (3) stem-isolating, (4) serializing, (5) agglu-
tinating, and (6) flectional. He gives Malayan as a stem-isolating language,
where the root is made into a stem by various affixes. This is essentially agglutina-
tion without inflectional affixes. English deep would be a root, and deepness an
isolating stem, but depth would already be partly flectional. Coptic (Semitic)
and Bantu are supposed to be serializing languages. For Bantu the criterion is
the complicated system of agreement, for Semitic the discontinuous morphemes.
F. N. Finck added two more types in his classification: (1) root-isolating
(Chinese), (2) incorporating (Eskimo), (3) coordinating [serializing] (Subiya),
(4) subordinating [agglutinative] (Turkish), (5) stem-isolating (Samoan, Tagalog),
(6) root-inflecting (Arabic), (7) stem-inflecting (Modern Greek), and (8) group-
inflecting (Georgian). The questions asked were slightly different for the differ-
ent categories. There were the old questions about the inflectional shape of the
word:
ISOLATING INFLECTING
roots Chinese Arabic
stems Samoan Modern Greek
groups Georgian
but for Subiya and Turkish, syntactic criteria were used, with concentration
on nouns for the former and verbs for the latter.
In addition to the above classification according to the makeup of the words
in relation to form and meaning, Max Mi.iller introduced the terms 'analytic'
and 'synthetic' to refer to the segmentability of units. W. D. Whitney added the
term 'polysynthetic' for cases when segmentation was especially difficult.
These terms have been used concurrently with 'isolating' or 'agglutinative',
'flectional', and 'incorporating,' respectively, because such types allow for
corresponding segmentation.
312 LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION! A SYNTHESIS
[16.3] Nineteenth-century typology was disfigured by extreme ethnocentri-

city and lack of reliable data. Indo-European was judged higher than other
types, and statements were made on undigested written material. One basic
criterion for classification was always translation (into German), which figured
prominently in the notion of incorporating languages. It was generally thought
that isolating languages yield agglutinating ones and that these in turn yield
flectional types. Max Muller connected the three types with social order as well:
the isolating languages were family languages, the agglutinating ones, nomadic,
and the flectional ones, state languages (see§ 21.11). Schleicher supported typo-
logical history (isolating to agglutinating to flectional) because it corresponded
to the biological parallel of birth, growth, and withering. Of course it was rather
arbitrary to brand a language with one name only, because such types are
relative. English is heavily agglutinative (cat-s, good-ness) and flection is a
minority (goosefgeese). Cases like dep-th, duch-ess are somewhere in between.
And if one characteristic of an incorporating language is that the free form and the
corresponding bound one are different (as in the appearance of Oneida above),
English has it also in dep-, duch- versus the free forms deep and duke, or even
further in cases like horse/equine/hippology or womanf.femininejgyneco/ogy (see
§ 8.12). Moreover, it is often possible to devise agglutinative analogs to synthetic
flectional languages, through internal reconstruction alias morphophonemic
analysis, which shows how sound change may indeed change agglutination into
flection (compare Lapp consonant gradation,§§ 10.14, 11.15). Morphophonemic
analysis makes the synthetic Oneida word fu·yaks 'they (masc.) eat berries'
into a perfect agglutinative sequence lhla-wa-ahy-k-sl '3rd person/masc.-plural-
berry-eat-continuous/present ', which can be converted into the actually occur-
ring form with six rules: (1) aV-+ a, (2) lawai-+ u in certain prefixes(§ 4.23),
(3) l#hl-1-+ /-, (4) insert a between a noun stem ending in a consonant and a
verb stem beginning with a consonant, (5) place the accent (') on the penult,
and (6) Vhy-+ V·y. In Latin dicor 'I am said' the ending -or is usually learned as
one lump meaning' 1st sg.' + 'passive' + 'present'. But in the reconstruction
this is easily split up into *deik-o-A-o-r 'show-conjugation marker-1st sg.-passive-
present'. Similarly, the Sanskrit middle subjunctive 1st sg. -iii in bharai 'let me
carry for myself' is in Indo-European terms *bher-o-e-A-o-i 'carry-conjugation
marker-subjunctive-1st sg.-middle-present'. (N.B.: Latin -r/Skt -i: isogloss 10
in Figure 15-2; see§§ 19.1, 19.10).
[16.4] To break the nineteenth-century deadlock on typology Edward

Sapir developed an apparatus capable of a more flexible characterization of
languages. Languages display four types of concepts:
I. Basic (concrete) concepts (objects, actions, qualities)

II. Derivational concepts
III. Concrete relational concepts (differing from the above in indicating
relations that transcend the word they are immediately attached to)
IV. Pure relational concepts (which are purely abstract, relating concrete
elements to each other, expressed through word order, particles, or inner
modification)
Groups I and IV are universal and must be represented in every language,

whereas II and III are facultative. Of these, group III is rather obscure, but
perhaps we can say that the -urn in Latin vidi virum 'I saw the man' indicates the
relation of 'man' to 'seeing' (IV), which in English is given by word order.
Then the second -urn in t•idi virum bonum 'I saw the good man' would seem to be
III, relating bonum to virum. Sapir also clarifies the old 'flectional' type by calling
it 'symbolic'. He adds the term 'fusional' when underlying agglutination is
modified, for example, in cases like dep-th, fil-th, and duch-ess. Fusion indicates
the relative firmness with which the affixed elements are united with each other.
The degree of (poly)morphemicity of the word is expressed by the terms
'analytic', 'synthetic', 'polysynthetic '. These terms are again purely relative;
a language may be analytic from one standpoint and synthetic from another.
Now all languages can be grouped according to the concepts expressed:
A. Pure-relational nonderiving (simple) languages (I + IV)

B. Pure-relational deriving (complex) languages (I + II + IV)
C. Mixed-relational nonderiving (simple) languages (I + III + IV)
D. Mixed-relational deriving (complex) languages (I + II + III + IV)
When these types are combined with different techniques and syntheses we get a
three-parameter classificatory scheme as in Figure 16-1. Chinese is now a simple
1. Fundamental
type 2. Technique 3. Synthesis
A Isolating (relating words together) Analytic
B Agglutinative} Synthetic
c Fusional within words Polysynthetic
D Symbolic
FIGURE 16-1. Sapir's three-parameter classificatory scheme of languages.
pure-relational isolating analytic language, Turkish complex pure-relational

agglutinative synthetic, English complex mixed-relational fusional analytic,
Semitic complex mixed-relational symbolic-fusional synthetic, and older Indo-
European complex mixed-relational fusional (with symbolic tinge) synthetic.
Bantu is given as simple mixed-relational fusional analytic (mildly synthetic),
although it could go under D as well.
It is obvious that this scheme is no longer so absolute as a single three(+)-
partite system, because technique and synthesis can be specified with 'strongly'
or 'mildly', and so on, and compounds like 'symbolic-fusional' are used. But
the system is still unable to represent exact details; Sapir of course was aware
of it and warned that the strong craving for a simple formula has been the
undoing of linguists, and that languages cannot be pigeonholed (stated thus
already by Humboldt). But Sapir's multiple-parameter typology was a definite
step forward, and it has been extended by Joseph Greenberg to yield exact
numerical values.
[16.5) Taking samples of one hundred words of running text, Greenberg

calculated various ratios between elements and relations. Let us look here
briefly at the profiles of eight languages through ten indices of his, reproduced
in Figure 16-2. The traditional nonquantitative results are on the whole con-
firmed. One can now draw the numerical boundaries for analytic (1.00-1.99),
,J:i
..... "'
~
C1>
Typological indices
·c:
~
"'=
1:::
JJ.I
"d
1:::
.~
"'
1-<
,J:i
.~
Oil
.....;:I
~
~
-:a
~
"'C1>
E
~
1:::
~
0
E
~ C1> 1::: ~ 1:::
til 0 p.. JJ.I >- til <r:: "'
IJ..l
Synthesis M/W 2.59 2.12 1.52 1.68 2.17 2.55 1.06 3.72
Agglutination A/J .09 .11 .34 .30 .51 .67 - .03
Compounding B/W 1.13 1.00 1.03 1.00 1.02 1.00 1.07 1.00
Derivation D/W .62 .20 .10 .15 .35 .07 .00 1.25
Gross
inflection I/W .84 .90 .39 .53 .82 .80 .00 1.75
Prefixing P/W .16 .06 .01 .04 .00 1.16 .00 .00
Suffixing S/W 1.18 1.03 .49 .64 1.15 .41 .00 2.72
Isolation 0/N .16 .15 .52 .75 .29 .40 1.00 .02
Pure
inflection Pi/N .46 .47 .29 .14 .59 .19 .00 .46
Concord Co/N .38 .38 .19 .11 .12 .41 .00 .38
M = morphemes, W = words, A = agglutinative constructions, J =

morpheme boundaries (junctures), R =roots, D = derivative morphemes,
I =Inflectional morphemes, P =prefixes, S = suffixes, 0 = order, N =
nexus (relation of words within a sentence), Pi = pure inflection, Co =
concord.
FIGURE 16-2. Greenberg's typological indices expressed by simple numerical
values, for example, the number of morphemes divided by the number of words
(synthesis). [Reprinted from Joseph H. Greenberg, "A quantitative approach
to the morphological typology of languages," Method and perspective in an-
thropology, Robert F. Spencer, editor, University of Minnesota Press,
Minneapolis, © copyright 1954 University of Minnesota, Minneapolis,
Minnesota.]
synthetic (2.00-2.99), and polysynthetic (3.00 and over), and similarly agglu-
tinative (0.50 and over). Perfect isolation is 1.00 (Annamese), and Eskimo comes
out as expected (0.02 = 0). Similar indices can be devised for syntactic facts
in addition to the last three in Greenberg's list.
It should be noted that the terms 'analytic', 'synthetic', and so on, are used
in widely different meanings by different linguists; the context usually shows
what is meant. The situation is no different from other linguistic terminology
which displays a diversity of meanings, e.g., 'morpheme' and 'sememe'.
(16.6 The AU-pervasiveness of Typology) Every descriptive scheme is

potentially typological. As so often in linguistics, different approaches are
complementary (e.g., internal reconstruction and the comparative method),
and this is true of the descriptive and typological approaches as well. Any feature
can be taken as a basis of classification, but the resulting groupings need not
have much practical value (e.g., the class of all languages with rounded front
vowels, or nasal vowels). Very popular is the grouping of vowel systems into
triangles and squares and/or by the number of units; for example, Latin has a
five-vowel triangle, Italian a seven-vowel triangle, American English (in the
traditional analysis) a nine-vowel square, and Turkish an eight-vowel cube
(Figure 16-3). Similar diagrams can be drawn for consonant systems, accentual
i u i i u
e o e :;, o
a re a ~
e a
Traditional
Latin American English Turkish
(Triangle) (Square) (Cube)
FIGURE 16-3. Characterization of vowel systems through geometric arrange-
ments.
systems, and so on. The Proto-Indo-European morphophonemic resonant

system VR "' R/IJ. (Chapter 12) occurs in almost identical form in Proto-
Kartvelian (the language from which Georgian descends). All kinds of tense and
aspect systems can be plotted into pictures or can be otherwise compared. The
basic features of Oneida verbal content structure are strikingly similar to those
of European languages, especially Romance, although, formally, the structures
are quite different. An imperfective (active) contrasts with a perfective (passive);
for example, kAtsyaku 'it-fish-eat-past/done' = 'the fish is done ate' = 'the
fish has been eaten' (compare Spanish esta comido 'it has been eaten'); wakit-
syaku 'it-to me-fish-eat-done' = 'I have eaten the fish' (compare Portuguese
tenho comido 'I have eaten'); wanitsyaku 'it-to itself-fish-eat-done' = 'the fish
has been eating' (compare the 'middle voice', or, for example, German der
3I6 LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION; A SYNTHESIS
Fisch hat sich geniihrt 'the fish has nourished itself'); and wanftsyaks 'it-to
itself-fish-eat-present' = 'the fish eats itself' ='the fish gets eaten' (compare
Spanish ellibro se vende 'the book is sold').
Syncrisis is a generic aspect of the study of variation (Figure 1-7), and the
same tools have to be used as in dialectology: diagrams (see Figure 3-1) and
numerical parameters(§ 9.11).
[16.7 Contrastive Analysis and Translation] A practical aspect of

typology is contrastive linguistics, whereby two languages are contrasted by
dismembering them into their components and matching the components as
closely as possible in the framework of semantic equivalents. Thus English
nouns like food, faith, and love have to be rendered by verbal expressions in
Mazatec (of Mexico); some Hopi verbs can be given by Kannada verbs, others
correspond to Kannada adjectives; and so on. Names are verbs in certain
languages, for example, Oneida KanAstalukwa 'Shelled Corn', Skanyataliyo
'Handsome Lake' (roughly 'the water is again good for navigation'), and also
layJ.thos 'he plants corn' for 'farmer' and shakoye·nas 'he arrests them' for
'sheriff', although the English word farmer was also borrowed as lafaqmahk6
(with considerable sound substitution and gender marking). The immediate
aim of contrastive analysis may be language teaching, but the same syncritical
comparison is also the essence of translation. Translation is intimately tied with
knowledge of the respective cultures, and linguistic typology has also been
connected with culture circle theory (see § 21.19). Translation merges on one
side into the notion of bilingualism, and it represents a situation that is fertile
for borrowing, either in the form of loan shifts or morphemic borrowing (as in
Oneida). In addition, translation was one of the basic activities that led to the
development of morphological typologies. This happened mainly in connection
with samples from the Bible, and it is interesting to note that Bible translation
was one of the momenta for the rise of descriptive linguistics in America (Sum-
mer Institute of Linguistics, American Bible Society). In Russia, B. A. Uspenskij
has developed an explicit notion of a comparison standard, which he calls
eta/on language (eta/on French____,.. Russian 'standard'; standard has already
been preempted, with a different meaning, in English usage). The concrete real
languages are characterized by the transform rules necessary for converting
their structures into that of the etalon language. Languages are measured by
their distance from the etalon language. Different etalon languages can be
devised according to the purposes of typological comparison. Note that for a
long time Greek and Latin (or Indo-European in general) served as an implicit
etalon language (standard of comparison). The notion of such a standard or
intermediate language makes typology even more similar to translation, since
one way of doing machine translation is through a machine language rather
than directly from one language into another.
[16.8 Language Typology and Genetic Linguistics] Language typology

shows two aspects, (I) language universals and (2) typological classification,
based on language-specific features. But so far we have not seen what typology
can do for genetic linguistics, although the nineteenth-century belief that iso-
lating languages changed into agglutinating and these into flectional ones has
been mentioned. Indeed, this sequence is often found, or at least such a tendency
is seen in the development of Indo-Iranian to Persian, Old English to Modern
English, and Latin to French (see Greenberg's table [Figure 16-2] for the first
two). On the other hand, Chinese used to have flection, and thus the develop-
ment between types is not necessarily a one-way phenomenon. (We shall return
to this question below.)
It turns out that the role of typology in diachrony is so basic that it is not
usually noticed at all. All diachronic changes imply types, for example, assimila-
tion, metathesis, analogy, fading of metaphors, and so on. Part II has shown us
the true regularity of processes of change, of diachronic universals (and every
chapter has had a section on classification as well). These have been empirically
established through historical documentation. These processes on their part
make reconstruction possible (Part III). Reconstruction itself can be viewed as
the establishment of a partial etalon language for genetic comparison. Diasystems
are thus members of the class of etalon languages made for a particular purpose,
genetic classification. The distance of each language from this comparison
standard is measured by transform rules (innovations or retentions). The
distance can often be given visually in a family tree or in a combination of a
tree and a dialect map, as already shown.
Also, largely through Greenberg's efforts, we now have a doctrine of dynamic
comparison between language types, where the objects of comparison are the
processes themselves. It is often possible to establish the relative origin of types
and we might caiJ this method seriation of types. There are two classes of lan-
guages, those that have nasal vowels and those that do not. There is the further
implicational hierarchy that languages with nasal vowels also have oral vowels.
Now, a hypothesis can be asserted about the relative origin of nasal vowels: they
result from the loss of a nasal consonant, apart from borrowings and analogical
creations. A typical course of events is VN > VN > V, but the nasal of course
can also precede the vowel. This is pure relative chronology, because nasal
vowels need not arise; when they do, however, they originate this way. There are
further hierarchical scales about nasal vowels; for example, their number is
always the same or Jess than that of oral vowels, never the reverse, and
mergers within nasal vowels occur more often than among oral vowels
(see§ 9.8).
This typological seriation started with an example between types and proceeded
to a discussion of hierarchies within the type. Greenberg has also provided
eight implicational laws about voiceless vowels, among them: (1) in languages
with stress, every vocalic voiceless segment has the weakest degree of stress;
(2) in languages with distinctive vowel length, the existence of voiceless long
vowels implies that of voiceless short vowels, but not vice versa; (3) every
voiceless vowel is either preceded or followed by a silence or a voiceless plain
sound; and (4) low voiceless vowels imply high voiceless vowels. These are
typological implicational laws (hypotheses) that have so far stood up under

empirical checking.
This kind of seriation and implicational scaling transcends the usual com-
parative method, although it has a striking resemblance to the principle of lectio
difficilior in its various manifestations. It provides another important contribu-
tion to comparative linguistics: a check on reconstructions. What is truly
generic about language must also be part of our reconstructions. We should not
posit anything in our unattested protolanguages (diasystems) that contradicts
our typological universals. A reconstruction of a vowel system with only nasal
or voiceless vowels is consequently impossible. Typology also helps us make
guesses about missing parts. If for some reason we have clear but fragmentary
evidence for a language with m and 1J, it is plausible to assume that it must have
had n as well; or if a language seems to have affricates, it should also have stops,
and so on (see § 6.5).
[16.9 Genealogical Classification of Languages] The two aspects of

language typology-universals and classification-are matched by another
division in comparative linguistics: (I) determination of fact and degree of
relationship and (2) reconstruction of earlier stages. The first part means classi-
fication. Those languages that represent outcomes of one and the same proto-
language are grouped into a family. It was mentioned that comparative
linguistics depends on the universal change types, and thus a typological factor is
also involved here, although it is generally ignored or not realized. The ultimate
task of typology is to determine what structures are possible, and why they are
possible to the exclusion of others. In this way typology is hierarchically superior
to genetic linguistics. It permits us to understand the general laws of change and
the possibilities of change within a given language type. It is this that makes
linguistics a true science and not a mere codification of facts, and genetic lin-
guistics of course enjoys the benefits. Otherwise, in actual application, typological
classification is of course quite different from the genetic one, because it is
based on arbitrary features chosen as bases for syncritical comparison.
The principles of genetic classification have already been treated in the
preceding chapter. The basic criterion is simply the sound correspondence.
Languages that fit into regular sound correspondences belong to the same
family. Subgrouping criteria give then the degree of relationship. Very crudely
put, comparison of linguistic categories and systems give typological classifica-
tion, whereas sound correspondences provide genetic classification (which is
the more convincing, the more grammatical elements are involved in the corre-
spondences). Figure 16-4 exhibits the standard criteria for establishing genetic
relationship. The lower right-hand corner is the chief area where linguists look
for a justification of their decisions.
(16.10] Syntax gets the same evaluation as onomatopoeia in this table.

Both are evidently iconic. It can be said that syntax belongs largely to all
languages; the more universal any feature is, the less valuable it is for classifica-
CLASSIFICATION OF LANGUAGES 3I9
Can this
Can this result Evidence
Agreement in result easily Can this or proof
different parts accident- from be in- of rela-
of language ally? borrowing? herited? tionship?
Agreement in the principles
of syntax, morphology, and Yes Yes Yes No
sound system
Agreement in descriptive
and onomatopoeic Yes Yes Yes No
vocabulary
Agreement in easily
No Yes Yes No
borrowable vocabulary
Multiple agreement in the
basic and rather un-
No No Yes Yes
borrowable vocabulary
with sound correspondences
Considerable and frequent
agreement in gram-
matical formants (endings, No No Yes Yes
prefixes, auxiliaries) and
sound correspondences
FIGURE 16-4. Criteria for establishing genetic relationship. [After A. B. Dol-

gopol'skij, "Ot Saxary do Kamcatki jazyki iscut rodstvennikov," Znanie-
sila, 42:1, 43-46 (1967).]
tion. Any language can be derived from a universal deep structure with omnip-
otent transformations. Thus the whole notion of syntax is rather limited if not
useless for classification. On the other hand, there is no doubt that syntax can
also be inherited. But it has not been possible to establish genetic relationship
purely on syntactic criteria. Whenever syntactic facts have been retrieved,
sound correspondences have also played a part (§§ 19.8-19.11). The fullest
treatment of the role of syntax in the question of language relationship (by
D. R . Fokos-Fuchs) comes to the conclusion that syntax alone cannot be used,
but neither should it be neglected. This is true, of course. The problem is that
syntax can be described so many ways, and for no language family do we have
commensurate syntaxes as a basis for further study. Take Indo-European as an
example. To prove genetic relationship by syntax alone one would have to
write a grammar for each language on exactly the same principles and show that
a different subgrouping from the use of other criteria would result. Then one
would have to show why this grouping is more valid than the others based on
different criteria. No such program has been carried out. Rather, all facts of
Proto-Indo-European syntax that have been discovered rest firmly on sound

correspondences as well. Note that in Figure 16-4 syntax enters the picture at
the lowest row, where it really counts, because it is connected with sound corre-
spondences. Indeed, it is here where evidence for genetic relationship is strongest,
and it is a serious mistake to think that proof is even better when sound corre-
spondences are discarded (compare§ 8.20). All levels of grammar are intimately
tied together, and we have seen that various grammatical facts can condition
sound change. There cannot be syntax without sound in the actual functioning
of the language. Thus the best target for genetic classification still remains the
middle of language. We have to compare higher levels of grammar, but not too
high, because then we get into universal grammar. To ensure that we do not
float too high, our units of comparison have to be anchored to the lower levels by
sound correspondences.
[16.11 Distant Relationship] 'Related' in linguistics means 'relatable'.

It is a positive term only, used when the comparative method demonstrates
connection. In cases where the method does not work, all that can be said is that
at the present time our tools do not cut deeper. Thus because the relationship
cannot so far be proved, one says that English and Chinese are unrelated. This
does not deny the possibility of ultimate relationship. Indeed there have always
been linguists who believe that all languages of the world are related-and
relatable. This then converts the classification into families into a vast problem
of subgrouping, but as far as the linguistic substance goes there is hardly any
difference. In recent years there has been a revival in the study of distant re-
lationship. This means applying the comparative method to some better estab-
lished families, and if sound correspondences seem to work out, relationship
can be postulated. Such hypotheses have been, for example, Indo-Semitic (Indo-
European and Hamito-Semitic), Indo-Uratic, and Ural-Altaic, not to mention
many cases among the American Indian languages. The Indo-Uralic hypothesis
looks particularly strong, because the agreement is very good in pronouns and
verbal endings, as well as in some basic vocabulary; for example, Uralic *nime
,..., Indo-European *nom!J > Finnish nime- ,..., English name and Uralic *wete ,...,
Indo-European *wod-orf*wed-en- > Finnish vete- ,..., English water. But all the
above families (and many others as well) have been combined into one super-
family called Nostratic, which reaches from the Sahara to Kamchatka. A table
of correspondences for the dentals looks something like Figure I 6-5 for a few
of the families (all units are actually reconstructed, but asterisks are given only
to the Nostratic labels). Korean has also been added to this roster, and then
Japanese to Korean. Language relationship is a transitive notion, and this is
why Japanese is related to English, if it is to Korean, and if Korean is related to
(Ural-)Altaic, and so on. Many scholars also believe that this family can be
spotted in the Americas as well, and several so-called cross-Bering comparisons
have been made (with little success). The Nostratic hypothesis rests on some 600
vocabulary items, and some of the cross-Bering connections have as much
substance behind them. This is much more than in many of the traditional
Hamito-
Nostratic Altaic Uralic Dravidian PIE Kartvelian Semitic
*t t- -t- t- -tt- t- -t(t)- t t t (t[-p])
1: •]
*t t- -d- t- -t- t- -t(t)- d t t

[· oJ
*d d- -d- t- -6- t- -t(t)- dh d d
G ·J
(t = glottalized, but Dravidian retroflex)
FIGURE 16-5. Table of the Nostratic dental correspondences. [After V. M.
Illic-Svityc, "Sootvestvija smycnyx v nostraticeskix jazykax," Etimologija
1966, 304-355, 401-410, Moscow, Nauka, 1968.]
American Indian connections. As for cross-Bering comparisons, anthropological

and archaeological evidence unambiguously indicates that North America was
settled from Asia over a land bridge which has existed from time to time between
Siberia and Alaska.
[16.12 Conclusion] Nothing has been said about areal classification of

languages, but it is not necessary, either, in this connection. There are two types
of areal classification: (1) mere geographic and (2) geographic with typological
similarity (convergence areas). No line can be drawn between the two types,
since geographically close languages are likely to share typological features, and
related languages can also be close both in geography and typology. The three
modes of classification can thus overlap extensively. 'Oceanic linguistics' is
geographic, genetic, and typological; 'Southeast Asian linguistics' is geographic
and typological at least (isolating tone languages), but genetic relationship has
not been established among all of them. We saw from the Indo-European dialect
map (Figure 15-2) that Greek and Latin differ on many points. For cultural
reasons, however, they are combined into a 'Classical linguistics'. Socially, the
American Indian languages share more or less the same position, and this is why
one speaks of an 'American Indian linguistics'. 'African linguistics' is also
largely genetic (Bantu) and typological. For cultural and historical reasons
there is now even an 'East European linguistics', and so on.
This chapter concentrated on the most elementary principles of language
classification, some of which were mentioned in previous chapters. It was regarded
more important to treat the principles rather than give classificatory lists, which
are easily available in handbooks.
REFERENCES
General: Humboldt 1970 [1836], Steinthal and Misteli 1893, Finck 1910, Horne
1966, Greenberg (ed.) 1963, 1966b, and in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11, Uspenskij
322 LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION; A SYNTHESIS
1965, Martinet (ed.) 1968, Graur (ed.) 3.493-682; 16.2 Robins in Sebeok (ed.)
1963f. vol. 11; 16.3 Hodge 1970; 16.4 Sapir 1921; 16.5 Greenberg 1954, Kroeber
1960, Householder 1960, Voegelin and Ramanujan and Voegelin 1960; 16.6
Lounsbury (personal communication); 16.7 Nida 1969, Nida and Taber 1969,
Alatis (ed.) 1968, Kazazis 1967, Uspenskij 1965; 16.8 Jakobson 1958, K.
Schmidt 1966, Skalicka 1967, Kuipers 1968, Greenberg 1969a, Hoenigswald in
Greenberg (ed.) 1963, Hodge 1970; 16.9 Brugmann 1884, Kroeber 1913,
Hymes 1959, Hjelmslev 1970, Haas 1966, Dolgopol'skij 1967, Martinet (ed.)
1968, Katicic 1970; 16.10 Fokos-Fuchs 1962, Teeter 1964; 16.11 Swadesh 1963,
Dolgopol'skij 1967, Illic-Svityc 1967, 1968, Martin 1966, R. Miller 1967; 16.12
The World: Fraenkel 1967, Martinet (ed.) 1968, Meillet and Cohen (eds.) 1952;
North America: Powell 1966, Boas 1929, Hoijer 1946, Pinnow 1964, Haas 1966
[1969]; South America: Loukotka 1968; Africa: Greenberg 1966a; Oceania:
Dyen 1965b; Europe: Lewy 1964, Bastian 1964; Soviet Union: Vinogradov (ed.)
1966f.-Current Trends in Linguistics (Sebeok ed. 1963f.) assigns the following
volumes to the following areas: 1 (Russia and East Europe), 2 (East Asia, South
East Asia), 4 (lbero-America, Caribbean), 5 (South Asia), 6 (South West Asia,
North Africa), 7 (Sub-Saharan Africa), 8 (Oceania), 9 (Western Europe), and
10 (North America).
CHAPTER 17
PHILOLOGY AND ETYMOLOGY
The chapter presents the parents of genetic linguistics-

philology and etymology. Genetic linguistics when con-
nected with the history and culture of particular speakers
is still as relevant as ever.
[17.1 Complementarity of Goals and Schools) Genetic linguistics grew

out of philology in the nineteenth century, and, in fact, in England the name
'philology' has remained in use for the former until our own day. In America
one can already meet students of linguistics who have never heard the term. The
purpose of this chapter is to reverse this trend and to show the place of philology
in genetic linguistics.
In philology, language serves as a means toward the understanding ofa particular
culture. Philology has been directed mainly toward written documents produced
by past cultures. It studies language as used by a people or an individual in a given
historical environment, the ultimate goal being the understanding of the human
aspects. Since the evidence is often fragmentary, one has to work with true
human probabilities. Genetic linguistics, on the other hand, elevated language
into an end in itself, and language change and reconstruction was studied as if
languages were independent organisms. When genetic linguistics gave rise to
descriptive linguistics, the separation between language and its users became
even more pronounced. Those who study language as an autonomous sign
system have strived to establish mathematical certainties and have accused the
philologists of 'losing sight of the reality'. The philologists also, even if they
acknowledge a certain usefulness in the 'linguistic exercises of symbolic logic',
maintain that this is after all not 'the true reality of language'. As often with
such scholarly controversies of taste and objectives of study, the underlying
reason is the complementarity of the aspects (as in units vs. rules, comparative
method vs. internal reconstruction, typology vs. description, and so on). Both
sides are justified and necessary, although this is not agreed to in either of the
partisan camps. In this unfortunate division, the Neogrammarian emphasis on
the independent linguistic side has led to a historical linguistics without history,
a development in which notational apparatus is taken as an insight into change
itself. Chapter 6 has all the machinery for this approach, although warning
was sounded throughout against this pitfall, which is ubiquitous (see § 9.2).
Because the basic principles were laid down by the Neogrammarians-and they
certainly deserve full credit-textbooks have unintentionally (one should hope)
led students into thinking that everything in genetic lingUistics has been done.
323
This is why restatements like those in Chapter 6 have enjoyed such an enthusiastic
reception; they look different, at least. At the opposite pole, the controversy led
to a historical linguistics that acknowledges only the human mind with its in-
dividual intuitions as the driving force of change. Linguistic change is just history
of the expressions of the mind, that is, art history in its widest sense. Grammar
is but part of literary history, which itself belongs integrally to culture history.
Aesthetics is the sole ruler of philology. This position is known as the idealist
school of linguistics. The appeal of the idealist position is reflected clearly in
the German term of abuse for the sterile mechanistic (Neogrammarian in the
negative sense) approach to language, Lautschieber, that is, 'sound shifter ' ,
known even among laymen. It has already been mentioned that this mechanical
approach is merely being continued as rule manipulation.
Polarization into opposite camps is quite common in the sciences. Two general
principles are mainly responsible for this, and A. Kaplan has called them (1) the
drunkard's search and (2) the law of the instrument. The first principle says that
it is easier to look for a lost key under a street lamp because "it is lighter there"
than where it was actually lost. And the second can be exemplified as follows:
give a small boy a hammer, and he will find that everything he encounters needs
pounding. It is indeed often good strategy to start the investigation "where it
is lighter"; and it is no wonder that the scientist formulates problems in such a
way that what is needed for their solution are those very techniques at which he
is most skilled. There is often considerable pressure from the scholarly community
or school as well. If the linguist is aesthetically inclined, he might see all of
language in that light; if he has been trained to observe sound shifts, he finds
this the most significant line to follow. On the other hand, if his background
encompasses rule writing, he finds mere rules everywhere and denies other
parts of language. We have all heard stories of doctors who always prescribe
the same medicine no matter what the ailment is. The beneficial effect of the
law of the instrument is that scholars can ride their ideas to the utmost, until
others pull them back. The danger is that one does not listen to others, but
brands them as unscientific (or something more colorful); the price for being
trained one way is trained incapacity to do things otherwise. It is clear that in
their behavior both the philologists and the formalists are identical. They have
different lamps and different hammers, but they certainly find that the same
objects need their pounding. Actually the philologists are rarely worsted in this
battle; the real stalemate is reached among different schools of structuralism
(including the generative-transformational approach) where the small-boy
behavior is strongest: the cry "My indoctrination can beat your indoctrination"
stands for "My father can beat your father," even when the hammers of both
parties chip away about as inefficiently.
Structuralism has not only pervaded linguistics, but also other areas connected
somehow with philology (ethnology, sociology, philosophy, and so on). Partic-
ularly influenced has been literary criticism, which has always been closely
allied with philology. The tendency to consider a literary work independently
of the total culture has been strong. Structuralism has now tended to become
PHILOLOGY AND ETYMOLOGY
synonymous with narrow-mindedness. The practitioners of this kind of struc-

turalism refer often to one of the main figures of the structuralist movement,
Claude Levi-Strauss. But Levi-Strauss has dissociated himself from this narrow
concept of structuralism; he sees no structural method in most of the works on
literary criticism that invoke structuralism. As there is no structural analysis
without constant leaning on ethnography, he cannot understand how one
could study a work within the framework of the structural approach without
having secured in advance all the information given by history, biography, and
philology for the interpretation. The analysis of literary works with the struc-
tural method illuminates much, but this method just adds to and does not
replace the traditional ones. An investigation that wants to be positive uses all
the possible methods and means. We should not fall prey so easily to pseudo-
philosophical nonsense. Here Levi-Strauss could be speaking for the linguists
as well.
It is highly important for a student of linguistics to be aware of this point,
because in most cases he will be drawn into one school of thought, and from
that perspective it is impossible to see splits in doctrine, for example, how
philology separates from genetic linguistics, and how both sides develop various
schools that feud among themselves. The eye and the fingernail develop ulti-
mately from one single cell, but what would an eye be without the rest of the
body? As in behavioral sciences in general, linguistic training should include
an appreciation of a great number of different techniques, and the linguist
should always be ready to ask himself whether it would not be better to use his
head instead of a formula.
(17.2 The Necessity of Philology and Its Reintroduction into Linguistics]

The simple truth is that philology and genetic linguistics need each other, if they
want to be relevant and to do justice to the complexity of a natural language
in its natural setting. The best results have been gained by those linguists who
can handle both sides. Serious mistakes have occurred when both parties have
taken the achievements of the other side at face value. To determine past lin-
guistic structures the linguist must use the most precise philology possible. He
cannot be content with mere philological approximations. He always needs the
most up-to-date philological achievements, especially if he works with "dead"
languages. Fortunately, at the side of a historical linguistics without history, a
modern philology has sprung up. Classical philologists used language as a key
to the culture and to its written documents. From the semiotic point of view
their main interest was pragmatic, the relation between signs and their users
(§ 1.16). Now anthropological linguistics and sociolinguistics have reintroduced
the human aspect to linguistics. The old priority has been partially reversed.
The speech community and the culture is used to understand linguistic variation
and change(§§ 1.18-1.20, 1.25; Chapters 3, 9), as was seen throughout Part II,
especially in Chapter 9. This is the sociolinguistic contribution. Anthropological
linguistics continues the priorities of the old philology by asking that linguistics
be relevant and explain something beyond mere language. Humanistic concern
is back where it belongs. Similarly, mathematics for the sake of mere mathematics
is of limited appeal in the humanities or other sciences, but as an aid it is rather
central. This does not deny the possibility of a mathematical study of language
or its usefulness, and many would indeed like to define linguistics this way.
But for genetic linguistics it would have little to offer, because language changes
when it is used by people.
[17.3 Philology As a Composite Puzzle) To see how linguistic evidence is

often not enough for interpretation, let us look at a hypothetical example
which comes close to many cases actually recorded in history. A stone inscription
is found in Asia Minor. Many scholars study a tracing of it, and ultimately
the following hypotheses are suggested for its interpretation : (1) it is a recipe
written in Oneida; (2) it is a recipe written in Lydian, a local language; (3) it
gives instructions to build a steam engine; (4) it gives instructions to build a
locomotive; (5) it is a sailor's letter home; and (6) it records a treaty between
two local communities. That the language should be Oneida is highly unlikely
on geographical grounds and the suggestion can be discarded right away. (If
the language is unmistakenly Oneida or Iroquoian, one would immediately
suspect a hoax.) In addition, cooking recipes are not normally inscribed in
stone. Instructions for a steam engine are theoretically possible, since the Greeks
toyed with them in Alexandria at least, but locomotives are completely unaccept-
able, since their origin is unambiguously recorded. Now, if we know that the
stone is a boulder that weighs three tons, it could not possibly be a letter, but
it could very well be a treaty. In order to unravel everything as far as possible
one would now bring to bear the method of epigraphy, as well as the history of
the area known independently from this document and any evidence from com-
parative linguistics, if the language would seem to have known relatives. The
cultural and historical aspects must match those of linguistics. When all parts
fit in perfectly, we have a solution. In essence this is simply what philology
is: the clearing of the channels of communication across the ages.
[17.4 Etymology As Prime Philology for Genetic Linguistics) A particular

branch of philology is etymology, the scientifically controlled study of the
histories of words. It is part of lexicology but is closely connected with genetic
linguistics, because any historical grammar or reconstruction must be based on
a careful checking of all the etymological equations. Etymology is a historical
undertaking par excellence with potentially unlimited appeal and value for the
culture historian as well. It is a good balance against isolationism in genetic
linguistics. A basic knowledge of it is a must for any student of language if he
wants to use etymological dictionaries in his own field efficiently, even if he
would not do reconstructions or etymological histories himself.
As a discipline etymology is older than Western linguistics, and it meant
literally the science of true meanings. It was incorrectly believed that the earliest
(ascertainable) meaning of a word was the only correct one. Change was looked
on as mere corruption, even though man was taken to be above the other
PHILOLOGY AND ETYMOLOGY 327
primates; that is, change was recognized and interpreted at will. After dialect
geography announced that each word has its own history, etymology received an
immense boost, although it has never returned to the mainstream of genetic
linguistics. But without it the groundwork of both historical grammars and
reconstructions is inadequate. In fact, the preceding chapters have included
considerable etymological detail, since etymology is the application of the
notions of Parts II and III to single words or semantic groups. In particular,
Chapter 7 (on semantic change) underlined the historical coincidences in
linguistic change, but this was no less true of analogy and borrowing which
characteristically affect single words. Etymology displays the same division as
historical versus comparative linguistics. Comparative linguistics gives us a
starting point for mapping rules that parallel historical change. Etymology can
concentrate on the origin of the word (counterpart to Part III) or its history
(counterpart to Part II). Both sides are complementary, not unlike the distinction
between units (starting points) and rules (derivatory history). Historical gaps
are often such that much of the history of a word is known but not its origin,
or else the origin is clear but the history contains uncertainties.
[17.5 The Role of History] Sometimes, through good luck, we have

historical attestation of the origin; this is most often true of relatively recent
times. Thus grog 'a mixture of rum and water' was named after Old Grog,
itself a metonymic nickname for Admiral Vernon (1684-1757), because he
wore a grogram cloak. Sandll'ich is likewise named after John Montagu, the
fourth Earl of Sandwich, who is said to have resorted to this kind of a meal
in order not to have to leave the gaming table. Russian vokzal 'railway station',
appearing first in print in 1777, derives from English Vauxhall, an enormously
fashionable pleasure garden and recreation spot near London, whose name
reflects Falkes Hall, after the thirteenth-century holder of the manor, Falkes de
Breaute. The difficulty lies in explaining how a word for 'pleasure garden'
could come to mean 'railway station'. For one thing, the English were world
leaders in developing and constructing railroads; for another, the architecture
of beer halls and early railroad depots was very similar, and railroad stations
have always been characteristic loafing places. This kind of exact historical
detail is usually lacking, even for very recent times; but it solves a difficult
etymological puzzle that would remain opaque indeed in the absence of such
detailed knowledge of history.
The most 'obvious' explanation can be wrong. Today many speakers would
explain bulldog as 'a dog that is like a bull', and by stretching one's imagination
one could find a certain similarity. History shows that the compound is not
iconic but indexical, because this kind of dog was bred for bull-baiting, a sport
that has died out. Russian samojed 'Samoyed' is not the obvious 'self-eater',
but rather represents Lapp Siime-jennam 'Lapland'. The Samoyeds once lived
west of the Ural mountains, and as late as the eleventh century they occupied
parts of the Onega region in Karelia. People and countries get named in a
rather "haphazard" fashion. Russia is named after the Swedes who founded
the kingdom; the original meaning of the form survives in Finnish Ruotsi
'Sweden' and in the place-names containing Roslags on the coastal area of
Uppland. This stretch north of Stockholm was a pol itical unit named Roslagen,
home of the expeditions to the East. All are derived from Old Norse r6psmenn
or r6jJskarlar 'rowers, seamen'. In a similar way Normandy in France is from
norpmenn 'northerners', a name that reflects another Scandinavian invasion
and settlement (A.D. 911). Similarly, France is named after the Franks, a tribe
of Germanic invaders, and Lombardy in Italy is a modern form of Langobardia,
named after the Lango bards ('long-beards'), a Germanic tribe that invaded
Italy and settled in the area (A.D. 568). Finland and Finn refer originally to
Lapps (compare OE finnas, Norwegian finner 'Lapps'; in addition, the word
Lapp is perhaps of Finnish origin). At times the transferred meanings are startling,
as in Modern Greek Romioi 'Greeks', derived from Roma 'Constantinople',
which became the capital of the Roman empire in 330.
The Finnish adjective santillinen 'punctual' would seem to be connected with
saanto 'rule'. There are many other pairs that differ in the length of the rad ical
vowel, for example, riilea 'cool',..., t'i!u 'cold, chill', riippua 'hang' (intr.),...,
ripustaa 'hang' (trans.) and kaappa,..., kapala 'paw'. The connection with
saanto becomes less certain with the revelation that dialects and older Finnish
also have santillinen, with a back vowel. This itself does not disqualify the ety-
mology, since there are pairs with both back and front vowels, for example,
raisu,..., raisy 'quick, boisterous', loka,..., loka 'dirt ', and tollo,..., tol!o 'simple-
ton'. But the base of the adjective seems to be an adverb santilleen/siintilleen
'at the proper time', and the correct explanation is obvious in terms of Catholic
Finland in the Middle Ages, when the calendar was known by the names of
the saints assigned to the days . The base form santti is a borrowing from Swedish
sankt, itself ultimately from Latin sanctus 'saint', and it survives in dialects in
folkloristic contexts. To do something santilleen meant thus to do it on the right
saint's day, at the right time. The base santtifsantti has in turn borrowed the
meaning of the adverb and adjective and means' a punctual or particular person'
(compare fast, Figure 7-4: C, § 7.9). Change of religion (the Reformation)
accounts for the loss of the base word in its primary functions; the connection
of santillinen and saanto has no historical foundation, although for many
speakers it might have some folk-etymological meaning (similar form, similar
meaning).
The European words for 'moustache' can be traced back to Italian mostaccio
in the West and to Greek moustaki (ou = [u]) in the Balkans. The word mustaks
[miistaks], apparently 'upper lip', occurs once in Greek (Plutarch, A.D. 100),
and once it was suggested that this might be the etymon of moustaki and the
Italian word; scholars have repeated this suggestion as though it were obvious
and self-validating, despite serious problems. Most importantly, there is no
way of relating the vowels of the first syllables; Greek mustaks, if borrowed
around the end of the first century, would have given Italian *mistacchi and
Greek *mistaki. When a scholar (Maher) was finally sufficiently bothered by
the difficulties and improbabilities of the standard etymology, and reinvestigated
the words, a much more plausible account was formulated. The Italian word
comes from mustum 'new wine', in a derivative mustiiceus 'wine-doused', a
name of a cookie as well as metaphorically of the moustache (attested in the
seventh century). The original meaning survives in the diminutive mostacciolo,
a spiced cake, and the Italian displays the formal scheme mosto-mostaccio-
mostacciolo. Greek moustaki is a borrowing from Latin and has originally
nothing to do with Doric nnlstaks 'upper lip', although the two words were
mixed up in the learned circles. Italian mostaccio survives only in a metaphorical
meaning, 'snout' (vulgar for 'face'). For the original meaning the Greek shape
was borrowed back as mostacchio or mustacchio (see § 8.8). This account fits
quite well with what we know about naming the moustache: culinary terms are
quite common, for example, soupstrainers. And of course borrowing back and
forth can occur; compare English sport, originally from French, which has
borrowed it back. That scholars make and keep false connections like the
mustaks etymology shows that they are human, and sometimes folk-etymologize
in the fashion of naive speakers (as in siiiint6/siintillinen above).
Apparently all languages have cases of the above kind (§§ 5.5, 7.8). Words
that derive from different sources can become psychologically connected, and
words that ultimately come from the same source can be completely separated
in the speaker's conciousness. A good case is dough "'jigurejjiction "' (para)dise
(§ 8.12). The original root *dheigh- meant 'mold, give shape'. In Germanic, it
gave dough (food preparation), in Iranian and Latin, 'to mold clay' (Iranian
*pari-daiza- 'molded around', that is, 'walled garden'). When these two words
finally reached English their meanings had already shifted, Persian through
Greek into a narrower, and Latin into a more abstract and general one. Knowl-
edge of earlier building practices is necessary to see that German Wand 'wall'
is likewise connected with winden 'to wind, twist', because mud walls had a
wicker frame armature (wattle) made out of saplings, willow, or the like.
It has become clear that evidence from the material culture, archaeology, and
history may be crucial in linguistic explanations (and vice versa, of course).
[17.6 The Adjustment of Origin and History to Each Other] One of the
objections of the classical philologists to genetic linguistics, which was becoming
independent at the beginning of the nineteenth century, was the neglect of syntax
by the linguists. Syntax was the central area for the Classicists, and language
was always studied in the context of full texts well integrated with the total
culture. Here they were completely right, as was shown by semantic change,
which depends heavily on both the cultural and the syntactic context. Let us
review another case where syntax and semantics meet. In general, the Latin
accusative is the case that is continued by the Romance nouns, or more precisely,
the oblique stem that had melted together with the accusative. In some instances,
however, the Latin nominative unmistakably survives, as in Italian moglie
'wife', uomo 'man', andre 'king'; and in religious meanings suora 'sister',
frate 'brother', and prete 'priest'. These words denote persons who occur
frequently as subjects in sentences, and as titles/vocatives; for both functions
Latin used the nominative in these words. Latin (nom.) serpensjserpentem (ace.)
'snake' survives in both cases in ltalian: serpefserpente. The first (the old
nominative) apparently derives from the biblical context of paradise. The snake
is admittedly not a person, but it is personal, since it speaks. Only the nominative
serpens occurs in the Vulgate. A few other words like lampa 'lamp', tempesta
'storm', and some (often foreign) birds like struzzo 'ostrich' also continue the
nominative, because the nominative survives as various types of subject. The
area where the Latin nominative is chosen for survival (see § 22.5) is the inter-
section of the syntactic notion of 'subject/agent' and the semantic notion of
'animacy'. To understand when personification like serpens > serpe and the
other cases take place, we need the total culture as the background : here, (I) a
religious literary legacy, (2) geographic distance from Africa and knowledge of
the distribution of fauna in the world, and (3) that natural phenomena occupy
subject position in Indo-European (wind, rain, lightning, and so on). All these
cases are examples of syntactic petrification, and such change can never be
predicted totally, nor is it ever perfectly regular (see § 7.13). Note also similar
splits from English, for example, the shade/shadow types (§ 5.8) and an adjective
like glad which occurs only in predicative position: I am glad, but not *a glad
boy. Thus it is not surprising that the fringes of a feature' animacy' (i.e., subject
position) would attract a few stray forms like lampa, tempesta, and struzzo.
Lampa goes with the natural phenomena and characteristically occupies the
subject position like tempesta and is thus different from other pieces of furniture,
and struzzo would occur more likely in sentences like 'The ostrich is a big bird
that lives in Africa', and so on.
Many scholars would derive serpe from an accusative serpem, which would
presuppose a Latin nominative serps or serpis. The object here is to push the
difficulties of historical derivation to the starting point (without caring what
happens there). Here the principle of reconstruction that says that protoforms
must be reconstructed in such a way as to allow a simple derivation of the
occurring forms is pushed too far. In this approach one relies blindly on the
sound correspondences, which makes the starting point (or protolanguage) a
repository of all the difficulties. These difficulties are expressed in a multitude
of coexisting forms. Whenever there is a formal problem of derivation, one
manipulates the starting point. Linguistic literature and even handbooks are
full of this shortsighted procedure, which is actually based on the implicit
assumption that there is only one kind of change, regular sound change in
phonetic environments. Germanic verbs cognate to can have a vowel between the
velar and the nasal against the 'regular' velar-nasal-vowel(§ 8.12). The problem
is within Germanic, which has both forms (typified by knowfcan ; compare
serpefserpente). The most widely encountered solution in handbooks recon-
structs a Proto-Indo-European shape *gona- (attested in Germanic) next to
*gno- (attested everywhere, Germanic included). Now the Germanic problem
is solved, but Proto-Indo-European has acquired a monstrosity ; linguists get
away with it, because the speakers cannot protest any longer. One has to use
typological expectations and synchronize both the origin and the history for a
maximal fit. As it happens, can is plainly an analogical formation; serps is not
only not attested in Classical Latin, it is extremely unlikely from the Indo-
European side as well. Now, the fact that Venantius Fortunatus, a fifth-century
author from Northern Italy, actually once writes serps cannot be taken at face
value. Given the literary prestige of Latin and the gap between it and the spoken
vernacular, both amply attested, it is very likely that Fortunatus is the first
recorded scholar' to make sense' out of serpe by creating the expected nominative
serps. This is a case of hypercorrection for him, since the mapping relations
between the two varieties were known to him. A sociolinguistic explanation
based on the attested tug-of-war between a prestige norm and a vernacular
colloquial form is superior to mere speculation about unlikely Latin words.
(17.7 Principles of Investigation (Some Rules of Thumb)] The question

arises: How much should one rely on hard-and-fast rules and sound correspond-
ences in identifying two words as etymologically identical? And how much
value should one put on each of the two sides, phonetic and semantic? The
answer is simple, although not very useful for application: the ingenuity of the
etymologist and his power of invention and combination cannot be replaced by
mechanical rules. The etymologist like any other archaeologist or historian
may stumble on his subject matter accidentally. Since chance and intuition
play such an important role, any kind of radicalism and narrow-mindedness is
even more dangerous than in other sciences. The playing chips are simply what
has been learned in the preceding chapters (Parts I-IV). A few guidelines can
be repeated here. One has to pay constant attention to three aspects: (I) phonetics
(sound correspondences), (2) morphology (word formation), and (3) semantics.
(I) and (3) correlate strongly with the comparative method, (2) with internal
reconstruction, as we saw above (Chapter 12). The following principles can be
listed:
I. If the apparent connection between two words contains phonetic difficulties,

the linguist should look elsewhere for a more economic solution. Often
indeed a better explanation is to be found; but the question is very subtle
indeed. We saw above (§ I 7.5) cases where history overran deceptively
obvious solutions with no phonological problems. To the contrary, many
scholars have not wanted to combine Germanic nut (OE hnutu) with
Latin nux, because the forms seem to be *knud- and *nuk-, respectively.
But if Latin is taken as *dnuk-, this is in metathesis relation with *knud-.
The forms could now be connected, although it is not clear which one
represents the original shape. In the same vein, Latin quattuor 'four' is
problematic both in its -a- and long -tt- in relation to the reconstructed
*kwetwor-, but still there is no reason to go and look for other connections
for the word.
2. Etymology has to satisfy the well-known rules of word formation; if there
are clashes, look elsewhere for a better solution. We have seen this principle
already in determining the direction of borrowing (§ 8.6), and in the
embedding of mostaccio in the derivational scale between mosto and

mostacciolo.
3. If in an apparent connection one must assume an unusual semantic develop-
ment, go back to I and 2, and often the solution is found there. Handbooks
traditionally treat Welsh blif 'catapult' as a cognate of Greek bd/16 'I
throw'. Semantically the change is in itself unremarkable, but such a
technical meaning in Welsh invites closer scrutiny. Since all the related
ballistic terminology is actually borrowed from Greek (catapult, ballist,
scorpion), in this case one would have to assume at least a Welsh loan
translation. Now checking the phonetic side, blif should come from
Proto-Indo-European *gw!emo- with a root shape *gw!e-. Such a shape is
nowhere attested; the Greek root comes from *gwe!a-. Further, a derivative
in *-mo- is not expected as a tool noun. Hence the best guess is that the
whole word is a borrowing from Greek. The best candidate would be a
Greek verbal noun blema 'throwing'. This, however, is attested late
(Euripides) and refers to a throw of dice only. Thus there is no certain
solution, but the assumption of borrowing is definitely the better hypoth-
esis, inasmuch as we know that there were Greek colonies in the South
of Gaul where the borrowing could have taken place.
4. If it seems that a word is guaranteed for the protolanguage, its (alleged)
absence in any of the daughter languages requires an explanation. A search
often finds the reason, or the missing form itself. The Indo-European
word for 'mouse' is missing in Romance. We know that Latin had musf
miiris, which should have given, for example, Italian *mure or *muro.
But these would apparently have clashed with the outcome of miirus 'wall',
which provides reason enough for replacement by talpa 'mole', giving
topo 'mouse'. The Indo-European words for 'kidney', German Niere
(OHG nioro), English kidney < ME (kid-)nere, Praeneste nefrones and
Lanuvian nebrundines, and Greek nephr6s warrant a base *negwhro-. It is
noteworthy that Latin is not represented, although two of its closest
relatives (Praeneste, Lanuvium) are. The Latin word is ren, generally
regarded as of unknown origin. But it has at least the same r-n as the
other words, and a metathesis *negwhro- > *regwlmo- > *reno- easily
shows how it could have happened. The vowel stem *reno- was then re-
placed by a consonant stem ren- by analogy to lien ' spleen', which is also
responsible for a by-form rien (compare nux above).
5. Various kinds of tests can be performed using a dialect map. For example,
if a word is somehow guaranteed for the protolanguage, adjacent dialects
should show the greatest resemblance. And if the word is not a loan, it
is likely to be paralleled in formation in one of the contiguous areas. In
short, studio etymologies often break down completely when taken to the
linguistic map.
(17.8 The Uniqueness and Complexity of Solutions) The cases presented

above are all rather simple or represent simple parts of bigger configurations
(note, however, the complexity of the 'moustache' case). But it is easy to appre-
ciate what the situation can be when all the change types and historical gaps are
thoroughly shuffled. One of the consequences is that each language has a
substantial number of unexplained words, and that certain words have many
competing explanations. The French word weekend is perfectly explained,
aveugle 'blind' has two candidates (Latin ab oculis 'off eyes', or a/bus + oculus
'white-eye'), and rever' to dream' has had some twenty-seven different suggested
explanations. Basically, however, only one can be correct, unless a certain
amount of contamination has occurred between two or more rival candidates.
When dictionaries have to list rival hypotheses, it would be commendable if
they gave an order of preference, but they rarely do. All dictionaries contain
mistakes or inadequacies, and the cases presented in this chapter were chosen
largely from among those that improve on the standard explanations. But even
if the reader knows the methods of genetic linguistics, he cannot solve questions
where he has doubts, because dictionaries cannot possibly give all the historical
and other information necessary for reinterpretation. It is interesting that there
has to be a certain amount of complexity as a challenge, before etymology
becomes palatable to the practitioners. Historical grammars use only the
perfectly clear cases, and the beginner might miss the point that these clear cases
provide the frame for attacking more complex problems.
[17.9 The Service of Etymology for Comparison) What has been shown
above is that etymology (and philology) form an integral part of genetic lin-
guistics, both in historical and comparative aspects. Etymological screening is
an obligatory prerequisite for reconstruction, to keep the protolanguage from
becoming burdened by the debris of our ignorance and high-handedness. The
elimination of English can and Welsh blif (and dozens of other similar forms)
as inheritances has a far-reaching consequence for Proto-Indo-European
morphophonemics. The corresponding roots are *gn6- and *gwela-, NOT *gona-
and *gwle-. A doubtful mechanism of alternation in the place of vowel within
the root, CeRC "' CReC, can be eliminated altogether. By adjusting the
starting points and the derivatory histories for a maximal fit, we get precision
for reconstructions (see§ 9.18).
Although experimentation is impossible in history, later independent finds
often confirm an earlier analysis (see§ 1.24). These take on the function of the
experiment in other sciences. In etymology, principle 4 serves this end. The fact
that the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European *negwhro- 'kidney' was found after
all, in a mangled form, in Latin ren reconfirms our faith in the predictive power
of reconstruction (see § 18.17).
[17.10 The Blending of Philology into Other Disciplines] One of the areas
of philology is textual criticism, which is also concerned with origin and deriva-
tion (history), but based on the text as a unit, not on the word(§§ 2.17, 2.18).
As a parallel from folklore we have the historic-geographic method of folklore
investigation, which studies folk tales (legends, games, riddles, ballads, and so
on). A large number of variants is necessary with many component parts. The
distribution of the components on the map and the internal seriation between
variants can give hints toward establishing an approximate original, its age and
place of origin, and the vicissitudes of the story. The similarity to dialect geog-
raphy is obvious-even the principle that each tale or item has its own history.
There is even a parallel in naming: areal linguistics is known as the Italian school
and the historic-geographic method as the Finnish method of folklore investi-
gation.
This short note is a final reminder that philology blends into nonlinguistic
aspects of culture. We must, however, content ourselves with this introduction
to the subject, having come full circle back to where we started the chapter
(see § 21.2).
REFERENCES
General: Breal 1893, Gamillscheg 1927, Hockett 1948a, Guiraud 1964, Ross
1965, Malkiel1968, Bakell968, Schulze 1966; 17.1 Kaplan 1964, Starosta 1969,
Garvin 1970, Vossler 1904, R. Hall 1963, Barthes 1967, Piaget 1968, Auzias
1967, Schiwy 1969, Ducrot 1968, Lane (ed.) 1970, Ehrmann (ed.) 1970; 17.2
Reid 1956, Hymes 1968a; 17.4 Szemerenyi 1962; 17.5 Malkiel 1968, Maher
1970c, Nirvi 1969; 17.6 Szemerenyi 1962, Maher 1969c, 1969d, R. Hall 1969,
Romeo 1969; 17.7 Breal1893, Szemerenyi 1962; 17.8 Malkiell968; 17.9 Anttila
1969b; 17.10 K. Krohn 1926.
CHAPTER 18
RECONSTRUCTING PHONOLOGY
This chapter is a complement to Part Ill, as it gives a

summary of the interlocking factors in the application of
the methods for reconstruction. It concentrates on how to
begin a reconstruction and how to polish it by assigning
phonetic value to the units.
[18.1 The Domain of Reconstruction] By now it has become clear that

there is a difference between the comparative method and linguistic reconstruc-
tion, which is often called comparative linguistics. The common term 'compara-
tive' is apparently the reason for widespread confusion among students. The
comparative method can be used for establishing a pandialectal grammar in a
synchronic setting, without any diachronic inference. It is the prime method in
reconstruction, of course, but not the sole one; in addition, internal reconstruc-
tion can be used (or sometimes must be used). Ultimately, actual reconstruction
must include considerations discussed in Chapters 14-17. The methods are
just general guiding principles and their results must be postedited in various
ways and adapted to other evidence or general (universal) expectations.
The comparative method has a rather curious relationship with reconstruc-
tion. In the case of obvious dialect cohesion, the corresponding sets of units have
synchronic reality and one does not speak of reconstruction. If, on the other
hand, the correspondences between languages remain vague, we can posit
distant relationship or borrowing, but reconstruction is impossible. The domain
of reconstruction is the area where relationship is neither too close nor too
remote.
[18.2 Matching and Correspondence] So far we have assumed that it is

relatively simple to segment and to know what sound corresponds to what.
But this is not always so easy, especially in the initial stages of reconstruction.
In the beginning everything is very provisional, because borrowings, analogical
creations, conditioning environments, and so on, can be detected gradually.
Thus what appeared to be clear correspondences at first glance are often not
exactly that. The term matching will refer to such tentative correspondences.
Thus when one starts looking to see whether English and French are related,
one works out matchings between them, for example, French z-English dz,
/-/, H, s-tS (§ 11.2), p-f (pere-father, poisson-fish), p-p (paterne/-paternal,
pure-pure), and so on. There are at least two occurrences of each, which makes
the matchings systematic or nonrandom. Of these only p-f would turn out to
335
be a real correspondence for reconstruction purposes; that is, both languages

have regular phonetic outcomes from a single phoneme in the protolanguage.
The other sets would remain as matchings, because they are due to borrowings
in English or in both languages (paternal). The value of matchings is that they
allow the linguist freedom for analytic operations without commitment to any
ultimate historical explanation. This is necessary, because the final explanation
is rarely (or never) apparent at the beginning.
[18.3] One way to start a reconstruction is to take some basic vocabulary

and to try to match every sound sequence systematically (at least two occurren-
ces). Let us use Gothic and Old English, the two" earliest" Vllrieties of Germanic
attested in texts, choosing the cardinals from one to ten as the basis. If sounds
cannot be matched within these numerals, additional material has to be brought
in from the rest of the vocabulary. If this additional material introduces sequences
which remain unmatched, further items must be admitted until the circle can
be closed so that every sequence recurs and no sounds remain unaccounted for.
For Gothic and Old English we can start out from
GOTHIC OE ADDITIONAL ITEMS

I. ains an } tains-tan 'twig'
II. twai twa
III. jJrija jJreo frija-freo 'free'
IV. fidwor jeower augo-eage 'eye', laun-lean 'reward'
dragan-dragan 'pull', land-land
v. fimf !if
VI. saihs siex wairs-wiers 'worse'
VII. sibun seofon filu-feolu 'much'
VIII. ahtau eahta aijJjJau-ejJjJa 'or', waila-wel 'well'
kalds- ceald 'cold ', haurn-horn
IX. niun nigon fisks-fisc 'fish'
X. taihun tien
There is always a danger of positing too many zeros for the matchings, and
this is why one can start with bigger sequences, for example, matching -ains
with -an in I. Here, however, ai matches a also in II, and n-n recurs many times
among the numerals so that a matching s-0 is rather obvious. But in III it is
better to match ija-eo, rather than i-eo + j-0 + a- 0 , or i-e + j-0 + a- o, and
so on. It is too early to find where such zeros fit in best. We can now extract the
following matchings:
I. 1. ai-a
2. n-n See pairs in VII, IX, and X
3. s-0
II. 4. t- t See pairs in IV, VI, and VIII
5. w-w
RECONSTRUCTING PHONOLOGY 337
Ill. 6. p-p VIII for jJ
7. r-r IV
8. ija-eo
IV. 9. f-f V, VII, IX
10. 6-e
11. au-ea [No matching for -id- and -eo-]
12. g-g
13. a-a
14. d- d
15. iu-eo kiusan-ceosan 'choose', triu-treo 'tree'
16. k-c
17. s-s VII and IX
v. [No matching for the medial. Closest material is nasal
followed by voiceless spirant]
18. VN-V munps-mup 'mouth' (see§ 4.16)
19. m- m lamb-lamb
20. u-u fulls-full, un--un-
VI. 21. ai-io
22. hs-x wahsjan-weaxan 'grow' and VIII
23. e-1£ merjan-miiran 'preach', swes-swiis 'one's own'
24. j-0
25. a-ea
VII. 26. U-0
27. b-b bileiban-belifan 'remain'
28. b-f
29. i-e lisan-lesan 'gather'
30. ei-i -leipan-lipan 'go' and IX for u-o
31. i-eo
32. 1-1
VIII. 33. h-h
34. au-a
35. ai-e
36. au-o saurga-sorg 'sorrow' and VIII
37. a-0
IX. 38. i-i [OE -g- cannot be matched with Gothic 0]
X. [Gothic -aihu- and OE -ie- remain unmatched]
Four pairs of elements could thus not be matched at all:
IV. -id- -eo-
v. -im- -i-
IX. -0- -g-
X. -aihu- -ie-
In spite of the obvious close relationship between Gothic and Old English four
sequences remain without a match. But, otherwise, the situation is clear: there
must be a genetic relationship underlying the matchings, and now one would
carry on with the comparative method to see which matchings can be combined
into one proto-unit. The great diversity of vowel matchings especially is due to
the various Old English umlaut phenomena, and it would eventually come out
that these matchings are indeed environmentally conditioned correspondences.
When the linguist starts to talk about correspondences he is already making defi-
nite historical claims (e.g., borrowings have been weeded out, clusters versus
single units have been decided, and so on).
[18.4] The ease with which one can establish a closed circle of matchings
within some kind of basic vocabulary is a quick practical measure both of the
degree of genetic relationship, and of the possibility of additional reconstruction.
Of course the significance of matchings depends on (I) the length of the words,
(2) the phonemic inventories, and (3) the number of words. If we have just a
few matchings in a few short forms or suffixes in languages with "poor" inven-
tories, we do not have a good case for relationship, and further comparative
work looks unpromising.
(18.5] Distant relationship is generally posited on the basis of matchings

that remain matchings. Let us check one case that has been suggested as a
possible instance of nonrelatability. Schleicher stated once that, with modern
(nineteenth century) evidence only, German and Russian could probably not
be shown to be related. These two languages do, however, have a certain similar-
ity of grammar that would make them better candidates for relationship than
German and French or Russian and French. Schleicher was, of course, stressing
the benefits of early written records for reconstructing the Indo-European
protolanguage. Let us now see what the situation actually is by taking the
500 most frequent words in Russian and German as a corpus (including German
words outside that list if they seem to match a Russian one in the list). These
words should include vocabulary items that are basic to the society in which the
language is spoken. Ignoring Russian palatalization and German voicing of
s or devoicing of g, we get (among others) the following matchings (note that
the glosses provide the same material between Russian and English as well):
RUSSIAN- GERMAN
I. t-d tam-dart 'there', brat-Bruder 'brother', ty-du 'thou', tri-drei
'three', togda-dann 'then', (e)tot-derfdies- 'that/this'
2. t-t stojat'-stehen 'stand', mat'-Mutter 'mother'
3. d-t den'-Tag 'day', segodnja-heute 'today'
4. d-ts sidet'-sitzen 'sit', desjat'-zehn 'ten ', serdce-Herz 'heart'
5. d-s voda- Wasser 'water', edim-wir essen 'we eat'
6. s-s syn-Sohn 'son', est' -essen 'eat', sidet'-sitzen 'sit', sest'-setzen
'set'
7. s-h segodnja-heute 'today', serdce-Herz 'heart'
8. i-g moino-mog!ich 'possible', leiat'-liegen 'lie'
9. ts-xt moc'-Macht 'power (might)', noc'-Nacht 'night'
10. p-f pjat'-funf 'five', pro-fur 'for', polnyi-mll 'full'
11. b-b brat-Bruder 'brother', ljubit'-lieben 'love', byt'-iclz bin 'be'
12. k-L' kto-1rer 'who', kotoryj-ll'elch 'which', kogda-1\'ann 'when'
13. r-v roda-Wasser 'water', dra-zll'ei 'two'
14. r-0 drer'-Tur/Tor 'door', twj-dein 'your'
15. l-l ljubit' -lieben 'Jove', lezat'-liegen 'lie', polnyj-mll 'full'
16. m-m moj-mein 'my', moc'-Macht 'power', mat'-Mutter 'mother'
17. n-n ne-nein/nicht 'not', nicto-nichts 'nothing', syn-Sohn 'son', nos-
Nose 'nose', nu-nun 'now'
18. r-r tri-drei 'three', pro-fur 'for', brat-Bruder 'brother', serdce-Herz
'heart'
19. e-e 6
20. a-u I, 2
21. o-a 9, 17
22. 0-0 I 0 and solnce-Sonne 'sun'
23. e-ai 17 and cel}j-heil 'whole', xleb-Laib 'bread'
24. e-a 3 and vera-wahr 'true'
25. u-i 11 and sjuda-hier 'here'
Not only do matchings occur among lexical items, but also in pronouns and
the like (which are short forms):
m- m- '1st sg.'
t-Jtt.:- d- '2nd sg.'
n- n- 'negation'
to- da-jde- '(th-) deictic'
k(o)- wa-Jwe- '(wh-) question'
-es' -(e)st '2nd sg. pres.'
-et -(e)t '3rd sg. pres.'
-em -en '1st pl. pres.'
-ete -(e)t '2nd pl. pres.'
We have confirmation of these matchings among basic vocabulary (kinship

terms, lower numeral, basic actions, and the like). There are also similar irregu-
larities, for example, the nasals in em-bin 'I am'; matchings in structurally
similar categories are strong evidence for relationship. The Jist of matching
items could be extended (e.g., novyj-neu 'new', mnoga-manch 'many', rabotat'-
arbeiten 'work', ljudi-Leute 'people', knjaz-Konig 'prince/king', volja-wollen
'wantjwiiJ ',all among the 500 most frequent words in both languages). Actually,
3 is an accidental matching of a kind that could not be spotted at this stage,
nor could many loans. Only those forms that are too similar betray borrowing
of some kind, for example, minuta-Minute 'minute', istorija-Historie 'history',
partija-Partei 'party', massa-Masse 'mass', plan-Plan 'plan', xarakter-
Charakter 'character', and so on.
[18.6] These matchings show that Russian and German are plausibly
relatable on the basis of contemporary evidence and that Schleicher was too
cautious. Indeed, a similar test between Russian and French also yields a
positive result, although a meager one. No actual reconstruction is readily
possible in either case, but the evidence for distant relationship is substantial.
Thus the matchings between Russian and German and Russian and French
give tangible reality to the possibility of ascertaining distant relationship even
in cases of languages with no recorded history.
Two ways of using basic vocabulary as the starting point of comparative
work have been presented. A third practical beginning is the glottochronological
list (the Swadesh Jist), whose items were originally selected so as to minimize
the likelihood of borrowings (§§ 22.13, 22.14). It gives the linguist two hundred
items among which matchings should show up, if they occur at all.
[18.7 The Method Deadlocked by External Forces] The above matchings

between Gothic and Old English were a promising start for further application
of the comparative method; those between Russian and German indicated
some limitation for further reconstruction, owing to the attrition of time, and
thus allowed us only the hypothesis of distant relationship without the possi-
bility of exact reconstruction. The method stalls because time has allowed too
many changes to accumulate. But typological constraints may in turn frustrate
the perfectly clear results of the method (see § 16.8). Let us look at a problem
in Tai linguistics. The typology of the Southeast Asian languages poses various
problems, but we shall observe two matchings in word-final position between
Saek, a language in the Nakhon Phonom area at the Laotian border, and
Siamese (Thai). Between these two, final n's match,
Saek ki~'
Siamese ki n 1 Iii~'
li n 4
vi~'
fo n 5
re~'
he n 5
vee~'
khwu: n 5
etc.
'eat' 'tongue' 'rain' 'see' 'hang up'

and, in fact, correspond, and one would reconstruct an *n. In addition, there
is also
Saek
pe~' rU~'
Siamese he n 5
hi n
va~'
fa n 5 1 Y"~' ruu~'
kh;n n 4
rJJ n 4
etc.
'civet cat' 'stone' 'slash' 'hammer' 'hot'

This set 1-n contrasts with n-n, and thus needs a separate label. Since Siamese
does not have final/ at all, *I would be the perfect choice. Certainly the outcomes
of both languages can unambiguously be derived from it. But such an */goes
heavily against the "areal grain," because no language has, or is known to have
had, a final -/ in the immediate typological area. Saek is completely alone in
having it. It is rather staggering to think that it alone would have retained the
*!. Although such inheritance is theoretically possible, it is typologically so
unnerving that some linguists have not taken the final step of making the
matching 1-n a correspondence. As a matching, it still waits for the ultimate
commitment of the linguists, a real explanation that fits best into the total
situation. One does not want to go against areal typology without some persua-
sive justification.
Internal reconstruction also can gradually clash more and more with typo-
logical expectations. In laryngeal theory (Chapter 12) we saw a very good
example of this: by multiplying laryngeals, the number of vowels could be
reduced to one, and in some analyses even to none. But here the method has
been pushed beyond the acceptable 'reality' of linguistic universals (for some
linguists), and linguists should be extra careful what they ultimately do in such
a borderline area where the method works fine but clashes with universals.
[18.8 Phonetic Reconstruction] The strict application of the comparative

method gives us units that contrast with other units, since the method groups
together all noncontrasting sets. But the linguist has to pick out the symbols
for the proto-units himself (Chapter 11 ). Two schools of thought have developed
as regards the reality of the reconstructed sound units. The one is the formulaist
(or algebraist) position, which accepts the abstract relational result of the method.
For the formulaists a reconstructed sound is merely an ideal notation with no
claim for perceptual reality; in fact, the reconstruction of parent forms is a
logical, not a historical operation. It is not reconstruction at all, merely con-
struction. The method gives us the network of phonemes with no phonetic
reality whatsoever. The other is the realist position, which can maintain that
reconstruction might even be so real that the vanished speakers would under-
stand most of it if there were a way to make such an experiment. As in so many
other linguistic controversies, the truth lies most of the time between the two
poles. Actually the positivist (realist) side wins clearly over the negativist
(formulaist); indeed, many of those linguists who maintain a negativist position
in theory are actually positivists in practice. On the other hand, positivists
sometimes have to acknowledge cases where only formulas can be posited,
because reconstructions are always full of gaps. When discussing Grimm's and
Verner's laws we started out from plain (voiceless), voiced, and" voiced aspirate"
stops, for example, *t, *d, and *dh (§§ 4.9, 4. I 0, 6.3, 11.3). The first two series
should be rather good approximations of the actual Proto-Indo-European
phonemes, whereas the phonetic features of *dh, and so on, have remained in
doubt. The notation (e.g., *dh) is a shorthand symbol for sets that contrast with
the other reconstructed series; in other words, in this spot the reconstruction
remains on the formulaic level. This exception is, of course, a challenge, and
linguists who do not want to leave the question unanswered generally assume
murmur as the distinctive phonetic characteristic; but this assumption is far
less certain than the guesses about *t, *d, and so on.
[18.9) In phonemic analysis one starts from phonetics to get to the pho-
nemes (Chapter 10). In reconstruction one often makes phonetic inferences only
342 LINGUISTIC RECONSTRUCTION; A SYNTHESIS
after the phonemes have been established, by relying on universal expectations

or naturalness of systems. This is largely due to the formulaic slogan that one
can reconstruct only phonemes. One also sees statements that the allophones
of the protolanguage are represented by all the noncontrasting sets of corre-
spondences between the daughter languages. This is, of course, a direct analog,
but need not be true of the protostage, although in some cases such an inference
seems to be correct. The Proto-Indo-European phonetic difference between
consonantal (R) and syllabic W) resonants apparently represents real allophonic
variation in the proto language (§§ 11. 7, 11.12, 11.14). The issue is so obvious that
most handbooks use allophonic writing for this. The reason here is that the
sets are phonetically different although they do not contrast when the method is
applied. Allophonic writing is a compromise between the two aspects (phonetics
and noncontrastiveness).
[18.10] One should note that phonetics has great heuristic value in the
actual analysis, that is, in the application of the comparative method. Sets
that contain the same or similar sounds are likely candidates for inclusion into
the same protophoneme. We saw this in the Germanic reconstruction (§§ 11.5-
11.7), where sets were arranged according to the phonetics contained in them.
We saw also that this phonetics helped determine the choice of the symbols
for the reconstructed units. This is the general approach in reconstruction.
Phonetics does enter into the initial stages in an implicit manner, and as a final
touch to the reconstruction one returns to it explicitly. In phonetic reconstruc-
tion, as in any other kind of reconstruction, one tries to minimize the steps in
derivation. For derivation one needs the subgrouping (family tree), and this is
why phonetic reconstruction must be done as a final touch. One simply distributes
the actual phonetics of the sets of correspondence to the proper branches of the
tree. Figure 18-1 shows a family tree for four languages. A set of correspondences
A-B-C-D has been aligned with the proper branches. But before we can proceed
we have to paraphrase briefly two basic principles of the algebra of classes,
namely, Boolean algebra.
Here we need only the basic notions of addition and multiplication of classes.
If we define a class that contains all women, and another that encompasses all
Americans, the addition of the two yields a class that contains either women or
Americans. If we let A represent the class of all women and B that of all Ameri-
cans (Figure 18-1 ), we can present the sum of them as in stage 2, A + B. There
is an overlap in the middle-obviously those members that belong to both
classes, who are both American and women. This overlap is the product or
intersection of the two classes. Addition is an either-or relation, multiplication
both-and. The peanut-shaped shaded figure A + B represents the sum of the
two classes A and B. The checkered elliptical leaf shape in the middle is the
intersection. The two facing crescents represent non-American women (hori-
zontal lines) and American men (vertical lines), but the crescents are part of the
sum. A sum need not contain an intersection; for example, the sum of a class
of all stones and all songs is a class with either stones or songs, without any
(A+ B)(C +D)
3. Intersections
(both-and)
2. Sums (either-or)
1. IIW,., -"' -''' -~1Starting points

FIGURE 18-1. Application of Boolean algebra in the reconstruction of
phonetics and semantics(§ 20.7).
intersection. It seems that all students are implicitly aware of these Boolean
notions of addition and multiplication; the former gives disjunctive definitions,
the latter conjunctive. The phoneme as a family of sounds, say English /k/ as a
class of [k, K, kh, and so on] (see§ 10.2, Figure 10-1), is disjunctively defined:
fk/ is either [k] or [k'] and so on, that is, a sum. Conjunctive definition gives
the bundle of distinctive features; that is, /k/ is an intersection of [voiceless],
[velar], and [closure] (both-and). Striving after conjunctive definitions is central
to linguistics (see§ 20.7).
Now we are ready to go back to stage 1 in Figure 18-1 and the set A-B-C-D.
Let us assign the value p-f-p-b to it, which is simple enough for exemplification.
When one ascends the tree one takes the sum of what occurs below for each
node. Thus for stage 2 we get A + B and C + D. The shaded areas represent
now: horizontal-line crescent = [closure], checkered leaf= [labial] + [voice-
less], vertical-line crescent = [friction], rising-line crescent = [voiceless], dia-
mond-checkered leaf= [labial] + [closure], and falling-line crescent = [voice].
But we need not dissect this far because we need just the sums. Since the tree
continues higher up, we carry both sums to the next node (for better legibility
we round off the peanut shapes into circles). When we reach the top node we
take the intersection of A + B and C + D, the shaded leaf shape, which means
[labial] + [closure] + [voiceless], that is, *p. The right-facing crescent ([fric-
tion]) and the left-facing one ([voice]) were discarded. The result is the obvious
one, obtainable through intuition, but Boolean algebra makes it explicit. Because
the method handles one protosound at a time, it does not give the answer all
by itself. One still has to consider each intersection in relation to other intersec-
tions; that is, the contributing factors are (1) subgrouping, (2) intersections,
and (3) relations between intersections. The last point allows a considerable
share in the decision making to typology and language universals, so mere
Boolean algebra can be overweighed (compare the Saek-Siamese case).
[18.11] Let us assume we have a case of three languages that show a set
g-r-h. Let us consider three possible trees:
1/A
g r h
In case I it would come to an intersection right away. If r is assumed to have
been uvular [R] at an earlier point, it could be derived from [y]. Continuancy
wins (2 to I) over closure; the best candidates are *y or *g (voicing also wins
out 2 to 1). Now we would have to look at other intersections. If there is one
with voicing, closure, and velarity, that one has a better claim for *g, and we
pick *y for this one. Each language requires now a single step, Verscharfung (g),
'rhotacism' (y > r), and devoicing (h). In case II continuancy occurs over the
deepest split which makes *y more likely at the outset, and in III velarity has
the same position making *g a good candidate, since spirantization would
occur only once in the subgroup r-h. Here we see clearly the importance of
comparing the intersections. In every case if there exists another set with (velar)
stops throughout, *y must be chosen for g-r-h.
[18.12] If no obvious intersection is obtainable, as between p and fJ (if

such a set occurred somewhere), phonetic reconstruction would have to be based
on typological guesswork. Such guesses may of course turn out to be rather
accurate. The Russian-German matching no. 12, k-v, would seem to be with-
out an obvious intersection. Thus one might try to posit a straight combina-
tion *kv as the starting point. This of course is the intersection, because the
unit is both k and v, and the result comes rather close to the ultimate Proto-
Indo-European reconstruction *kw. Further, k and v are not as incompatible
as it would seem at first blush, since Finnish has paradigmatic alternation
between them in one environment at least(§ 10.13). In short, one can say that
the assignment of phonetic value to the reconstructed proto-units plays an
important role in establishing "reality," but it does not add anything to the
relational network. Both the positivists and the negativists are right.
[18.13 Phonetic and Internal Reconstruction] Phonetic inferences are also

possible in internal reconstruction. Greek has the following stop sets (columns):
p t k p before (a, o, consonant)
p t k t (i, e)
p t k k (u)
Internal reconstruction gives an invariant starting point for each set; for the
first three there is no problem, and thus the fourth one cannot use any of the
A
lp, t, kl. It contrasts with all of them. It would seem that a coarticulated *lkPI
would be the best guess. If areal constraints would make that unlikely, one
would perhaps resort to a labiovelar * lkw l (which it is in Indo-European terms).
When all the normal stop positions are already occupied, one can use a" blunt"
intersection of the features (compare Russian-German k-v, reflexes of the same
proto-unit). Phonetic reconstruction can also aim at an intermediate stage
between the starting point and the surface variation. In Finnish consonant
gradation (involving single stops), we have the following alternations:
p-v t-d k-fJ
p-m t-1 k-j
t-r k-v
t-n k-y
All are environmentally conditioned within each articulatory set, justifying
thus reconstruction of *p, *t, and *k. But the weak grade diversity is now a
perfect target for Boolean algebra with phonetic features, as exemplified above.
The basic features labial, dental, and velar are given "from above" (first
columns), and this leaves us with two others to be worked out. Zero (in k-0)
has no phonetic feature, so it has to be excluded. All other outcomes share voice,
and all except d continuancy. A single exception is outweighed by the otherwise
perfect regularity, and the intersections of the three features give us *jJ, *o, and
*y. The assumption of such a unified stage of the weak grade gives a natural
phonetic explanation for the various assimilations yielding the attested sounds.
The labial *jJ assimilates only to the labial nasal m, but not to preceding liquids,
because of the greater articulatory difference. The dental *o assimilates also to
the liquids, because both share articulation in the dental region. The velar
*y assimilates to flanking lip-rounding, because [y] and [u] have quite similar
tongue positions, and also to flanking dental-palatal tongue position (j = [y]),
and is lost elsewhere. Ultimately, then, all such spirants merge with other
continuants (v, I, r, j, and nasals).
The only sore spot in this analysis is the stop d. But we here have the possibility
First stage p t k
Second stage P
A B
tl\d(h)) (\
k y( g(h))
Third stage
/A
p m v t d
I r 0 1 n r j
/~
v k 0
FIGURE 18-2. Derivation trees for Finnish consonant gradation.
v j lJ
of checking our inferences (see §§ 11.8, 11.9). If possible, one should always
consult any earlier evidence, and earliest Finnish records show that d was a
spirant, written dh or d, and that instead of a v for the velar *y there was a
written g!z or g. In fact, one Western dialect still retains [o] for d; some other
Finnish dialects do not have d at all; instead various "continuants" occur
(j, v, I, flap f) or else 0. The variant d of Standard F innish is thus a late spelling
pronunciation (on the Swedish model). We have been able to posit a unified
phonetic stage for the weak grade and get the relative chronology given in
Figure 18-2. (The outcomes of the second-stage spirants do not necessarily
represent direct continuations as seemingly implied by the lines. Some are no
doubt transition sounds filling the gaps left by the loss of the spirants. But such
transition sounds generally observe "natural phonetics" from the environment.)
(18.14 Inverted Reconstruction] The derivation trees for the Finnish

consonant gradation show one interesting fact. To get at the voiced spirants
(the right-hand nodes in the middle row), we used information "from above"
(first row) and "from below" (third row). One speaks of reconstruction when
one makes inferences from below into earlier stages, and of inverted reconstruc-
tion, if there is evidence from a higher node with respect to the one which is our
target. Thus in reconstructing Proto-Germanic, information from Proto-Indo-
European reconstructed on a wider scale may prove very useful indeed. Such
inverted information is always used when our target of investigation is a lower
node in an otherwise rather well-established family tree; e.g. in trying to retrieve
Pre-Greek we use the attested Greek evidence plus our expectations from Proto-
Indo-European. We see also that inverted reconstruction is part of what is
known as confirmation, or comparative checking, with further independent
material. But since this evidence is drawn right into the primary analysis, it is
of course not called checking. When it was said that Latin serps is highly unlikely
from the Indo-European side (§ 17.6), a principle of inverted reconstruction
was being used. It is natural that such triangulation from above and below will
often lead to a correct solution that would otherwise have taken much more
labor, if it were possible at all. The unmatched sets between Gothic and Old
English(§ 18.3) can be explained quite easily in terms of Proto-Indo-European,
through the reconstructions *kwetwores '4', *penkwe '5', *new~ '9', and *deKf{!
'10'.
(18.15 Overall Conclusion on Reconstruction] Chapter II and many other

sections have already shown how one continues with the method after some
initial indication of success. All this cannot and need not be repeated here. It
has also become clear that the mere mechanistic method is never the ultimate
goal, although it is a valuable guideline and often all we have to go by. Figure
18-3 characterizes the reconstruction process in a flow-chart form. Such a
chart is very approximate only, and here resembles corporate structure charts
more than computer programming. The main point is perhaps the optimization
of the match between units and rules. Here one often has to go back and forth
Sets of basic vocabulary items

with rather strict meaning
requirements
~
Do matchings or sound KNogenetic
correspondences emerge? elationship
Yes l
K
Unit reconstruction
Apply the mechanism of Fig.l3-3.
Is it possible to reach units in a Distant
0 straightforward way (clear
relationship
environments, etc.)?
~----------------------
Next simple unit solution
Yes~
--
Rule Formulation No
Can all the daughter forms be ~
mapped easily in definable

environments from the
reconstruction? Continuing No
Yes l
Devise the simplest set of rules
0 and incorporate them with a
corresponding family tree
~ Additions
Any universal/typological Yes
constraints (areal, ~ Filling gaps
physiological, etc.)
Yes I !No
Subtractions
Protoforms (units), rules and relative
chronology, and the family tree
Output
FIGURE 18-3. Flow chart for the basic steps in the reconstruction procedure.
between steps 3 and 4; step 6 also participates in this extensively. The most
eloquent example of this has been the etymological adjustment of origin and
history of an item (§ 17.6).
(18.16 Analysis and Analogy] By now we have seen enough of analysis

to make it profitable to return to the notion of analogy (Chapter 5). This is
particularly enlightening in connection with internal reconstruction, because it
occurs within one language, as most analogical creations do (if borrowing is
discarded ; see § 9.2). Typically the linguist tries to pull aberrant forms back
into a unified pattern. Thus we have had the following configurations :
STRAIGHT SETS VARIA NT SETS

English (sg.) m p s f f () s
(etc.) vs. (etc.)
(pl.) m p s f v 0 z
Finnish (nom.) m p v r p t k
(etc.) vs. g (etc.)
(gen.) m p v r v d
Greek m p t k p
m p t k (etc.) vs. t
m p t k k
We have also seen how the "aberrant" members could be unified under one
"expected" invariant unit. If the" straightened-out" unit clashes with a previous
straight one (e.g., English f-v as *f clashes with f-J, which should be an *f by
better rights; the same is true of Finnish p-v as *p, or Greek p-t-k as either
*p, *t, or *k), one has to choose other labels, for example, English *j2 , Finnish
*p2 , and Greek *kw, where the numbers can then be interpreted with different
chronology, and so on. The above tabulation shows the same relational setup
as analogy, which also attacks forms that get out of line, for example, English
fowozf oaths is being replaced by fow9s/ (analogy, of course, does not provide
subscripts). This proportion in analysis is of course one side of the proportion
in change (see§ 9.2). The difference is that the linguist gets a historical pre-form,
whereas analogy gives a new synchronic form. Analogy is future-oriented,
internal reconstruction past-oriented. But both are based on clashes between
morphemic and semantic structure (see§ 9.19).
[18.17 Analysis and Psychological Reality] The previous section leads

us finally to the difference between history and synchronic reality. Psychological
reality has become the ultimate justification of linguistic analyses, and it is
indeed a fine goal. The problem, however, is that it is not really workable in
linguistics, because so far we know hardly anything about it. It seems to be to
some degree an individual matter. Clearly the boundary between history and
synchrony is different for different persons. It seems that most English speakers
do not connect bleak and bleach synchronically, although the connection
between speak and speech is more apparent. The alternations in bake and batch
are quite compatible, although now most speakers store these items separately.
Internal reconstruction rakes up all such possible connections, whereas speakers
give them up much more readily than linguists usually believe. This is not just a
peculiarity of English (e.g., drink/drench, sing/singe, cook/kitchen, and so on),
but it is quite general of linguistic change (see § 6.24). When such pairs are
pointed out to "na'ive" speakers, their native linguistic reality is likely to change
at one blow to incorporate such new information. Memory or brain storage is
on a much more extravagant scale than we would like to think; even the most
"obvious" cases can be stored separately. Many examples could be cited from
various languages, but the following one from Modern Greek is one of the
clearest. A linguist (Kazazis) had been speaking Greek as his first language for
some thirty years and had practiced linguistics for some ten (in the United
States). He had never made a conscious connection between peto 'I fly' and
peto 'I throw', although the two verbs have identical conjugational paradigms.
Then it came to him in a flash that the second peto is obviously a causative of
the first, i.e. 'I cause to fly', and that formally it is one and the same verb. This
also shows admirably how the difference between homophony and polysemy
rests ultimately with the individual speaker (see Figure 7-4: C, §§ 7.9, 9.3).
Here a case of homophony became instantaneously one of polysemy, both V.
Linguists of various language backgrounds repeat such experiences all the
time, and it reveals an interesting fact: once you have linguistic training, you
spoil your native intuitions as a normal naive speaker, and you cannot write a
psychologically real grammar for a normal speaker. Linguists are not normal
speakers when they write grammars (see§ 6.15). On the other hand, if you are
a naive speaker, you cannot write grammars at all. This is why a psychologically
real grammar may be quite impossible to achieve through introspection (see
§§ 1.10, 6.25), and psycholinguistic tests have not yet contributed anything. Then,
too, perfect history without gaps is certainly beyond our grasp. We are lucky
in that in spite of this, linguistics, especially genetic linguistics, passes for the
most exact humanistic science (see § 1.24).
It has been emphasized throughout this book that history provides extra
complications for analysis, leading to the frequently heard dogma that no firm
conclusions are possible in historical and comparative linguistics. This is totally
misleading. If it is true that all languages are fundamentally alike (Chapter 16),
then it cannot be questioned that philological linguists are in a position to
reconstruct some of the intuitions of native speakers long dead (see Chapters 7,
17, 20). On the other hand, serious mistakes can be made by linguists (who
presumably have native speaker intuition) in writing the grammar of their own
language, because the grammar one writes is limited by the grammarian's
ability to recall and recognize all the relevant variants of, fo r example, a common
sentence type. Thus sampling error interferes as seriously with the correctness
of a (say, generative) grammar as of a comparative grammar. The difference is
one of degree only, not of principle, and consequently all of linguistics has to
use the same methods in parallel situations (see Figure 1-7).
REFERENCES
General: Bonfante 1945, 1946; 18.2 Dyen (private communication), Swadesh

1963, Schramm 1967; 18.7 Gedney 1967; 18.8 Allen 1951, Hoenigswald 1965;
18.11 R. Hall 1960; 18.13 Hoenigswald 1960b; 18.14 Hockett 1958; 18.16
Bolinger 1968; 18.17 Hass 1969, Raffier Engel 1970, Maher 1970a, Jucquois
1970, Katicic 1970.
CHAPTER 19
RECONSTRUCTING GRAMMAR
A few characteristic possibilities of grammatical recon-

struction are discussed as partial case studies. The ultimate
prerequisite for grammatical reconstruction-the use of
total grammars as the starting point-is impossible in an
introduction.
MORPHOLOGY
(19.1 Morphology As Applied Phonology] Relatively little need be said

about reconstructing morphology in this introduction. As it will turn out, the
basic procedure has already been dealt with; comparative morphology is simply
applied phonology. Of course, it must be remembered that the reconstruction of
phonology is not possible on the basis of mere sound, since meaning plays an
equally important role. Because comparative phonology is based on a triangula-
tion from sound and meaning into grammar (see Figures 1-1, 1-2), it is quite
natural that it leads into morphology, since words are generally used to begin
with. Observing the right sequence of the sound correspondences, we have to
reconstruct Proto-Indo-European *esti 'he is', *bhero 'I carry', and *ago 'I
drive' (Figure 11-6). Other verb forms would follow with equal facility, *esmi
'I am' and *bhereti 'he carries', and so on for dozens of other verbal and
related nominal forms. Once we have enough such forms we can more or less
forget how we got them and apply normal linguistic analysis, which is of course
language-internal. By contrasting forms and meanings one tries to see whether
these forms can be cut into smaller units; for example, the setup
'BE' 'CARRY'
1st sg. esmi bhero
3rd sg. esti bhereti
provides at once a third singular *-ti (see also Sanskrit aniti, § 12.5) and a first
singular *-mi. In this partial paradigm of 'carry' the subtraction of *-ti leaves
a stem *bhere-, but additional evidence would show that the root here is just
*bher-, so that *bher-e- is the present stem. Now, whenever this *-e- occurs,
the first singular is *-o and not *-mi; *o is a morphophonemic alternant of
*-e- (as *e "' *o ablaut), which leaves length as '1st sg.': *bher-o-H (*-o- also
occurs in 1st pl. *bher-o-mes and 3rd pl. *bher-o-nti). Because of the a-a corre-
spondence in the perfect, for example, Greek oida: Sanskrit veda 'I know', one
351
can further identify the *Has probably or possibly *A (see § 16.3). Chapters 10
and 12 have already shown how morphophonemic analysis, alias internal
reconstruction, combines morphs into invariant morphemes, or even into
canonical forms such as by rewriting *estt as *Eesti (with an initial consonant;
§ 12.4).
[19.2] This normal analysis now yields morpheme boundaries and the
sequences of morpheme slots, for example, *es-ti, *bher-e-tiwith ROOT + [e + ]ti.
We get systematic inferences about morpheme order, that is, word internal
syntax. There is always the danger than any particular combination of morphemes
never occurred in the protolanguage, even if it is present in the daughter lan-
guages. But it still means that our sequenltial formula for combination is valid,
since it must be responsible for the independent combinations in these daughters.
The problem here is that reconstruction is always positive; we have no sure way of
reconstructing the absence of something, ~:xcept for trivialities like being certain
that there was no word for airplane in Proto-Indo-European.
This is how one continues the reconstruction of morphology. It is simply
internal reconstruction and normal synchronic linguistic analysis, once the
comparative method has provided enough substance to be handled. The differ-
ence from synchrony is that the results are far less certain, but in the previous
chapter it was pointed out that even synchronic analysis often violates native
psychological reality. Again we have reached a juncture with direct access to
descriptive linguistics; those who want to brush up their knowledge oflinguistic
analysis have to refer to the references given (for§ 1.1).
(19.3 Relative Chronology and Morphological Types] In addition to

relative chronology of individual sound changes, inferences can be made about
the relative age of whole morphological categories. With a combination of
variation and productivity one can often reach at least tentative conclusions.
A comparison of short selections from English and Finnish will exemplify the
method. English has the following ways of deriving verbs from nouns or adjec-
tives:
A. red redden B. foul defile
fast fasten doom deem
loose loosen full fill
soft soften whole heal
c. wreath wreathe smoke smoke
glass glaze cause cause
safe save brush brush
free free
D. fish fish cool cool
color color an X to X
Types A-C are no longer productive; type D is, with no formal difference
RECONSTRUCTING GRAMMAR 353
between noun and verb. Similarly, nominal derivatives like song from sing and
bond from bind are unproductive as opposed to nouns like a run, a slip, and so
on. Suffixes like gift from give, birth from bear, and filth from foul, are also
limited in their range of combination. Among causatives an unproductive type
E contrasts with an analytic one F:
E. drink drench F. laugh make laugh
sit set run (make) run
lie lay X make X
fall fell
In fact, the synchronic connection between the columns in E has broken down
and is purely historical. The analytical type is unlimited (e.g., make sit, and
make lie). In English, then, generally, the more productive a type is, the less
variation or fusion it has. The plural formations repeat this principle, for
example, ox-en (A), mice (B), calve-s (C), and faith-s (D). Calves has the analytic/
agglutinative plural marker, but the variation f"' v and the unproductivity of
it makes the type older thanfaith-s, for example. Note that by the same token
warmth should be later than filth, for example, because it has less variation than
the latter (-th normally carries umlaut). It should be one of the last forms
created before the suffix lost its productivity altogether.
We have, of course, seen (§§ 4.2, 4.5) how the umlaut and other alternation
phenomena are almost always due to the loss of a suffix (B, C). Now we can
also match type D a fish-to fish with a plural type a sheep-many sheep. There
is no alternation and no suffix. Is sheep then a recent type also? No, because it
is not productive. It is peculiar to a few animal names, particularly in hunting
or catching situations; that is, they are now virtually mass nouns like water.
This is a semantic area that correlates well with earlier "cultural" practices.
[19.4] In contrast to English, Finnish does not have a scale that equates
alternation with non productivity:
A. NOUN VERB
sy!ke- 'saliva' sy!ke- 'spit'(§ 10.13)
tuule- 'wind' tuule- 'blow'
kuse- ' urine' kuse- 'urinate' (§§ 8.3, 9.3)
tuke- 'support' tuke- 'support'
su!a- 'liquid, unfrozen' su!a- 'melt'
lohko- 'portion, section' lohko- 'split, partition'
tahto- 'want' tahto- 'want'(§§ 4.23, 10.13)
B. STEM 1 STEM 2
sure- 'to mourn' sur-u- 'sorrow'
pure- 'to bite' pur-u- 'chewed pulp'
sana- 'word' sano- 'to say'
liittii- 'to join' liitto- 'alliance'
pit-kii- 'long'(§ 6.10) pite-X- 'to become longer'

pakka- 'pack' pakka-X- 'to pack'
tiiyte- 'full' taytta- 'to fill'
jiiii- 'to remain' ji.i-ttii- 'to leave'
C. NO CONSONANT GRADATION
peti 'bed' pupu 'bunny'
muki 'mug' /aku 'licorice '
auto 'car' kapu ' captain'
D. VOICED STOPS AND CLUST:ERS

jodi 'iodine' (§ 10.12) abbedissa 'abbess·
grogi 'drink' (§ 17 .5) struktuuri 'structure'
jobt'job' frekvenssi 'frequency'
geeni 'gene' ogglutinaatio 'agglutination'
E. DOMAIN PERFORMER ADJECTIVE GLOSS

kritiikki kriitikko kriittinen 'critical'
epiikka eepikko eeppinen 'epic'
etiikka eetikko eettinen 'ethical'
/ogiikka /oogikko /ooginen 'logical'
-VCVV- -VVCV- -VVC(C)-
Finnish has a rich derivational apparatus, a few instances of which are given
in B, without indication of the direction of derivation. In general, nouns and
verbs, verbs and causatives have different stems. ln opposition to this type we
have A, which is a curious anomaly indeed; there is no difference between the
nominal and the verbal stem. We have already seen, however, that the verbs
show consonant gradation in some cases where the nouns do not (§ 10.13).
Otherwise consonant gradation prevails in A and B, but is absent in C, where
the meanings represent objects of material culture (typical of loans), slang words,
and hypocoristic words (second column). Type D is characterized by much
more technical semantics (plus some slang: jobi) correlated with the phonetic
peculiarity of voiced stops and complicated consonant clusters. Such stops
belong only to innovative dialects and are not used by all social or regional
dialects. This type is thus a clear newcomer. And so is E, which displays the
most complicated kind of alternation in which consonant length is coupled
with vowel length (except that voiced stops do not alternate). The extremely
technical meanings point to recent date, and the type is productive for such
Greek terminology.
The Finnish situation thus shows relative growth of suffixing (A to B) and
lessening of consonant gradation (A and B to C), as well as formal features
which are integrally tied to the functioning of the language (D and E-a kind of
derivational consonant gradation with gratuitous vocalic complications as well).
Although much in the evaluation of both English and Finnish alternation
matches, there are some characteristic differences. First of all, the existence of
alternations or derivatory suffixes alone does not guarantee the chronology.
One also needs information on productivity and semantics. English started
with stem variation and ended up without it (a fish-to fish, D), Finnish is the
reverse (A is clearly a relic, the list here including practically all the existing
stems of this type). In the plural, however, English showed an old type without
variation (one fish- two fish). Finnish consonant gradation is alternation belonging
to the oldest types, and then again a recent peripheral pattern (E) has similar
alternation. An inference that one would be likely to draw from the English
and Finnish configurations is that English has lost flectional apparatus and that
Finnish has acquired it. Basically this is quite correct, with the difference that
for English the time span here is about a thousand years, for Finnish perhaps
four thousand. We shall not present the comparative and documentary evidence
that confirms our analysis, because the purpose was to show what kind of
inferences can be made from internal evidence. Moreover, much of the English
material has, in fact, been mentioned earlier.
Finally, it should be noted that these inferences about relative chronology
concern morphological types or patterns only and not the individual members
or items, because any word can analogically shift types (e.g., English cow from
B to D or oath from C to D). Such shifts occur usually toward the more pro-
ductive (newer) types. These rather systematic inferences concerning the relative
chronology of morpheme types are quite parallel to the reconstruction of the
sequences of morpheme slots. In the latter case we also faced the uncertainty of
not knowing whether any particular morpheme had in fact been combined
with some other morpheme in the protolanguage (to which the slots themselves
can be assigned).
SYNTAX
[19.5 Syntactic Change] It has been generally agreed that the unit of
speech is the sentence (only now is this conception changing in favor of a whole
text, a discourse, as the basic unit; see§§ 19.8-19.11, 20.1-20.6). So far relatively
little has been said about sentences and syntactic change in general. First of
all, there is the practical problem of space: to characterize syntactic change one
would first have to present a great deal of background information. It has
always been easier to present change in terms of the various units that build up a
sentence, because without units there would be no sentences either. This is a
simple and obvious point that is easily forgotten. The arbitrariness of the lin-
guistic sign resides in these building blocks of the sentence and not in the purely
syntactic rules, which are heavily iconic. Because syntactic change is analogical
it interferes heavily with reconstruction. This creates the following paradox:
since syntax is iconic, it is an important factor in change (which is largely
iconic) but a peripheral aspect in reconstruction (which requires symbolic
factors). Both aspects have already been mentioned. The first has been implicit
all along, in the absence of neat compartments of change. Syntax is deeply

involved in analogical change, in semantic change, in figures of speech, in
borrowing, and so on. It can be the conditioning factor or the conditioned
part of sound change. To repeat all these passages here would give material
for a separate chapter. It has been noted already that chapter divisions are rather
arbitrary practical matters which are likely to do violence to the interconnections
of language or linguistics.
The main analogical forces in syntax are reinterpretation or reanalysis, that
is, emphasis or fading. We also know these notions under the terms 'elaboration'
and 'simplification'. Ellipsis can automatically give a new part of speech (e.g.,
daily paper > daily; see § 7.8). Loss of pause can create a conjunction like I know
that; You will come > I know that you will come. A question in between ('self-
question ') can give 'because': Latin Nones eques. Quiire? Non sunt tibi milia
centum. 'You are not a knight. For what reason? You do not have a hundred
thousand'. Quiire fades into 'because' and gives later French car. Similarly,
I ask you: Whether? Will you come or no(t)? results in whether functioning
only as a conjunction. A loss of pause in sentences like Then he smiled, a shy
nervous smile gives a transitive verb whose object is formally related to an
intransitive verb. Semantic fading gives a periphrastic perfect from concrete
cases like I have a cake baked > I have baked a cake in Romance and Germanic
(as well as other tenses;§ 19.10). We shall Sl!e below how similar reinterpretation
can engulf independent particles into verbs or pronouns.
Whole sentences get petrified; for example, Latin quam vis 'as you wish' >
'however' and nox 'it is night'> 'by night'; English willy-nil!y from 'whether
I want or not want' (i.e., will-I-ne-wi/l-1; see §9.8); and Frenchpeut-etre 'perhaps'
< 'can be' (compare maybe). These examples show that syntactic derivation
was stored as a lump and became an arbitrary linguistic sign. For this to happen,
the phrase has to be frequent (see § 9.8). Syntax can remain unchanged even if
the outer form is eroded by sound change. In the English type D (§ 19.3) the
noun and verb were formally different (as in help- helpe). The original French
genitive survives, for example, in street names like Ia Rue Monsieur le Prince,
the syntactic mode appropriate for the genitive but without the original genitive
ending (compare Finnish type A;§ 19.4). We shall see below a case in which the
same form can be suppressed if it occurs more than once with exactly the same
meaning. In the French sentence Vous savez que je vous ai toujours respecte et
vous porte une vive affection, the vous has to be repeated in the last two clauses,
because it represents the accusative (e.g., je /e respecte) and the dative (e.g.,
je lui porte), respectively.
One reason mere syntactic change seems to have been neglected is that there
is no independent syntactic change at all. Syntactic change is only a different
aspect of the various types that we have seen already (see§ 7.13). In using syntactic
notation to describe change we are looking at change from a new angle (compare
phonemes to rules). This has always been taken into account in etymological
research , where everything is considered. We shall see that syntactic reconstruc-
tion is largely applied morphology. (See in particular§§ 9.16-9.18.)
[19.6 Internal Reconstruction and Syntax] In the beginning of this
chapter we saw that the application of internal reconstruction to morphology
was in principle no different from phonology, in that imbalance and irregularity
were evaluated against regularity (see § 18.16). Taking unproductive types as
the irregular ones, we reached certain conclusions about relative chronology,
which is always a by-product of internal reconstruction. In that case, however,
reconstruction as such was not possible, only relative chronology. To see how
internal reconstruction can work in syntax let us go back to the Finnish material
of § 5.17. Now, in Finnish we have a sentence pojat menet·iit 'the boys go'
which is formally the reverse of meneviit pojat 'the going boys'. Word order
seems to make the difference between a normal sentence and a nominal phrase,
which is not at all infrequent in the languages of the world (compare Indo-
European *-nt- both in the third person plural and the present participle, for
exam pie, Latin feru-nt 'they carry' and fere-nt-es 'the carrying ones'). The
singular of the nominal phrase is as expected, menevii poika 'the/a going boy',
but the third singular verb phrase poika menee does not fit, even though the
word order is the expected one. The relational setup is thus
3rd pl. noun phrase XY X'Y'

vs. in the sg.
3rd pl. verb phrase YX Y'Z
The plural and the singular match perfectly except for the Z (menee). We have
often seen that such irregularities are prime targets for analysis, exactly like
analogy (§ 18.16). We have immediate success here, since archaic and poetic
Finnish goes poika menevi in the singular. A v shows up where expected, and
Z can be replaced by X", in which only the final vowel deviates from the pattern.
Now it would be very attractive to be able to combine -va and -vi, and the sim-
plest way is to posit grammatical conditioning of sound change: a final -a in
predicative position yields -i. And now X" can finally join the pattern as X'.
Predicative position is rather prone to provide change (see § 4.24), and it is
quite common for a nominal sentence to give a verbal tense. The participle
became first a verb syntactically, and then (with sound changes) also semanti-
cally. Earlier we saw that the accusative singular of the participle produced
an uninflected form(§ 5.17).
Thus this evidence, and that in the Finnish type A, support each other:
both point to a lack of differentiation between noun and verb in Pre-Finnish
(§ 19.4). And indeed comparative evidence makes it likely that this was true of
Proto-U ralic.
[19. 7 The Value of Numbers for Syntactic Protorules] The iconicity of

syntactic rules has led to the question of how much evidence one needs to justify
a syntactic rule for the protolanguage. A widespread rule of thumb has been
that chance could easily result in two languages showing a particular rule, but that
when three agree, the feature can be assigned to the protolanguage. Greek and
Latin have compound verbs with more or less idiomatic meanings, for example,
Greek en-ktesasthai 'to acquire possessions in a foreign country' (to buy in)
and hupo-thesthai 'to take a mortgage (to place under), Latin oc-cidere 'to kill'
(to strike against), and con-surgere 'to ris1~ up together'; these can be repeated
in the discourse without the preverb, but the meaning undergoes no modification.
We have here a kind of syntactic ellipsis or haplology (AB 'X' ... AB 'X' >
AB 'X' ... B 'X'). Now Latin could perhaps have borrowed this rule from
Greek; but it is very unlikely, because it occurs in the earliest legal language of
both languages. According to the three-witness requirement, we could not
assign this deletion rule to Proto-Indo-European. But when we see that Hittite
has the same rule (e.g., [appa] pai 'gives back' and [ser] sarnikmi 'I make
restitution') we have the third witness, and the rule can be assumed for Indo-
European. Counting the number of witnesses is not a reliable criterion, however;
a deletion of the above kind would seem to be quite natural in any language
having similar verbal compounds. In syntax one needs the total situation far
more urgently than in other areas of grammar, and below we shall see that
even a single witness can be crucial.
[19.8 Proto-Indo-European Pronouns and Hittite Sentence Connectives]

On the basis of the following evidence it was easy to reconstruct a Proto-Indo-
European nonpersonal demonstrative (anaphoric) pronoun (which shows rela-
tive and personal usage as well):
PIE SKT GREEK LITH. GO. OE

nom. sg. masc. *so sa[s] ho [tas] sa se [pe]
ace. sg. masc. *tom tam ton tq pan[a] pone
gen. sg. masc. *tosyo tasya tofo [to] pis pees
dat. sg masc. *tosmoi tasmiii [toil tamui pamma pflm
nom.jacc. sg. neuter *tod tad to ta[i] pat[a] p<£t
nom. pl. masc. *toi te toi [hoi] tie pai pii
In Greek and English, it subsequently yields a definite article. This is a selection

of course, but it is sufficient to provide the necessary information about the
Proto-Indo-European paradigm. Parts that violate sound correspondences are
bracketed and typically represent analogical formations. Spotting them is part
of reconstruction and it is possible when the paradigm starts to emerge. Three
"irregularities" or deviations from the normal nominal paradigm can be noted:
(1) the initials- in the nom. masc. sg. vs . t· in the other cases, (2) lack of a nom.
sg. masc. ending, which is -s elsewhere, and (3) a formative -sm- in the dative.
Retention of these features must now be considered older than their lack (on
the basis of seriation). Thus the initial t- and final -s in Lithuanian tas become
quite understandable as innovations, as does the late Sanskrit -s. Old English
also levels out in favor of the oblique stem: pe. Some dialects of Greek go the
other way, extending the s-form into the plural: hoi. The omission of -sm-
in Greek is also clearly leveling, and the Lithuanian genitive to takes its ending
from the noun. There is considerable give and take between the pronoun and
the noun in the Indo-European languages, and on the whole the developments
can be spotted by plotting the various paradigms side by side. Suffice it to say
that the sound correspondences and the paradigmatic relations enable us to
reconstruct the pronoun as given. This is the classical Proto-Indo-European
reconstruction from the morphological side.
(19.9) Pronouns are shifters (indexical); they refer to something else in

the discourse, especially an anaphoric pronoun. Thus one would expect that
syntax is strongly involved. Indeed, once one has reconstructed pronouns,
syntax is automatically implied. In the oldest stages of Sanskrit, Greek, and
Germanic these pronouns tend to occur at or toward the beginning of the
sentence. We could accordingly suspect that such a word order existed in the
protolanguage. But it is Hittite that turns the suspicion into probability. Hittite
does not have such an anaphoric pronoun at all. It has sentence connectives
su 'and' (unchanged subject), ta 'and (then)' (change of subject), and nu 'and
(now)'. Practically every sentence in a given discourse, except for the first,
begins with one of these. Then there are enclitic pronouns for the third person,
-as 'he', -an 'him', -at 'it', -e 'they', and -us 'them', which can be attached to
particles other than the sentence connectives, for example, -wa(r )- 'direct
quotation': nu-war-as 'and now he said:" ... "', or nu-smas-an 'and you him'.
But when no other particles intervene we get the following conglomerates of
the sentence connective plus the enclitic pronoun:
nas tas sas 'and he' (nom. masc. sg.)

nan tan san 'and him' (ace. masc. sg.)
nat tat 'and it' (neut. sg.)
ne se 'and they' (nom. masc. pl.)
The formal similarity of the last two columns to the pronoun *so-f*to- is obvious.
There must be a historical connection. The best inference is that the Indo-
European pronoun is a fusion of the earlier sentence connective plus the enclitic
pronoun (isogloss 24 in Figure 15-2). It is now possible to see a natural reason
for the reinterpretation of *so as a nominative (no change in subject), and the
less frequent combinations *t(o) + os and *s(o)-om were lost. (But Old Latin
has sum 'him', sam 'her', and sos 'them'!) The principles of linguistic change
tell us how much easier it is to merge independent units rather than split them:
for example, English not could not have split into nan wiht, so the development
must have been the reverse (§ 9.8). The Hittite facts have to be interpreted as
the lectio difficilior, and we see how syntax has crystallized into morphology.
Earlier we saw how particular sentences can freeze into adverbs, that is, words
(willy-nilly ).
[19.10 Sentence Connectives and Tense/Mood) Some Indo-European

languages show so-called primary (I) vs. secondary (II) personal endings; for
example:
I II
1st sg. -mi -m
2nd sg. -si -s
3rd sg. -ti -t
3rd pl. -nti -nt
The relation between these endings is best known through the difference between
a present *bhere-ti 'he carries' and an imperfect *e-hhere-t 'he was carrying'.
Sanskrit has also a verbal form called 'injunctive' which does not indicate
either tense or mood, for example, (md) bharat 'he (may not) carry' (*me
bhere-t). When one lines up all these forms one gets a clear segmentation of
forms:
SANSKRIT PROTO-INDO-EUROPEAN
bhara-t-i bhere-t-i
a-bhara-t e-bhere-t
bhara-t-u (imperative 3rd sg.) bhere-t-u
md bhara-t me bhere-t
Generally, prefixes and suffixes exclude each other, and it is quite obvious that
the -i of the primary endings is a temporal suffix added to the person marker.
Against this complementarity of suffixes and prefixes we have a type with both,
as in Sanskrit pra-hharat-i 'he carries forward' (*pr6-bhere-t-i). In the earliest
attested Indo-European a pre-verb like *pro is still a free word, whereas the -i
is not; in many languages it is obligatory. It looks as if the verb had incorporated
the particle -i not unlike the Indo-European enclitic pronouns incorporated
the sentence connectives. Old Irish does indeed bear this out; all prefixes require
secondary endings (known as conjunct), for example, from 'carry' > 'take'
(ni-heir 'he does not take', do-heir 'he gives'):
PRIMARY (ABSOLUTE) SECONDARY (CONJUNCT)
1st sg. hiru -biur

2nd sg. biri -bir
3rd sg. berid -heir
3rd pl. herait -herat
The highly complex Irish syntax turns out to be a fossilization oflndo-European

at the time of free tense and mood particles. Syntactically, the Irish verb is
clear in Proto-Indo-European terms, although sound change has disturbed
the appearance, for example:
*to bheret > do-heir /do'Bef/

*to me hheret > do-m-heir /dom'be!/}" infixed" pronoun
*nu me bheret > no-m-heir /nom'ber/
*bheret i > herid /'befio'/
*bheret i me > heirthium /'beffYimw/ ("suffixed" pronoun)
In a similar way Romance developed single tenses (e.g., the future) out of
analytic phrases, and also infixed pronouns. Portuguese retains the original
Latin state of affairs most clearly, as in fabulare habeo > fa/ar hei > falarei 'I
will speak'. This is directly parallel to French parlerai 'I will speak', which is
an unbreakable single word. In Portuguese, however, pronouns can still occur
between the infinitival part and the present forms of haver: lemhrar-me-ei 'I
will remember' and chamti-lo-ei 'I will call him' (the orthography is conven-
tional, compare Brazilian chamal-o-(h)ei). Portuguese further has a compound
future with the above components in a different order: hei-de /ho dizer or
hei-de dizer-/ho 'I will say to him'. Such a situation is very similar to the Irish
development (compare Oneida in §16.3). The Proto-Indo-European imperfect
prefix *e is presumably another adverb, as is *m~ 'don't'. Once the tense or
mood is fully specified, the discourse continues with injunctives, which indicate
person and number only. And these injunctives are linked to the previous sen-
tences by sentence connectives.
The analysis of these two interrelated syntactic problems from Indo-European
-pronouns and sentence connectives, and sentence connectives and injunctives
-was based on the seriation method. This means that internal criteria were
used to single out apparent relics, and these relics were combined for Proto-
Indo-European. The crucial evidence came from Hittite and Old Irish for the
connectives and from Sanskrit and Old Irish for the injunctive, although the
complexities of the Irish evidence for connectives were not elaborated upon (e.g.,
the so-called 'dummy' prefixes like no- < *nu) (see isogloss 15 in Figure 15-2).
(19.11 Indeterminacy of Historical Order] Syntactic reconstruction shows

best results when it can be connected with morphology that contains clear
sound correspondences. This has been anticipated (§§ 16.9, 16.10). Syntactic
reconstruction makes the correspondences on the morphemic level much more
meaningful. It does not replace the work done in other areas of grammar, but
adds to it. Abstract syntactic rules alone are inconclusive for genetic connection.
Of course, rules can be written counter to the actual history. In the case of the
preverb deletion in Latin, Greek, and Hittite it is descriptively obligatory to
start from the richer form AB ... AB being reduced to AB ... B; the same
would be possible for the injunctive as well; that is, a sequence
VERB + PERSON + { TENSE}

MOOD ••• V +P + {T}
M
is reduced to
V + P + {;;} . .. V + P,
if the tense or mood remains the same. For Proto-Indo-European one would
be tempted to write such a rule if semantics were taken as syntax-dependent.
This shows how easy it is to devise all kinds of rules which probably do not
reflect history, for the injunctive is clearly the original verbal form, ousted by
those verbs that incorporated temporal and modal particles. History shows
accretion of forms, but typical syntactic rules would treat this as deletion.
Of course history can go both ways. Languages may develop complicated
congruence phenomena or lose them (often with much of inflection in general).
Germanic developed a complicated adjective inflection, which has now been
lost in English. The Finnish congruence between adjective and noun in case and
number is also an innovation. One cannot predict the direction of change in
advance without evaluating the total evidence at hand.
[19.12 Conclusion] We see now a dilemma between synchronic theory and

reconstruction. Synchronic models are based on the directionality of meaning
to sound (§ I 0.6). Semantics is the very reason of language, but it does not work
as a starting point in the study of languages attested only through documents,
or in reconstruction. Linguistics as an empirical science must comprise adequate
and coherent theory building and exact empirical testing methods. As far as
syntax is concerned, generative-transformational grammar meets the theoretical
requirements better than any other school, but very little or no attention has
been paid to the testing of hypotheses. This is left to the intuitions of the analysts
(compare§ 18.17), or is brushed aside as a matter of" performance." Thus it is
obvious that generative grammar is hardly suitable for reconstruction, because
no informants or native intuition are avai lable. Only philology can help here,
because it handles the total pragmatic context systematically and serves as an
approximate empirical checking.
The comparative linguist must work with a model maximally complete,
coherent, consistent, and explicit in its deductive hypothesis formation, but this
model must be testable and found probable. A pure aprioristic position is useless
in comparative linguistics, because here one is always right in advance. Com-
parative linguistics needs discovery procedures, and this is the end to which its
methods explicitly serve (§ 9.19). These methods operate between theory and
philological investigation (Part IV). Syntactic reconstruction is an evaluation of
probabilities (not a calculus with exact numerical values; compare § 21.14)
based on the following factors: (1) the spread of the phenomenon among the
languages used (compare § 19.7), (2) formal correspondences, (3) semantic
correspondences, (4) the results of internal reconstruction (compare § 19.6),
(5) the fit of the individual phenomenon in the framework of the total recon-
struction (e.g., § 19.10), and (6) the typological constraints. Without parallels
from the living languages any reconstruction remains doubtful (compare
§§ 6.5, 18.7, 19.10, 21.14, 21.20). Very important are implicational universals
of the type that the reconstruction of a phenomenon a makes the reconstruction
of the phenomenon b probable (compare§ 16.8).
By necessity the directionality in syntactic reconstruction is thus from sounds
to forms to case syntax, and so on (§ 20.2; compare §§ 22.1, 22.2). Note that
ultimately this procedure can indeed reach discourse analysis as was exemplified
by the Indo-European sentence connectives(§§ 19.8-19.10). The reconstruction
of morphology is also often impossible without syntax(§§ 19.5, 19.6, 19.9, 19.10),
although morphology need not always be fossilized syntax.
REFERENCES
General: Havers 1931, Fokos-Fuchs 1962, Katicic 1970; 19.1 Krahe 1970,
Szemerenyi 1970; 19.2 Hymes 1956, Dressler 1969a; 19.5 Breal 1964, Porzig
1924, Havers 1931, Allen 1951, Watkins 1965, Skrelina 1968, R. Hall 1968,
Szemerenyi 1968, Traugott 1965, 1969, 1971; 19.6 Anttila in Sebeok (ed.)
1963f. vol. 11; 19.7 Watkins 1966; 19.8-19.9 Sturtevant 1939, Szemerenvi )970;
19.10 Meid 1968ab, Kiparsky 1968b; 19.12 Dressler 1971.
CHAPTER 20
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY/SEMANTICS
Because of the impossibility of providing a complete

language-specific semology, the chapter can only delineate
methods and procedures that point the way. The border
between universal semantics and language-specific semology
cannot be drawn with partial evidence; thus only the term
'semantic' will be used.
[20.1 Comparative Method and MorpbologyjSyntaxjSemantics] Because

syntax is so extensively iconic, the comparative method with its sets of corre-
spondences cannot be applied explicitly. Syntactic rules of two languages corre-
spond easily, for example, word order XY in language I with word order YX
in language 2. This alone does not tell much; it could be quite accidental.
Similarly, a participle in one language may correspond to a relative clause in
another, as in a running boy vs. a boy who runs. These are common patterns that
even exist side by side in one language. Now the fact that transformational or
mapping rules can be written relating the syntax of two languages need have no
historical validity whatsoever. Syntactic rules must be tied with some arbitrary
features to carry historical conviction. A good example comes from Indo-
European case syntax, where we have the following correspondences between
Latin and Greek:
'oF' 'FROM' 'WITH' 'IN' 'FOR/TO'
Latin GEN ABL ABL ABL DAT

Greek GEN GEN DAT DAT DAT
The morphological units spelled with small capitals represent forms that are
connected with sound correspondences; that is, a Latin genitive corresponds
in this sense to the Greek genitive, although it does not mean that the two cases
have the same function in both languages. On the contrary, the case corre-
spondences have a different range for the: three Latin cases and the two Greek
ones (see§ 7.2). The glosses are a translation shorthand for the syntactic-seman-
tic environments. The sets represent "pure" cases without prepositions. One
can now note that syntax and semantics play a role in the environments of the
morphological sets (which themselves are reconstructed on the basis of sound
correspondences). The configuration suggests immediately that at least the 'of'
set and the' forjto' set contrast; then one should see whether all those sets having
364
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY /SEMANTICS
Latin ABL belong together, or whether the Greek with only GEN and DAT allows
us to predict the Latin. Since the 'with' and 'in' sets are formally the same these
are the most likely candidates for being the same. First of all, the 'in' set is
rather limited in both languages, which normally use the preposition in + the
'in' set for the meaning 'in'. Seriation would hold that a productive form
marked twice analytically is the younger one. But then both languages have also
a few forms that are not the same as the Latin ablative or the Greek dative,
respectively (e.g., Latin "ablative" media urbe 'in the center of the city', or
Carthiigine 'in Carthage' vs. the "genitive" Romae 'in Rome', or an "-i" case
in domi 'at home'; ruri 'in the countryside' and Greek "dative" Delphois 'in
Delphoi'; and kukloi 'in a circle' [both normally with the additional en 'in']
vs. oikoi 'at home' or ekei 'there'). These formal differences, which are clearly
relics, are now added to the relic peculiarity of the lack of in 'in'. The indication
thus is that the 'in' set does not point toward unity with the 'with' set at all,
and they cannot be combined.
[20.2] In fact, all the sets contrast with each other because they carry
the different meanings as indicated. We see that our method is quite different
from that in phonology, after all. Here we have to know meanings to predict
the forms, because meanings are the environments. In phonology we had to
predict sounds in the environments of other sounds. We used the meanings to
give us the forms for analysis, but in the actual analysis such meanings could be
pushed into the background. Here we are clearly coming back to meaning. To
reconstruct the actual case morphemes, we would use vague meanings such as 'a
grammatical suffix with local meaning'. This would be enough background for
the comparative method, which would let the sound correspondences ferret
out protoforms, if possible. Here we have come back to the link between
meaning and form, the basic makeup of the linguistic sign. This same buildup
provided the forms for the comparative method, and we see once more that
different parts of language are indissociable and complementary in a natural
situation. The linguist's vivisection does not always do justice to the joints.
The small selection of Latin and Greek above is extremely simplified because the
cases can be formally quite different (in the different declensions). This is why
the labels GEN, ABL, and so on, do not represent form alone, but also syntactic-
semantic equivalences (slots as it were). This is why the members of these case
correspondences (G EN, D AT, and so on) also represent higher levels of grammati-
cal hierarchy (sounds~ forms~ case syntax). Thus our task is not the recon-
struction of single case forms for each set, after all, as would seem from the
table; that would not be possible with these languages. The reconstruction
results in a series of semantic cases, that is,' of', 'from', 'with', 'in' and 'for/to'.
(The actual forms are a different matter.) It is expedient to assume that the
protolanguage had such categories, since the phonology and morphology
establish clear protoforms. Although reconstruction is based on both form and
meaning, we once more get an indication that both sides obey the laws of inde-
pendent structures.
[20.3] This small selection from cas'~ syntax is typical: it takes so much
exposition compared with the final yield. It was also chosen so that a further
comparative check would be possible from Indo-European languages not used
in this analysis. Having made the inference that five semantic cases can be
assumed for the protolanguage on the basis of five case correspondences in five
semantic-syntactic environments, it is also likely that there was a more uniform
formal representation of the five semantic cases (in particular the 'in' case had
relic forms clearly pointing to extra forms). Otherwise it would be difficult to
understand the almost haphazard formal case representation between Latin and
Greek. If, on the other hand, we assume that there was a richer case system as a
starting point, it is easy to see how the number of cases would be reduced with
the expansion of prepositions; the history of English is another good case in
point. Although only the 'in' case was mentioned as co-occurring with a prep-
osition in (infen), this is true of others as well, for example, with (cumfsun =
syn) and from (defap6). Cases without prepositions look older (restricted
relics).
The evidence from other languages confirms our guesses quite well. Sanskrit
has five local cases: gentive 'of', ablative 'from', instrumental 'with', locative
'in', and dative 'for/to', although an ablative separate from the genitive exists
in one declension only. In fact, this formal matching with the assumed semantic
cases, which could be adduced from other languages as well, proves the issue.
We started out from apparent morphology, which turned out to be case syntax
and ultimately semantics, that is, structural semantics independent of form.
Semantic reconstruction is also heavily applied historical morphology and
syntax.
(20.4 Internal Analysis of Apparent Synonyms (Based on Comparative

Evidence)] To anticipate a simple semantic answer let us look at the Indo-
European numerals for' one'. Formally there are two units, *oi(no)- and *s(e)m-:
*oi(No)- *S(E)M-
Greek ofne 'one' (on dice) heis < *sems 'one' (masc.)
oios 'alone'
Latin iinus 'one' sin(gulus) 'single'
sem(el) 'once'
San- eka 'one and only' sa(krt) 'once'
skrit era 'all alone, only'
(Avestan 'one')
OE iin, NE (al)one, on(ly)
ocs inu 'one, another'
Sanskrit represents here Indo-Iranian and the selection is limited to forms clearly
meaning ' one' (except perhaps for Latin singulus). Since exact synonyms are
rather rare in a language, the next step is to see whether the formal difference
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY /SEMANTICS
represents a semantic difference as well. Are there other forms available with
compatible semantics that would show more about the semantic range of the
forms? Indo-Iranian has compounds with sa-, for example, Sanskrit sa-jo:}a
'having one will' or 'having the same will, whose will is the same'. The meaning
'one and the same' is suggested by other occurrences: the full grade sam means
'together', as in san-dhi 'putting together'. Greek agrees quite well with Indo-
Iranian, for example, ha-ma 'together' and hom-os 'common' (sometimes
without the h-, as in a-lokhos 'having the same bed', i.e., 'wife'). Glosses like
'one, same, together' have already hinted that Germanic same also contains the
*som- reflected in Greek 'common'. Sanskrit, in fact, displays the exact counter-
part to Germanic same and Greek homos: sama 'same', and an enclitic sama
'any, every'. The form recurs in Germanic 'together', German zu-sam-men,
and Swedish till-sam-mans; compare further German sam-meln and Swedish
sam-/a 'to gather'. Latin sim-ul 'together', sim-i/is 'like', Russian sam-yj
'same', and the prepositions/adverbs German/Swedish samt 'with' and Balto-
Siavic (e.g., OCS su) 'with' further expand the reflexes for this semantic area.
But clearest of all is the Scandinavian preverb sam- 'together', as in Swedish
sam-tal 'conversation' and sam-arbete 'joint work, collaboration'.
But even for the numeral, Germanic has reflexes of *s(e)m-. Old English has
a pronominal adjective sum 'a certain one, one, a; some'. In Modern English,
it can mean unspecified (greater) number or quantity, as in some twenty people,
but as a suffix it means a specified (smallish) number, as in threesome, that is,
'three together [as one]'. The meanings of OE iin 'one, a certain one; the same;
only, alone' partially overlap with those of sum, but this is hardly surprising,
since we are dealing with a sphere of 'unity'. Sum occurs in what is practically
paradigmatic alternation with a derivative of iin (&n-ig > any), as in Do you
have some bread? No, I don't have any.
Other languages and additional forms could be adduced, but this is enough
for retrieving one interesting point. Proto-Indo-European apparently had two
notions of unity, 'one-alone' and 'one-together'; the importance of the distinc-
tion is borne out by the different roots to express it. Of course many languages do
express these aspects by derivatives of 'one', for example, Finnish yksi 'one',
yksi-n 'alone', and yhde-ssii 'together' ('in one'). In Indo-European such
derivations also occur: Latin iinitiis 'unity', a together meaning from the alone
word, and singulus 'single', an alone meaning from the together word. The
meaning 'same' fits in quite naturally with 'together', since it means 'something
must be taken together with what was known or mentioned before'; it is another
side of a known unity. That the words like iin > one or Russian odin also mean
'same' (They lire in one house, compare alokhos above) is a natural phenomenon,
but Old Church Slavic shows a meaning 'another' for inu, which is 'not the
same', that is, clear contrast.
[20.5] Now it is clear that even a numeral like 'one' can be semantically
very complex, because it overlaps the pronominal sphere. The question is
whether the singulative and the collective unity have other formal expressions
in Indo-European. Indeed they do. Consid1~r, for example, the singulative suffix
*-(i)on and the collective *-(i)ii-, in a Gre:ek name like Plat-on 'the flat-faced
one', hegem-on 'leader', Latin Cat-o(nem) 'the sly one', and Greek sophia
'wisdom ', Latin miseria 'misery'. Greek has clear syntactic reflexes in pantes hoi
anthr6poi 'all the people , and autos ho hippos 'the horse itself' (singulative) vs.
hoi pantes anthropoi 'the people all together ·· and ho autos hippos ' the same horse'
(collective). Here word order (Pronoun-Article-Noun vs. A- P- N) differentiates
the semantic units we have delineated through different words and derivatory
suffixes. It is quite well known that the feminine singular and neuter plural are
formally identical in Indo-European (*-[i]a-), and these can be taken as repre-
senting an original collective, which implies plural ity as unity. Thus Greek !zenia
'reins' occurs both as nominative plural neuter and as nominative singular
feminine, and Rigvedic tanii as nominative plural 'descendants' and as fem inine
singular ' offspring'. This collective -ii contrasts with the singulative -s (nom . sg.
masc.), for example, OCS nog-a 'foot '/Lith. nag-a' hoof' vs. Greek 6nuk-s 'claw',
Greek phord 'produce, fruit' vs. pharo-s 'tribute, payment', pharo-s 'bearing
(favorable) wind', and Sanskrit hfma 'winter' vs. hinu:i-s 'cold, frost'. Support
for this collect ive/plural comes also from the fact that a neuter plural subject is
combined with a singular predicate in Greek ([pl.] ta zoia [sg.] trekhei ' living
things move'), earliest Avestan, and sometimes in Vedic Sanskrit as well. In
Baltic the third plural verb was lost altogether and this 'collective singular'
usage was generalized.
[20.6] The purpose of this demonstration was to show that one can
continue combining morphological and syntactic evidence for semantic recon-
struction. Gaps and mistakes would not be identifiable at this point. As a final
conjecture Jet us look at another possibility in this semantic sphere of unity (we
shall take the following forms at face value for the moment). Swedish has two
compounds for 'the present time' : nu-tid and sam-tid, that is, with 'now' and
'one-together'. German has corresponding Jetzt-zeit, also 'now-time' and
Gegen-ll'art 'presence', in which the first part is the same as in English again.
The meanings of again include 'once more' and 'back into a former position',
and an obsolete 'back'. Such meanings come into the area of 'same', that is,
repetitions of earlier things, even if againstfgegen normally mean togetherness
of a hostile nature. Is it really possible to combine meanings 'one, now, again,
back' into one semantic unit? We would not take these as variants of one se-
mantic unit in Modern Germanic, but is it possible for earlier times? It would
seem so; Oneida has such a unity sememe with exactly the variants mentioned,
expressed, for example, by the s-in Skanyataliyo (§ 16.7), although in certain
environments another morpheme is used.
But German Gegenwart acquired temporal significance first in the eighteenth
century ; and Jetztzeit was coined in 1807, Swedish nutid being formed after the
latter. Thus the possibilities explored above diminish substantially. The moral
of this is that in semantic reconstruction it is easy to go too far, even though each
step can be perfectly substantiated or paralleled from another language.
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY / SEMANTICS
Let us refer back to the buildup of anaphoric pronouns from sentence con-
nectives(§§ 19.8, 19.9). The notion of' sameness' is inherent in *nu, which means
'carry on, add this sentence to the preceding ones, the same discourse continues'.
Since it appears that *to 'and' was used with a change of subject, the attractive
hypothesis emerges that the mystery *-sm- in local cases of the anaphoric
pronoun is actually the zero grade of *sem-, that is, *to-sm-6i 'and to this same
one, to the aforementioned '-the *-sm- in effect canceling the change of subject
usually associated with *to, and contributing to the simplification of what pre-
sumably was a very complex set of paradigms. Once more we come back to
syntax. Reconstructing structural semantics is very complex indeed. We cannot
expect easy results, since there are great difficulties in reaching agreement on
semantic structure even in synchronic situations. Reconstruction is many more
times difficult.
[20.7 Semantic Reconstruction and Boolean Algebra] In the reconstruc-

tion through the formal representation of semantic cases, Boolean algebra was
not possible because the target turned out to be the connection of meaning to
form. In the case of 'one-alone' and 'one-together' the intersection 'one'
did not yield the best reconstruction for both forms either, because again the
crucial point was the linkup of the linguistic sign, and 'one' turned out to be a
conditioned variant of 'alone' and 'together', respectively, to use common
language terminology. Thus in semantic reconstruction we face the problem of
deciding when an intersection is a variant or the underlying unit. The one-alone
and one-together case is paralleled in phonology; for example, the [v] of
to grieve and to dive is an intersecting variant of both If I and Ivi (see§ 12.4).
Similarly, in Finnish, the -i of nappi 'button' and sappi 'gall' are variants of
li I and lei, respectively (compare [gen.] napin and sapen). Sememes can be
defined rather like phonemes. A disjunctive definition of the meanings of Oneida
s- would give preference to the actual surface variants (e.g., either 'back', or
'now', or 'again', or 'one'), whereas a conjunctive definition produces under-
lying 'unity'(§ 20.6); the latter is preferable (see§ 18.10). Here the intersection
gives the unit and not a variant. Boolean algebra can often be used as a guide-
line (Figure 18-1), when we want to get a common derivation point for different
but 'relatable' meanings in different environments or languages.
[20.8] English story 'narrative' and stor(e)y 'floor in a building' could

ultimately be one polysemous word, if a common denominator (intersection)
and its environment could be found. Indeed, some dictionaries connect the two,
pointing out that a story is a structured whole that proceeds step by step, or
that it is built up of layers. But here we happen to know for certain that the two
words are etymologically distinct. This suggested combination shows the dangers
of trying to push the analysis too far. This is, in a way, analytic (inductive) folk
etymology; it is surprisingly easy to devise abstract meanings to cover any two
meanings (see §17.5). Etymological literature is full of such mistakes. Finnish
lokki 'gull' and lokki 'pulley' would at best have an intersection 'hovering in
the air', which is obviously absurd, and the words must thus be regarded as
homophones only. Independent evidence tells us that this is the correct inter-
pretation. English board (1) 'flat (long) piece of wood', (2) 'food' (room and
board), and (3) 'committee, body of people', presents a formidable problem on
purely internal evidence, but if we know the groaning board or that Swedish
bord means 'table' (smorgasbord§ 8.6), the metonymic chain is obvious. We
see the intersecting indexical joints' board',,' a board used as a piece of furniture',
'what is put on the board', and 'those who sit around the board for some pur-
pose'. Internal seriation shows that one meaning could be taken as original,
the others as conditioned variants. The intersection of the meanings of French
fille is 'woman' (§ 7.12). This would give a starting point for jeune fille 'girl' at
least, although not so easily for (ma) fille 'daughter', both of which are syn-
tacticaJJy marked. Semantic derivation would at least suggest that' prostitute' is
not original, and the pronominal combination of ma fil/e seems to be hierarchi-
cally deeper than a compound jeune fille (see §§ 20.16, 21.17). The intersection
'woman' is not historically accurate, but seriation might have pointed toward
the correct origin, Latinfi/ia 'daughter'.
[20.9) Translation into the linguists' own language can obscure the issue
and strengthen apparent homophony. Thus Greek trephO is usually listed under
two meanings, (I) 'rear, bring up, cause to grow' and (2) 'curdle, congeal'.
Close observation of the Greek passages shows that these are variants of one
meaning: 'to favor the tendencies inhere:nt in the matter, to allow growth'.
When you Jet children have their biological way they will grow up, when you let
milk take its course, it will curdle, and so on. Here the intersection of the two
meanings gives the simplest solution, and the example shows that the danger of
missing legitimate intersections of meanings is about as great as trying to create
illegitimate ones. Semantics is notoriously an area where common sense cannot
be replaced by mechanical reconstruction steps.
[20.10] But the principles of Figure I 8-1 can serve as guidelines. English
sheep and Sanskrit chiiga 'goat' share the protoform *sK.egwo-. In addition, both
languages have reflexes of a word *owi- 'sheep' (ewe; Figure I I -6). Because of
the latter, the meaning' *sheep' for *sK.eg'"o- is unlikely, but could it have been
a straight intersection 'small cattle' covering both sheep and goats? We do
not know, because some kind of a goat is also possible. Note that we do the
same thing here as in phonetic reconstruction: we compare intersections.
Since *owi- 'sheep' has a better claim for 'sheep' (the evidence goes well
beyond Sanskrit and English), we would have to find something nearby (see
§§ 18.1 0, 18.11 ). All over the world we have similar problems with domesticated
animals. Shifts occur between them very easily, which means that all we need is
the context and that the context need not be elerated into a protomeaning (see
fille above). If in American Indian languages the same form can mean either
'cow', 'goat', or 'dog', it does not justify a reconstruction '*domestic animal'
in itself. In northern Eurasia the same form can mean either 'dog' or 'reindeer',
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY /SEMANTICS 371
but a reconstruction '*sledge-pulling animal' would be wrong, because this
could have been no more than the characteristic context for metonymic shifts.
[20.11] Let us assume that a linguist has compiled various reflexes of

Proto-Indo-European *pont- with the meaning 'road' in Indie and Balto-
Slavic, 'sea' in Greek, 'bridge' in Latin, and 'ford' in Armenian. There seems
to be a division between terrestial and aquatic usage. Now, if we take Greek
p6ntos as a natural metaphor in the Greek geographic setting, the remaining
'bridge' and 'ford' are stretches of a road negotiating water. All this would now
seem to point toward '*road' as the original meaning. But note that while this
reconstruction is possible in principle, it has too many iconic and indexical
shifts (two tatum pro parte), and the reconstruction relies heavily on a disjunc-
tive definition (Figure 18-1 : 2), that is, the sum of variants. What would be a
common intersection (Figure 18-1 : 3) which would not specify whether the route
goes above or through the water, or on land? One such meaning is 'passage' in
general. Such an intersection is by far more natural than the one devised for the
two stories, but is it still the same as '*domestic animal' above, that is, various
kinds of passages? Yes, it could be the same; the intersection is not enough to
prove such a meaning, even if it is an attractive hypothesis. Here we are lucky
in that Vedic Sanskrit supplies independent evidence (independent because it
was not used in the reconstruction). In Vedic, the word panthlis contrasts with
various other words for 'road'; it is something unpaved, not used by wheeled
vehicles, a stretch between two points implying labor, uncertainty, and danger.
And it is not limited to land and water; the birds have theirs as well. Thus a
meaning 'passage, crossing' fits the situation quite well. But Iranian, both
Ancient and later, turns out to have the meaning 'path', and now one would
notice that this occurs also in Indic (and Greek patos). 'Path' is the concrete
counterpart of 'passage, crossing' and can be taken as the original meaning,
because it seems to be rather usual that 'road' develops into more abstract
meanings. English way is etymologically the same as wain/wagon (see §§ 11.7,
11.8) and meant originally a road passable by carriages, although now it can
mean any mode of doing things. Thus it is no wonder that we get the meaning
'sea' in Greek; note OE hron-rlid (§ 7.8) and Swedish strat 'passage (over water)',
and German Wasserstrasse 'waterway' (from a loanword meaning 'paved
[road]' in Latin) (compare street). And finally, note that 'path' as the original
meaning is supported by Germanic path, which is evidently an Iranian loan.
since it does not show Grimm's law.
[20.12] The principle of constructing derivational trees with the least

number of steps is more inconclusive with semantic features than with other
linguistic units, although the same procedure holds as for phonetic reconstruc-
tion (Figure 18-1 ). The danger lies in pushing the analysis too far, thus distorting
the true historical state of affairs (which may never be available to us anyway).
The same danger lurks of course in synchronic analysis, in which linguists are
prone to combine forms beyond the actual psychological reality of the naive
speakers (e.g., bake/batch; § 18.17). But when the unknowns of history are
combined with the present unknowns of semantics, we have to be content with
the few methodological approaches and gains we have established so far. One
should note particularly the paraiielism between phonetic and semantic features
(Figures 1-3-1-5) in reconstruction (Figure 18-1), as wen as the similarities in
their respective relative difficulties.
[20.13 Context and Semantic Reconstruction] The discussion in this

chapter has turned on the notion of context, both linguistic and cultural.
Semantic reconstruction consists of making inferences about the most likely
semantic changes and using this information to establish earlier stages. (Chapter
7 showed the importance of contexts.) This is why unraveling semantic change
consists primarily of spotting contexts that show that two variants are condi-
tioned mem hers of the same unit. The case of Latin proclivis 'easy ' and proc/ivis
'difficult' is a very good example of this(§§ 7.3-7.5). The application of ail the
possible shifts described in Chapter 7 in connection with the total cultural or
archaeological evidence provides the means of making inferences about contexts.
The inferences can then be processed in connection with family trees and Boolean
algebra. One of the prime tasks of semantic reconstruction is to see whether
two apparent homophones are in fact polysemous (see§ 18.17). Like so many
other linguistic notions, homophony and polysemy are relative concepts (like,
for example, competence/performance).
[20.14 Word Meanings and Protoculture] Once the protomeanings for

the reconstructed word of a language family have been determined as accurately
as possible, we can use these as a window to the protoculture and possibly to its
geographic environment. Such cultural reconstruction from vocabulary is very
complicated and requires a delicate touch and sensitivity in the interpretation of
cumulative evidence. Coilaboration between archaeologists and linguists is
desirable, because each side tends to apply the findings of the other too simplis-
tically.
For Proto-Indo-European we can reconstruct the numerals from one to ten
exactly, and numerous body parts (head, face, ear, eye, mouth, tooth, nose, arm,
elbow, hips, arse, penis, foot; blood, heart, liver, milt, lungs, and so on). These
words do not ten anything about culture, but they provide sound correspond-
ences, which may be useful in spotting loans in the more technical areas.
Reconstructed flora and fauna include barley, birch, beech, aspen, oak, yew,
alder; dog, cattle, ox (and yoke), cow, sheep, Jamb, wool, horse (and wheel),
mare, pig, goat, wolf, bear, fox, mouse, snake, eagle, crane, goose, duck, salmon,
otter, beaver, fly, bee, louse, flea, and so on. The kinship terms include words for
father, mother, husband, wife, brother, sister, son, daughter, daughter-in-law,
mother of husband, father of husband, brother of husband, sister of husband,
and wife of husband's brother. There are only a few indications of terms for the
blood relations of the wife. A hypothesis that posits a patriarchal joint family,
which the wife entered upon marriage, gives an attractive interpretation for
RECONSTRUCTING SEMOLOGY /SEMANTICS 373
this. For wider social organization, it seems likely that there was an elected
military and religious leader, a king, for a smallish collection of clans. As for
religion, we can reconstruct the personification of natural phenomena (e.g.,
sky, dawn, fire, and water). As a social ritual there was a reception of guests
during which they partook of "fire and water," (i.e., a meal). At such meals
heroic poetry was recited, and the art of the poet was apparently looked upon
as a craft (that is, he was a carpenter of words). Careful scrutiny of shared
vocabulary has led to rather substantial glimpses of Proto-Indo-European
culture (e.g., in the areas of law and economy), but here we must be content with
these few hints.
[20.15] This cultural reconstruction is similar to making inferences about

cultural diffusion through borrowing(§§ 8.9, 8.10). A borrowed word does not
necessarily mean that the corresponding item was also borrowed. A recon-
structed meaning does not necessarily mirror the exact reference in the proto-
language; our reconstructed oak may quite well have been a beech, for example.
Plant and animal names have been taken as evidence about the possible geo-
graphic areas of the protolanguage. Matching such names against the findings
of paleobotany and paleozoology might be expected to give the original home
automatically. However, it has not turned out to be so easy, because of linguistic
indeterminacies and archaeological gaps. The whole doctrine of making cultural
inferences from linguistic evidence, known as linguistic paleontology, has rarely
enjoyed particularly high repute. But in any case it remains true that linguistic
paleontology very neatly provides assumptions to be tested.
[20.16 Relative Chronology of Concepts] The morphological treatment

of words incidentally reveals the relative chronology of culture concepts. When
the relative chronology of morphological types is looked at from the point of
view of meaning, we see, for example, that the older English types occur fre-
quently with cattle, as in sheep/sheep, oxjoxen, cow/kine, and calf/calves(§ 19.3,
and note the zero plurals for game animals). This shows the importance of
cattle breeding in the earlier culture. In contrast, the basic electronics terminology
does not contain these types; cattle breeding, then, seems to be older than
electronics. Of course nonlinguistic evidence confirms this assumption com-
pletely.
The overall makeup of the linguistic sign can be used for the same kinds of
inference as morphophonemic alternation. Symbolic (unmotivated) unanalyz-
able forms (e.g., English bow, arrow, spear, wheel, plough, king, and knife)
belong to an older layer than clearly iconic (motivated) formations (e.g.,
railroad, battleship, submarine, and attorney general), which are built out of
symbolic parts. Place-names can be important in this connection, because the
longer an area has been settled by the same speakers the more time has there
been for wear, which often makes iconic compounds into symbolic isolates
(compare York, § 9.8). Thus many Nootka village names are unanalyzable,
whereas for less-settled tribes, such as the Paiute and Ojibwa, place-names are
readily interpreted. The Hupa call Mt. Shasta (in northern California) nm-ms-'an
lak-gai 'white mountain', whereas the Yana have a single unanalyzable term
for it, wa<gafu·. The inference is that the Athabaskan-speaking Hupa are new-
comers in California compared to the Yana.
Most languages yield readily to such inferences. The fact that Seneca (an
Iroquois language) has unanalyzable roots with the meanings 'to be in water'
(-o-; compare Oneida kahy-6-/oras, § 16.2), 'to fetch water' (-jc-), and 'depth
of water' (*-!mot-) seems to show prolonged association with water. Similarly,
the unanalyzable roots for the snowsnake (*-/mas-) and hoop and javelin games
(*-ket-) point to the antiquity of these games among the Seneca. The Iroquois
religious system has two components, (northern) shamanistic rituals pertaining
to a hunting environment and (southern) agricultural ceremonies. Both sections
have been regarded as the earlier one. Now, the linguistic evidence unambiguously
supports the greater age of the shamanistic complex, because its terminology is
comprised mainly of unanalyzable roots, whereas the agricultural area makes
use of descriptive compounds.
Among the dangers and uncertainties in this method, only positive evidence
counts. That is, the fact that a meaning is represented by regular morphology
(cowfcows § 19.4) or an iconic compound (top cow § 7.6 and mere-hengest
§ 7.8) does not mean that the item cannot be old. Then, borrowings give un-
analyzable forms that can be very recent (squaw and wigwam). And further, a
form may change meanings, so that the semantic inference we are making belongs
to another notion altogether (for example:, meat would appear to belong to
'flesh', but actually it once represented 'food', see § 7.13). All this shows once
again that for ultimate solutions various principles must be synchronized and
fitted with care, and with sensitivity for such puzzles.
[20.17 Conclusion] Chapter 18 is notably different from 19 and 20,
because in phonological reconstruction it is easiest to separate units for analysis.
Chapters 19 and 20, on the other hand, form a tight-knit unit in which mor-
phology, syntax, and semantics are inextricably interrelated. Because gram-
matical and syntactic reconstruction requires such an enormous amount of
background information on the languages used, as well as long practice, only brief
hints could be supplied in this introduction. Even so, the essential guidelines
have been described, and if the student wants to continue in this particular area,
he has to develop the necessary ability for" scientifically trained fantasy" himself,
without which syntactic and semantic reconstruction is a mere game on paper.
REFERENCES
General: Benveniste 1954; 20.1 Hoenigswald 1960a; 20.5 Lehmann 1958, Maher
1965, 1969b; 20.8-20.11 Benveniste 1954; :W.13 Maher 1970e; 20.14 Schrader
1883, Sapir 1912, Krahe 1970, Thieme 1953 and in Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11,
Dressler 1965, Scherer (ed.) 1968, R. Schmitt 1967, Benveniste 1969, Cardona
and Hoenigswald and Senn (eds.) 1970, lFriedrich 1970; 20.15 Tovar 1954,
Swadesh 1959; 20.16 Sapir 1916, Chafe 1964.
PART V
CONCLUSION:
LINGUISTICS AS PART
OF ANTHROPOLOGY
CHAPTER 21
CHANGE AND RECONSTRUCTION

IN CULTURE AND LINGUISTICS
The study of(genetic) linguistics leads naturally to anthro-

pology. Parallels are drawn between the two with regard to
change and reconstruction.
[21.1 Summary] The preceding parts have concentrated on linguistic

change and reconstruction, that is, genetic linguistics. Genetic linguistics was
not considered in isolation, however; its relation to synchronic linguistics has
been duly considered throughout. In fact, synchronic linguistics alone is not
sufficient background for treating change, since cultural and historical informa-
tion is often indispensable for reaching the proper understanding of change.
Language does not exist in a vacuum; it is used in concrete cultural and historical
circumstances. Anthropologists and other social scientists may feel that culture
has been under-emphasized. If this is true there is no harm done; they already
know this aspect of the field and can add the necessary linguistic emphasis here.
If linguists also were to join in the complaint, the matter would be rather serious.
Such a complaint seems unlikely, however; linguistics has lately concentrated
heavily on language-internal factors of change, whereas this treatment has paid
attention to the dangers and inadequacies of such a narrow conception of
linguistic change. Hence this book attempts not only to give a balanced view
of genetic linguistics in itself but also of genetic linguistics as tailored for the
needs of the 1970s. One of the timely theses is that linguistics is too important
to be left to linguists alone, which is one more reason an introduction should
avoid the school feuds and idiosyncratic terminologies of the different camps.
Rather than issuing propaganda for the flashy notations of particular schools,
the book presents what must be known and accounted for no matter what
notation or theoretical framework the student will ultimately adopt. Notation
alone is no insight, and to minimize notational dazzle a noncommittal position
has been adopted for the book, the purpose of which is to explain genetic
linguistics rather than to proselytize for any linguistic school. If a particular
theory cannot handle the facts presented, it is immediate evidence for the
inadequacy of the theory.
(21.2 Linguistics and the Study of Man] Both psychology and anthro-
pology have recognized linguistics as a methodological model and as the most
precise of these particular sciences. The sociologists acknowledge the" cruel truth"
that awareness of language can do more for them than sociology can do for
377
378 CONCLUSION: LINGUISTICS As PART OF ANTHROPOLOGY
linguistic studies. The issue is not that simple, however, since it is exactly
sociological information that is crucial in understanding linguistic change
(Chapter 9). Language is necessary for sociologists and society for linguists; the
truth of course is that the best results for all social sciences are secured by well-
planned cooperation. Thus one must pay equal attention both to the autonomy
and to the integration of the social sciences. Linguistics has secured a central
position in these interdisciplinary studies, largely because of its unusually
regular self-contained patterning and because of its central role in the totality
of culture (although the former has led to the dangerous tendency of looking
only into language-internal facts in studying change). Language is a constituent
of culture and functions as a substructure. Therefore it is easier to abstract
linguistics from the remainder of culture and define it separately than vice
versa. One does not usually realize that even mathematics is firmly rooted in
ordinary language, since it is verbal activity presupposing language. Money and
economics can also be viewed as a language:, because the circulation of money is
one kind of sending messages. This is part of wider communication (for example,
social intercourse), and in all these areas linguistic models are useful. Because
social life is not conceivable without the existence of communicative signs,
semiotics is part of sociology. Linguistics is the study of verbal messages, which
makes linguistics a small hierarchical part of sociology after all. And of course
the wider end of semiotics leads into biology and neural systems (Chapter 22).
[21.3 Culture and Biology] Man is an end point in a biological line of

evolution ; with the stress on his animal nature he is a mere hairless ape. Far
more attention has been given to the obvious fact that man is different from
other forms of life: he is the language animal, the cultural animal, the tool-
making animal, the human animal, the political animal, or the divine animal.
None of these components should be forgotten; man is both an animal and a
carrier of culture. Language is a property of the human species, but so is culture.
The psychic unity of mankind must also have a biological foundation. Culture
did not "triumph" over biology, resulting in a superorganic extension of the
organic foundation. Neither of these is mutually exclusive or independent.
Culture is an aspect of man's biological difference from other species. It depends
on an organ, the brain. It is a result of natural selection, exactly like the "social
systems" found in other species. The tool-making animal needed mind to survive,
and language and culture gave the perfect combination for that. The brain is as
much a consequence as a cause of culture, and culture is both the producer and
the product of human nature. Culture needed better and better brains, and better
brains could expand culture. Behavior evolved with the structure ; thus one
cannot separate an organic from a superorganic. Man seems to have a species-
specific basic grammar and a specific repertoire of behavior (a grammar of
behavior), which both have biological limits, although there is no end to fantasy.
Our genes determine our ability to learn a language and a culture (or languages
and cultures), but they do not determine just what is said or acted. Universal
processes do not necessarily produce uniform results. The genes may quite well
CHANGE AND RECONSTRUCTION IN CULTURE AND LINGUISTICS 379
contain the universal laws of culture as well and not just a naked capacity.
Culture is a refined replacement of instincts; in fact, in many ways it becomes
instinct by constant drilling of the young. Like instinct, it is unconscious and
automatic to such a great degree that it does not require thought for its opera-
tion; certain stimuli automatically produce the "correct" response. Culture
thus has all the benefits of instincts without their high cost of rigidity. Culture
habits can be changed within a generation, if changes in the environment
warrant new adaptation; there is no need to wait thousands of years for natural
selection to do the same. There are actually cases where societies have sat down
and reorganized cultures. In this sense cultural behavior is a means of biological
adaptation and serves biological needs. Culture is an organ of change to keep the
human species "unchanged", that is, alive, to put it bluntly (§§ 1.17, 22.6). Of
course, this means that natural selection is still operative, but guided by culture.
CHANGE
[21.4 Synchrony and Diachrony] Culture can be interpreted synchroni-

cally and diachronically. Like language, every culture is a result of historical
development, whether it is studied as a functional system of composite parts
(§ 22.6), or atomistically as a description of ethnographic facts. Before studying
change one must of course identify the social and cultural system. The problem
is that cultural facts are not easily broken up and given precise taxonomies, not
to speak of the much more difficult task of structural analysis. In structural
comparison linguistics has been an appropriate model for culture, because in it
culture is taken as a system of communication (the silent language, grammar of
behavior, body language, and so on). Unfortunately, this is not the place to go
into these problems. Suffice it to give one parallel between culture and language.
Let us take an example from clothing (fashion often exemplifies cultural change
in introductions to anthropology). If one imitates the way someone else dresses,
which is a common occurrence, we have a parallel to spelling spelling (§§ 2.6,
2.15). When there is a need to use a certain type of clothing, as for diving or
space exploration, we have a parallel to pronunciation spelling, spelling after
the stark need (§ 2.16). And finally, spelling pronunciation is equivalent to
the consequence of wearing false breasts, padded shoulders, and so on; out-
siders take these at face value, which of course is the characteristic prelude to
spelling pronunciation. Parallels need not be exact to give important insights
both ways, and they may lead to new discoveries (see§ 9.16).
[21.5 Study, Traces, and Processes of Change] The cultural and social
evolutionists believe that they have been successful in establishing unilinear
schemes of social evolution, parallel to the development of man from infant to
adult. A scale of evolution from primitive to sophisticated with three basic
categories (savagery, barbarism, and civilization) was very popular in the
nineteenth century. Every society was supposed to have risen through the same
hierarchy (unless it was still standing on the lowest rung). Such typological
schemes are untenable today as are so many other earlier ones (Chapter I 6,
§ 21.11). But the essence of such notions is salvaged by neo-evolutionism, which
makes use of a typology better suited to the enormously complex phenomena.
[21.6] Still, change is always characteristic of man's life in organized

communities. It is essential to orderly persistence, and not only to revolutions
(extremely abrupt discontinuous changes). Changes may pile up and lead to
elaboration and specialization, or innovations may simplify the structure. This
is parallel to rule addition and rule loss through additions. Culture may also
be reinterpreted. Changes may be brought about through internal factors
(innovations), or external (e.g., conquest); environment, borrowing, and
spontaneous mutation are basic. It is very rare to have a single cause, and the
identification of causes is difficult because full experimentation is not possible.
The factors are often intricately interwoven. The implications of the following
short and unusually straightforward example should be self-explanatory.
Pueblo life in San Ildefonso, New Mexico, was deteriorating just before World
War I. An anthropologist chose the pottery of the best crafts woman for promo-
tion in the outside world. Once by accident (see § 7.3) two pots turned black
instead of red. Such a mutation would have been fatal (self-eliminating) in the
local community, but it found an ecological niche in the outside society, because
the customers were not bound by tradition in this area (note the maxim that it is
difficult to be a prophet in one's own country; see§ 2.9). The firing of black pots
was then accepted by other potters as well. The acceptance of the black pots
was an accident, too, made possible by cultural contact. The "benefits" of the
innovation remained, of course, with the home economy as well.
(21.7] H uman matter cannot be presumed to have a neutral attitude

toward change. Social action is always purposive, and the direction of change
may well reflect the desired direction of change. Some anthropologists operate
with the notion of' strain toward consistency', which implies that habits that do
not fit together get eliminated. This has not found general acceptance, although
one does speak of basic orientations in culture and themes in their ideologies
(compare§§ 9.13, 9.16, 22.6).
[21.8] When the fit between cultural norms or suppositions and actual
behavior (i .e., the deep structure and the surface structure) becomes rather loose,
one can expect restructuring toward the actual behavior, for example," bringing
laws up to date." This is of course another vague parallel, but it is instructive in
that here also the change creeps into the underlying structure from the surface
(compare§ 9.16).
(21.9 The Interrelation Between Culture and Language Change] To

understand linguistic change we must see it as part of cultural change. Linguistic
change is sociolinguistic change, as has been seen. Since culture generally does
not lend itself to the precise segmentation and comparison necessary to establish
genetic relations, linguistics as the oldest cultural science can help. No cultural
aspect can be studied without reference to the linguistic signs used for it. Exam-
ples show also that linguistic change tends to be accelerated when the culture of
the speakers undergoes rapid changes; for example, the Norman conquest of
England brought in loanwords, new spelling, and it was at this time that loss
of grammatical endings was most rapid (in the literary tradition at least). All
this is summed up as the transition from Old to Middle English. When the
culture of a people is relatively static or slow to change, linguistic change tends
to slow down also. An often cited example of this is Lithuanian, whose speakers
led the same kind of life for millennia. Certainly such correlation is not random,
even if individual cases might not seem to comply.
[21.10] It has been observed that the nomadic way of life often corre-
sponds with lack of great dialectal variation, even when the area occupied by
such speakers is large. Thus, roughly, the European societies have undergone
change through various forms of states, organized religions, and the industrial
revolution; the Indo-European languages do seem to have changed more rapidly
than, say, the Turkic ones. Dialectal stratification is the basis of internal change,
and correlates with social evolution as well. The Paleolithic hunting and gather-
ing societies had low population density, no fixed abodes, and autonomy of the
social units. There was no specialization of labor and no stratification in society,
and consequently no social or prestige dialects, but equality of single ones.
There were different dialects, of course, but they were all taken as equal, as is
still true in the Paleolithic way of life. Father, mother, children, aunts, uncles
can all speak different dialects. People branch into different tribes and get
together occasionally for such matters as the arrangement of new marriages.
With the Neolithic economy of planned food production, population increased;
the social unit remained about the same size, but it was still rather mobile
because of the slash-and-burn method of agriculture. Surplus people branched
off to found new settlements. The family-tree model is appropriate here. But
branching off often meant marriage in another community, and thus the wave
theory is also operative. The Neolithic social unit remained self-sufficient and
without prestige dialects until urban revolution produced a stratified society
and prestige dialects, and apparently much faster change in language. Note that
prestige is one factor in addition to the Paleo- and Neolithic variations along the
scales of sex and age. Ecological influence finds its way into the grammar; for
example, hunters occasionally have to stay away from their families, which
encourages development of hunting tabus and other sex-linked linguistic
features.
[21.11] Linguists have noticed that the Malaya-Polynesian languages

have apparently changed much less than the Indo-European ones during the
same time (e.g., the last five millennia). And in fact we are once again dealing
with small Paleo- ,..., Neolithic communities without much social stratification.
382 CONCLUSION: LINGU I STICS As PART OF ANTHROPOLOGY
It seems thus quite likely that socioeconomic factors correlate with change (see
Muller, § 16.3). In the Soviet Union, N.Y. Marr took this hypothesis too far
when he correlated language with the Marxist doctrine of social evolution through
the following stages: primitive horde, slave-holding, feudal, capitalist, socialist,
and communist (see § 21.5). Of course Russian did not change with the revolu-
tion, except for new vocabulary.
[21.12] If culture can influence language, especially in its vocabulary, then

maybe language can influence culture as well. What is meant is not the success
of certain orators or demagogues in influencing the course of history, but the
possibility that the very structure of language (and not what is said) has an
influence. The so-called Sapir- Whorf hypothesis states that language is culture;
it mediates action; culture is stated in language; action is described in language.
According to this conception language becomes a molder of thoughts, cultures,
and philosophies. Language is supposed to direct our perception, so that speak-
ers of different languages experience the world differently. Whorf highlighted
his arguments by speculating on the differences that Aristotle's philosophy
would have shown if he had been a Hopi Indian, since the relations expressed
in Hopi are quite different from those in the standard average European
languages. There is no agreement as to how far the hypothesis is valid.
[21.13 Diffusion and Duplication of Culture Elements] Cultural diffusion

shows many parallels to linguistic borrowing, and in fact the latter is often a
consequence of the former. Those who are most unhappy with their own
culture will accept new things more easily. Other things being equal, tangible
objects (tools, utensils, and ornaments) are borrowed more easily than abstract
notions (see § 8.2). The process of acculturation shows the same phases as
borrowing:(!) the initial acceptance of the cultural element, (2) its dissemination
to other members of the society, and (3) the modifications by which it is finally
embedded to the preexisting culture matrix. Cultures easily tolerate duplication
of function, at least temporarily, whether this is due to borrowing or invention.
Such duplication is an essential accompaniment of culture change, which is true
of linguistic change as well. The old and new forms exist side by side until one
wins out or both differentiate into different domains. The car replaced the
horse only gradually, and there remain environments for the latter only; earlier,
the railroad had interfered with the horse. Now each mode of locomotion has its
own characteristic environment. Relics are pushed into secondary functions (see
§ 5.15): horse coaches are still used for ceremonial purposes by the Queen of
England, and horseback riding is now mainly a sport, as are hunting, skiing,
archery, and even nudism. When the Kwakiutl borrowed the steel knife, stone
knives were preserved in the salmon-cutting ritual. Candles have similar ritualis-
tic overtones; Roman numerals still occur in conventional uses like chapter
headings; and the Old English (black letter) script may find its way into certain
books of poetry, wedding invitations, and so on. Many pagan customs found a
place in the Christian structure, such as the traditions associated with Christmas
and Easter to a large degree. In a vanishing bilingual situation the obsolescent
language has considerable stylistic value: nostalgic, comic, or the like (for the
parallels in language see especially§§ 5.15, 7.9, 8.8). A sound change produces
often mere "decor," as in the umlaut in *mys-i, before it is made grammatical
use of, as in mys (§§ 4.5, 5.21). Similarly, many technological and scientific
inventions have been toys before becoming part of utilitarian systems, for
example, electricity and rockets (compare§ 9.16).
RECONSTRUCTION
[21.14 The Comparative Method in Anthropology) Culture is extensively

indexical with respect to man's biological needs; that is, it is part of man
(§ 21.3), and thus actual reconstruction has no solid basis. There is nothing like
the comparative method in linguistics, which gives good approximations of
earlier forms at least, or like the actual skeletons of paleontology. Culture
everywhere serves the realities of the human condition: two-handedness,
biological aging, the male-female dichotomy, the long period of infants'
helplessness, and so on. Consequently the comparative method in anthro-
pology is quite different from that in linguistics (Chapter 11). It is directed
toward ferreting out cultural universals, toward distinguishing those functions
of man that are inborn from those that are acquired. The procedure is known as
cross-cultural comparison; it is syncritical comparison that lines up an inter-
section from all cultures (see§§ 18.8-18.11, 20.7-20.12). This intersection shows
the nature of human nature, the regularities within man; these are either
universal truths or at least statistical probabilities. But once statistical probabili-
ties are drawn in, the danger of loose interpretation arises, and indeed features
occurring in less than half of the world's cultures have been taken as universal,
which is highly doubtful.
Cross-cultural comparison is the basis for anthropologists' generalizations
about culturally regulated human behavior. For example, comparison of religious
behavior among various cultural groups illuminates the functions of religion as a
whole, which are difficult to isolate by studying a single society. Cross-cultural
comparison itself is not explanation, and it should not be taken as a disguised
form of scientific experiment leading to explanation. It is indispensable for the
exposition of the cultural argument. But even if it does not prove anything, it
gives deep insight into the nature of culture. Note that the comparative method
in linguistics also exposes certain possibilities without giving final answers,
because the linguist has to postedit the results of the method.
[21.15 The Historical Method] Since the common core of culture is

universal, the attention is drawn to contrasts rather than similarities. This is
true in linguistics as well. The study of contrasts gives us functional alternatives;
that is, what is the range of possible structures capable of fulfilling a given
(universal) function? And the study of individual cases leads to the reconstruc-
tion of the long-term cultural history of a society. This is the so-called historical
method, which concentrates on well-defined small geographical areas. The
method implies a detailed study of customs in relation to the total culture and
their relation to, and distribution among, the neighboring tribes. The method is
thus culture-internal with glimpses into neighboring geography. It is dialect
geography with cultural items. The comparative method studies the results of
historical growth, the historical method the processes of growth. The two are
complementary and essential for understanding societies and their institutions.
[21.16 Seriation and Stratigraphy] The historical method is of course

seriation and stratigraphy. Cultural seriation is based on the often-contested
assumption that human development has normally proceeded from simple to
complex. Thus simpler forms of a cultural element are often interpreted as of
greater age than the complex ones. The Nootka totem pole consisting of a single
carved figure is thus older than the more elaborate poles of the Haida and
Tsimshian, with superimposed figures (see§ 22.8). The unorganized shamanistic
practices of the Eastern Cree and some other Algonkian tribes may well repre-
sent an older stratum of religion than the more elaborate medicine lodge of the
Ojibwa and Menomini (see§ 20.16). The gradient need not be from simple to
elaborate, but any other logical sequence; for example, realistic picture signs
might develop into geometric designs (see § 1.12). Here the scale is from the
logically prior to the logically secondary. Typological seriation is particularly
clear in (archaeological) artifacts, where mere inspection may give the direction
of development. We are all familiar with series depicting how a box-like auto-
mobile becomes more and more streamlined every year. Pots and axes may show
the same development and thus provide relative footholds for dating.
[21.17] Another kind of seriation is cultural association. Elements and

complexes of culture are always interconnected. Some complexes presuppose
others, and thus one can make inferences about relative chronology. The art of
dressing skins among the Plains Indians is older than making buffalo-skin
tepees. The widespread Eskimo design in bone or ivory of a dot and a circle or
concentric circles is later than the drill with which these designs must be made.
Borrowing may of course disturb our associative inferences very badly, exactly
as in comparative linguistics. Older elements can be embedded into newer com-
plexes (or vice versa), for example, superstitions and pagan rituals in Christian-
ity, or whaling adventures among Nootka family legends. The firmer the
association between two elements, the older the connection; or the more
frequently an element is associated with others, the older it is. For example,
Christianity enters into more cultural areas than do trains. Similarly, loanwords
fall into different hierarchical levels in respect to the grammatical rules to
which they are subject (see§§ 10.16, 10.17, 19.4).
[21.18] Stratigraphy enters the age-and-area hypothesis. The notion of

the culture area is a handy means of organizing vast amounts of data on maps.
Thus for food areas in North America we get caribou, buffalo, salmon, wild
seeds, Eastern maize, and intensive agriculture. Each element has its chracteristic
area. There is, of course, some overlapping at the peripheries. With a sufficient
number of diagnostic elements culture areas can be defined as intersections of
the elements. It is assumed that the cultur~ center is the place for superior
productivity, and when the center mantains itself for some time it tends to
radiate culture content into surrounding zones. Relative age can now be posited
as in dialect geography (see§§ 14.5-14.7, 17.10, 21.2lf.).
[21.19] A theory related to the age-and-area hypothesis is the Kulturkreis-

lehre (doctrine of culture circles). This is the study of cultural similarities
which are apparently not determined by the material element or institution.
Granted that most people have houses of some kind, it is not automatically
given that they should be round or rectangular, have two doors and five windows,
display certain decorations in the eaves, and so on. If there is matching in these
arbitrary accompaniments, historical connection is assumed and the qualitative
criterion has been successful. But still the houses of two peoples might acci-
dentally have the same qualitative features. What excludes chance is the quanti-
tative piling up of qualitative agreements in various parts of culture (e.g.,
building, weapons, religion, and music). This method comes close to the
comparative method in linguistics, because it is based on signs (culture ele-
ments) which contain arbitrary ingredients, and the arbitrary part can of course
point more readily to genetic relation, as it does in language. But there is a
wide distance between the solid comparative method and the much less definite
Kulturkreislehre. If borrowing can be ruled out, there is, however, a certain
parallelism between culture area, diffusion (i.e., borrowing), and linguistic areal
classification (dialect geography) versus Kulturkreis, inheritance (i.e., migration),
and linguistic genetic classification.
[21.20 Living Paradigms in Reconstruction] One requirement of linguistic

reconstruction is that typological or universal facts (known from present-day
languages) cannot be violated. When the methods give us a few footholds (e.g.,
in the form of relational phonemes), we can fill out the rest from our experience
with modern languages (e.g., phonetic reconstruction) (see§§ 16.8, 18.7). Archae-
ology and history face the same situation. Excavation yields the mere (relational)
house posts, and one has to infer the missing parts from the ground plan and
other possible debris. Material objects are often all one has to make inferences
about the rest of culture. We have already seen how this is possible with linguistic
signs(§ 20.13). One can grasp the concept of truths like the Pythagorean theorem
or the comparative method, one can explain realities like thunder and lightning,
but one must understand historical deeds and movements, personalities, and
works of art. Conception, explanation, and understanding are important factors
in historical study, but the last one is a crucial "step into the irrational." To
understand means to be able to set oneself into the assumed circumstances and
to see the (mental) relations of things. "To understand oneself one must
understand others, and to understand others, one must look into oneself" is
Schiller's variant of the principle ofsyncritical comparison in ethnology. We study
history in order to make the present understandable through the past, but the
past would be inaccessible to us, if we could not use our own experience to inter-
pret the traces of past life and societies. In other words, synchrony, diachrony,
and syncrisis are intimately connected, as in linguistics (see Figure 1-7).
[21.21] Thus, using the living paradigms offered by the Eskimos or the
Papuans, anthropologists can supply rather realistic detail for the life of the Ice
Age mammoth hunters of northern Europe, or of the Neolithic peasants
penetrating into the European virgin forests. The folklore of modern gathering
communities may give clues to earlier rituals. The way such communities make
and use tools brings life to archaeological finds. As in linguistics, all theories
must be checked against "living paradigms." And without such present-day
examples much would remain incomprehensible. The psychic unity of mankind
serves as a typological check on reconstruction, even if alone it does not carry
historical meaning other than species specification in relation to other primates.
[21.22 Migration Theory] Linguistic subgrouping and the geographical

distribution of the languages yield information on the direction of population
movements as well as on time depth. There are just two principles of making
inferences about time past. Either great differences, or wide geographical spread
between languages requires time. We have already seen how place-names may
be worn beyond analyzability (§ 20.15), which also indicates passage of time.
Inferences about migration rest on two postulates: (I) The area of origin of
related languages is contiguous, and (2) the probabilities of different recon-
structed migrations are in an inverse relation to the number of reconstructed
language movements that each requires. The first assumption of course gives a
reason to look for a unified home in the case of discontinuous languages rather
than taking the existing distribution as the original one. We are working with
probabilities only, because islands like Sardinia may quite well make the
protolanguage discontinuous. The postulate of least moves is of course the
general principle of simplicity we have seen in rule writing and other derivation
schemes (e.g., subgrouping and drawing family trees). Migration theory uses
these family trees once more for population movements. It is much more likely
that a node in a tree" moved" once rather than many times; for example, it is
more probable that the modern Indic languages differentiated in India after the
speakers of one proto language came there once (which may have taken centuries
or more), rather than that each language came with its own migration (see
§ 15.2). We choose the one move necessitated by the protolanguage against a
dozen or more.
[21.23] Without going into a rigorous step-by-step demonstration of the

method implied by the migration theory, let us refer to one more diagnostic
criterion. The area where the related languages are most differentiated is the
original area of the protolanguage. Sapir's metaphor of the "center of gravity"
of a language family (borrowed from botany) is helpful in understanding the
method. Through Blackfoot, Arapaho, and Cheyenne, the Algonkian family
shows great diversity in the West compared to the rather unified Central and
Eastern languages around the Great Lakes and on the Atlantic; whatever the
exact relation of Wiyot and Yurok (in California) is to Algonkian, they cer-
tainly agree by showing even greater diversity. An attractive inference is that
this language situation shows a west-east movement of the peoples. Similarly,
the Athabaskan languages show deep boundaries in the North (with Haida and
Tlingit as well), against the greater homogeneity on the Pacific and in the South-
west. The migrations must have gone from north to south. The greatest diversity
of Eskimo-Aleut in Alaska, compared to Canada and Greenland, points to
migration toward the East. English is a good test case. Dialectal differences are
far greater in England and Scotland than in North America, South Africa, or
Australia. Thus one would infer that the original home is England as compared
with the other areas, and we know this to be true.
(21.24] Of course history can play tricks on us, and this is why one has to
remember that the method yields probabilities only. But these are very valuable
for ethnology when used together with other nonlinguistic evidence. Modern
mobility and immigration interferes with the method, but in such cases we
generally have documentation to go by. When one finds the Russian colony in
California, one would presumably guess that it came from Russia, or from
Russian Alaska. But simplest derivations are not necessarily always right
historically. The colony is known to have moved first to China, from there to
Brazil, and then to California. Unless loanwords record such routes (see Figure
8-4), mere migration theory is powerless. Every historical method has its weak-
nesses, of course.
[21.25 Conclusion] The few basic characteristics presented in this chapter

cannot do justice to the enormous complexity of the factors involved. It is
wrong to expect simple answers. Let us conclude with a quotation of Sapir: "It
is a comfortable procedure to attach oneself unreservedly or primarily to a
single mode of historical inference and wilfully to neglect all others as of little
moment, but the clean-cut constructions of the doctrinaire never coincide with
the actualities of history" (1916). Sapir identified a malady that was to plague
historical linguistics fifty years later.
REFERENCES
General: Kroeber 1935, 1944, (ed.) 1953, 1963ac, Rice (ed.) 1931, Carroll1953,
Beals and Hoijer 1965, Pike 1967, Jakobson 1969, Hallowell 1956, Henle (ed.)
1965, Hoijer (ed.) 1954, Current Trends in Linguistics vol. 12 (Sebeok ed.), and
see also the selections in the Bobbs-Merrill Reprint Series in Social Sciences;
21.2 Voegelin and Harris 1947, White (ed.) 1956, E. Hall 1959, Fast 1970,
Birdwhistell 1970, Bouissac 1970; 21.3 Lenneberg 1960, L. A. White 1959,
Steiner 1969, Wescott 1969, Fox 1970, Woolfson 1970; 21.4 Kroeber 1919, L.A.
White 1945; 21.5 L. A. White 1945, Eisenstadt 1968, W. Moore 1968, Service
1968, E. Vogt 1968; 21.6 E. Hall1959; 21.7-21.8 Oliver 1964; 21.9 Hoijer 1948,
Holmberg 1954; 21.10 W. Miller 1967, Maher 1970d; 21.12 Whorf 1956,
Hormann 1970, Shands 1970; 21.14-21.15 Irving 1949, Eggan 1954, Leach 1968;
21.16 Paor 1967, Deetz 1967, Sapir 1916, Romney 1957; 21.17 Sapir 1916;
21.18 Ehrich and Henderson 1968; 21.19 W. Schmidt 1939, Greenberg 1957;
21.20-21.21 Childe 1951; 21.22-21.23 Sapir 1916, Dyen 1956, Romney 1957,
Diebold 1960.
CHAPTER 22
GENETIC LINGUISTICS AND

BIOLOGICAL GENETICS
A comparison is made between the phenomena of language

and biology from the point of view of change and recon-
struction. Existence is change.
[22.1 The Genetic Code and Language] One of the recent striking findings
of molecular biology is the structure of the genetic code, which revolves around
compounds known as DNA. These are nucleic acids whose immense molecules
are arranged in double helices. When the strings separate, each helix attracts
the missing part of the original double helix, thus providing exact copies of the
original. A DNA molecule must contain all the information for all the details of
the future plant or animal. How this staggering requirement is met is not known.
DNA is built out of four nucleotides (A, G, T, C), and this gives a four-letter
alphabet of life, combined according to the "grammar of life," as yet undis-
covered. (Curiously, this matches the number of mythical cardinal humors:
blood, phlegm, choler, and melancholy.) The order of the letters is significant,
as well as certain bracketing, that is, commas or "spaces." A DNA code word,
a codon, consists of three letters. The message in DNA is taken up by another
nucleic acid molecule, RNA, and this single-stranded messenger takes it into
the protoplasm, where the transfer RNA each bring their own amino acids,
which form proteins according to the message in the first RNA. In spite of the
attractive chemistry, all this is pure witchcraft, that is, beyond our understanding.
How does DNA regulate growth and specialization of cells of the same genetic
inheritance? How does it determine a bird's song? We do not know. But one
parallel to language is obvious: we have a deep structure, DNA, and rules, RNA,
that take the message to an ultimate surface structure. And, indeed, geneticists
have freely used linguistic terminology; S. K. Saumjan in Russia uses the
biological terms genotype and phenotype as the counterparts of deep and surface
structure. DNA is subject to mutations, the equivalent of deletion and metathesis.
An alphabetic unit can also produce a different result in different positions of the
genetic message, that is, contextual meaning. Now it seems that there is one
crucial difference compared with language: the message goes one way only,
from DNA to RNA, which would be parallel to a grammar for a speaker only.
Such grammars have indeed been popular in linguistics around the late 1960s.
But it now seems certain that certain cancer-producing viruses, consisting of
only RNA and a protein sheath, may make their own DNA once they invade a
host cell. This message from the RNA stays permanently in the host cell, and
cancer is passed on during cell division. This evidence makes the DNA-RNA
389
relations more similar to language, where the machinery is habitually used both
ways (Figure 1-1). Note also the curious facts of regeneration. When the poste-
rior half of a planariandevelops a new front part, it will include the brains as well.
The rear end develops its own future control mechanism(§ 5.7).
[22.2] The parallels are startling, though not perfect. One could find
more; for example, is a grammar of rules only, with no units, a "virus" or a
"cancerous grammar"? A more important question is this: Does genetics
support the view that deep structure is after all the place for determining genetic
relationship of languages? (§ 16.10). The answer is apparently no, because
note that the alphabetic compartments are reversed in language and the genetic
code. The chemical alphabet occurs in the deep structure, the acoustic one in
language in the surface structure. In genetics the "arbitrariness" lies in the fact
that a particular combination of the nucleotides is connected with a particular
meaning (e.g., man, cat, worm, and so on). Similarity in DNA cannot be ran-
dom; it means closer historical connection. Since all forms of life are related,
the matter is one of subgrouping, and it works out as expected; for example,
the primates have closely related DNA as well as similar physical shape, and
so on down the hierarchy. It would seem that DNA parallels support the
position presented in the preceding chapters exactly. Of course such parallels
do not necessarily have any validity whatsoever. But they are so striking that
one can raise the question whether the isomorphism between genetic and verbal
codes results from a mere convergence of similar needs, or whether the verbal
code was imposed directly on the molecular structural principles (see § 21.3).
Language is in part at least a molecular endowment of man, and both the genetic
code and language are anticipatory models of the future (see§ 1.16).
[22.3] A biologist and a linguist, C. D. Darlington and L. F. Brosnahan,

have tried to show that genetic factors do, in fact, interfere with the sounds of
a language. A preference for particular sounds is supposed to depend on a
statistically predominant combination of genes in a mating group. Since gene
combinations in population recombine constantly, genetic drift would now
explain sound shift as well. The authors have plotted various genes and sounds of
Europe and claim to be able to show more than chance correlation between
them. Thus the distribution of the 0-type blood gene at a frequency of 60 per
cent or more in Europe covers roughly the same area as the existence of the
dental fricative. The distribution of this spirant, however, includes both past
and present spread, and there are other fiexibilities as well. So far such a theory
of genetic dominance as deciding the preference for certain sounds has not found
acceptance, either in biology or in linguistics.
CHANGE
[22.4 Direction and Mechanism of Change] According to the second law
of thermodynamics, all natural (chemical and physical/__.. processes tend to
GENETIC LINGUISTICS AND BIOLOGICAL GENETICS 391
proceed toward increased entropy, that is, greater chaos. In other words, they
tend to run down. Organic matter (life) is sharply the reverse, because in it
order tends to increase. The general trend of biological evolution is toward
organisms of greater efficiency as a whole, and this is achieved by more and
more complex synorganization and interdependence of parts. Cells can either
be independent units or collaborate to complex ends. This is in a way a parallel
to language, where various components and units can be studied in isolation,
but where ultimately everything is combined for reaching one end, that of
providing a flexible means for communication. Language and biology share
complicated synorganization in their systems. Life, like language, is complex,
self-reproducing, and self-varying matter, and both inherently reside in the
same structure and imply each other. Mutation is an accidental affair; it takes
place in all directions, but it provides the raw material for evolution. Natural
selection converts accident into apparent design and determines its direction.
Those mutations that improve the fit of the organism to its environment usually
make the organism more fecund and favored (selected) for survival; others will
be ultimately rejected. New and old forms can exist side by side for a long time,
if the mutation is not fatal outright; or, with isolation, both can survive in
different environments. Evolution has also been vexed by the problem of whether
change comes from within or from without. Gene mutations do come from
within, but the future of such changes is mediated by natural selection. Adapta-
tion to the environment is the main causative agent of organic evolution. In
this sense, evolutionary changes come from the environment, that is, interaction
between inheritance and environment. No organism is without a genotype
(deep structure), and no genotype can exist outside an environment, that is, a
continuum of space and time.
[22.5] The parallels to the above in linguistic change are obvious. In the
previous chapters we have seen that linguistic change is a complex phenomenon
in which both internal and external causes must be recognized. In environmental
factors the social ones are the most important, and social factors are of course
further anchored in a particular society, a particular age, and a particular
historical event. Social factors play a role in human evolution as well, because
various incest tabus and marriage systems either prohibit or encourage exchange
of genes between particular individuals. A linguistic innovation is either accep-
ted or rejected by the speakers, or both can be preserved in different environ-
ments, for example, once/one's, mead/meadow, my/mine, metal/mettle etc.
(§§ 5.7-5.9, 7.9). Also linguistic change is subject to choice, a kind of Darwinian
selection. The speakers can choose to change or not to change, and this is
clearest in situations with social motivation. One can sometimes choose one's
group membership and linguistic solidarity. The universality of change (§ 9.1)
makes no change very baffling indeed, and language does not stay put as long
as biology can (for example the ant has remained practically the same for some
fifty million years). Choice is still a force that governs both change and no
change, and in language of course there may be no change in grammar even
392 CoNCLUSION: LINGUISTICS As PART OF ANTHROPOLOGY
if there is in phonology. But over rather short stretches (some one hundred
years or so) language always changes somehow. However, in language there
does not seem to be any improvement or progress in organization; that is,
language retains its basic structure (Figures 1-1, 1-2). There is an efficiency
factor, however, in that areas vital for the community will be matched by
language. The language of the Aymara is adapted to the importance of the
potato, that of the Arabs to the camel, and that of the Eskimos to snow. Thus a
language will increase its efficiency for any particular cultural situation by
developing new vocabulary or syntactic patterns, without violating the universal
laws of language design. The implications of this are explicit in the cultural-
relativistic slogan that every language is as good as any other for the society that
uses it; that is, the Aymara have a rich vocabulary for potatoes, and the Western
languages for airplane screws and nuts. The same seems to be true of organisms
as well: they all are well fitted for the environments they live in. Of course,
languages can borrow from each other to meet specific needs; organisms can-
not: a bird cannot borrow the burrowing and eating habits of a worm. Only
man has been successful in this; he has borrowed underwater travel from the
fish (submarines), armor from the rhinoceros (tanks), flying from the birds
(airplanes), and so on. Ultimately, all this is possible only through language.
[22.6 Teleology, Mentalism, and Function] Even if the genetic code and
the mechanism of natural selection explain one side of biological evolution, it
is not enough for understanding life, or the mind. No notion of awareness of
existence can be extended from physics or chemistry into biology; a non-
mechanistic factor must be involved, and most biologists agree on this point.
Parapsychology, the study of extrasensory perception and psychokinesis, is an
established fact, although still a disquieting one for many scientists (who believe
that they have open minds). Its statistical proofs are impeccable. On the other
hand, statistics shows unequivocally that man cannot exist. Mere evolutionary
accidents would never have produced man. Biologists have had to return to
Aristotle's final causes, which are goal-directed, purposive, and self-regulating.
It is not enough to ask how or for what reason; rather, it is legitimate to ask
for what purpose(§ 9.1). It is the nature of the organism to be oriented toward
the change that occurs. The earlier monistic views based either on matter or on
mind alone are inadequate. This has changed into a both-and attitude and the
beginnings of psychosomatic biology.
Language is also a teleological or goal-directed system. It maintains a certain
dynamic equilibrium for functioning through time, providing a vehicle for
anticipation, initiative, and foresight(§ 21.3). This is quite typical of functional
systems. It can be briefly mentioned here that the notion offunction is applicable
where the following conditions are fulfilled: (l) the object of study can be taken
as a system forming a unitary whole (which is not to say a monolithic lump);
(2) the unitary whole can be ordered as a differentiated complex so that it is
possible to talk about part-whole relationships; and (3) the parts are elements
that contribute to fulfilling the purpose for which the ordered whole has been
set up, that is, the parts must help maintain the whole in a persisting or enduring
state. Phonology alone can satisfy these criteria, since its parts, distinctive
features (or units) and rules, ensure speech synthesis (see§ 9.15); the same is true
of other parts of language, or of culture in general, although such a notion of
function was originally borrowed from biology. Keeping the necessary homeo-
stasis, that is, functioning, the language has to change to stay the same, to
continue to fill its purpose. One of the factors here is the psychological-mental
one of one meaning-one form, shortcuts in particular environments, whether
grammatical or cultural. And then of course one cannot predict which mecha-
nism will be chosen for new nomination when it is needed, or even without a
need (see§ 9.5). As it turns out, the psychological factors of biological evolution
are completely beyond our grasp, at least so far, whereas they are on the whole
understandable where linguistic change is concerned. No doubt much more will
be found out in the future.
RECONSTRUCTION
[22.7 The Influence of Evolution on Linguistics] Geology was an impor-

tant model for biological evolution, and comparative anatomy was an explicit
guide for the founder of Indo-European comparative grammar, Franz Bopp. He
formulated (comparative) linguistics as a natural science, and looked on lan-
guages as natural organisms (in their morphology), which were subject to sickness,
mutilation, and decay. In half a century a compromise was struck: in its method
linguistics is a natural science; but in its object, a social science. It is consequently
understandable why historical explanation became elaborately genetic(§ 1.24);
by preference every science was taken from the historical point of view. It
should be noted that all this happened well before Darwin.
[22.8 Subgrouping, Seriation, and the Comparative Method] The biologist

looks at the results of evolution and then reconstructs the total picture of
derivation that will best fit the facts. Independent confirmation sometimes is
available in the form of fossils, which will help fill out the details. Since all
forms of life are related, the central question is subgrouping, that is, drawing
a family tree on the basis of common innovations. The actual method is firmly
based on seriation and syncritical analysis, because the historical connection is
given in advance. Syncrisis gives us the shared innovations. Thus looking at the
situation of man, we compare him with that form most similar to him, the ape,
and take the intersection. Thereafter we can expand the area to all primates,
then to all mammals, and so on. Since seriation is given by the principle of life
which develops into more complex organizations, we can establish the branch-
ings, and get relative chronology. We arrive at the well-known hierarchy of
taxonomy: species, genus, family, order, class, phylum, and kingdom. (The
kingdoms are animals, plants, viruses, and so on down the scale.) In biology,
subgrouping coincides with typology. Syncrisis thus sifts the shared characteris-
tics, seriation orders them, and the "confusion" of descriptive facts is turned
into history. Schleicher phrased the same principle for language, in that one
need only convert the side-by-side arrangement of systems (e.g., man and fish)
into the successive stages of evolution (fish first). We have seen how seriation
works in making inferences about relative chronology in linguistics (§ 14.7).
There is also a biological equivalent of the comparative method, although it does
not come out as explicitly as the corresponding one in linguistics: there is
certain form (e.g., a bone structure in mammals) which carries a function (i.e.,
meaning, say, locomotion); but the form may be environmentally conditioned
(e.g., the leg, the wing [of a bat], and the flipper [of a dolphin]-these three are
conditioned by land, air, and water, respectively, and thus they are variants of
one mammalian protoform).
[22.9] What makes linguistic reconstruction possible is the irreversibility

of (sound) change, and the same is true of evolution. Thus all terrestial animals
that have become secondarily adapted to aquatic life retain many features that
betray their stay on land. The superficial similarity between whales and fishes
is a case of convergence, owing to the strong environmental selection. Mammals,
of course, ultimately came from water, that is, as fishes do. We have seen the
same phenomenon in a language family, which is the parallel to the life family.
Loans can be spotted by their sound contours, which betray earlier habitats.
Many Indo-European words converge in English, and sometimes it is quite
easy to spot their origin, for example, raise, hale, dentist, and genotype (§ 8.12).
In this sense, it can be said that after considerable further evolution the "whale"
was "borrowed" back into water.
Mammalian flippers point to the interesting parallel that "rule addition,"
that is, adaptation, can ultimately lead to loss, which is true of language as well
(§§ 5.16, 6.14, 6.15). For example, the snake ultimately adapted to crawling and
lost its legs altogether by "rule addition" (compare end of§ 6.15).
[22.10] Physical appearance that is out of line from the expected seriation
reveals "loans" geographically. Sometimes the distribution of certain genes or
gene combinations shows distinct spatial orderliness in the form of statistical
averages that produce a gradient over the map. These gradient steps are called
clines. For example, skin color, dependent on the presence of a complex organic
molecule called melanin, has a general distribution of darker at the equator and
lighter in the north, or away from the equator. This is similar to the "cline"
in French dialect geography with k-ts-s from south to north, that is, decrease in
obstruction (see § 14.6). The reason apparently is that heavy pigmentation
protects against radiation and thus has survival value. Where there is less sun to
cope with, pigmentation decreased accordingly, because all evidence points to
dark as the original color. If these hypotheses are true, the distribution of skin
color clines on the map automatically reveal certain movements(" borrowings").
Thus it is apparent that the New World was populated later than the Old
(although darker pigmentation has developed around the equator in the New
World also), that the majority of the Indonesian population are latecomers,
that the Eskimo have been in the north a shorter time than the Scandinavians,
and so on. In short, this locates disjoint seriation. Often there is other evidence
to support such reasoning.
(22.11) This leads to the question of using diversity for relative chronology
as in migration theory (§§ 21.22, 21.23). The area of greatest diversity is the one of
longer settlement. Thus the racial diversity of man in the Old World points to
oldest settlements there, because this way we need to posit fewer large-scale
migrations. Mutations take time to pile up, and where they have exerted their
influence most, the most time has flown by. In language we could use similar
seriation in that diversity represents an older state of affairs. For example, a dialect
with cow/kine is "older" than one with cow/cows(§§ 14.7, 19.3, 19.4); but note
the case of Finnish type E, which is the latest arrival(§ 19.4). And indeed, the
same danger lurks in biology as well, in the form of adaptive radiation. A famous
example is Darwin's ground finches, from the Galapagos Islands, songbirds
derived from some New World species. The islands provided a perfect evolu-
tionary setting, without competitors or predators. The normal seed-feeding
mode of life was of limited use on the islands, and those variants that could take
advantage of un-finch-like sources of food would flourish. The group now
consists of seed-eaters, omnivorous ground-eaters, insect-eaters, leaf- and bud-
eaters, and a woodpecker type-four genera and fourteen separate species.
Although the birds are still very similar, they have developed beaks that are
adapted to these different modes of food gathering. On the mainland there were
no such low-pressure niches available, and no such differentiation has occurred.
Reconstruction is a very delicate puzzle game indeed. Note that the filling of
ecological niches by various forms of life has a certain similarity to filling the
holes in phonological patterns (§ 9.6). When genetic drift alters a single species
in the same environment, there is often the difficulty in deciding when it becomes
a new species. The same problem recurs in linguistics-for example, the bound-
ary between Old and Middle English (see§ 21.9).
[22.12 Decay Dating-Giottochronology) We have seen that some of the

methods of reconstruction are the same for language, culture and biology,
notably stratigraphy and (typological) seriation. Dendrochronology, dating
by the year rings of trees, is also a kind of stratigraphy or seriatwn, because the
tree fingerprints the sequence of fat and lean years. In a way this is parallel to
how the whales have recorded their stay on land. Atomic physics has made
available a chronological method of very wide application in archaeology.
Owing to the bombardment of the upper atmosphere by cosmic rays from outer
space, some atoms of the nitrogen isotype 14 N are converted into atoms of the
carbon isotype 14 C, which is radioactive. This mixes with the ordinary carbon
12
C contained in the carbon dioxide of the atmosphere, which is absorbed by
living organic matter. The proportion of 14 C and 12 C is constant, and the
proportion absorbed by organisms is the same as that in the atmosphere. Once

an organism dies it ceases to take in carbon. Because 14 C is radioactive, it decays
(reverts back to nitrogen) at a steady rate: half of the original quantity takes
some 5,600 years to "evaporate." The ratio 14C to 12 C in the sample tells when
the organism died. There are of course many problems with this method, but
this is the basic principle.
(22.13] Genetic linguistics has its own decay dating, known as glotto
chronology. One of its underlying assumptions is that some items of the vocab-
ulary are better preserved than others: lower numerals, pronouns, body parts,
natural objects, basic actions, and so on-items referred to as the basic core
vocabulary. Words that are intimately tied with cultural items suffer loss with
the items themselves; for example, the vocabulary of falconry went with the
practice (any dead metaphors surviving today are synchronically unanalyzable).
Another assumption is that the rate of attrition in the core vocabulary is con-
stant, so that about 81 per cent of the original two-hundred-item core vocabulary
set would be preserved after a thousand years. The time of separation, t, is now
equal to the logarithm of the percentage of cognates, c, divided by twice the
logarithm of the percentage of cognates retained after a thousand years of
separation, r:
t = log c
2log r
The cognates are decided through strict observance of meaning; for example,
'animal' between English and German comes out as animal/Tier, that is, no
cognation, even though Tier can be etymologically aligned with English deer
(§ 7.12). Generally, inspection and matchings are used, because inaccuracies
can be expected to cancel each other out.
Glottochronology has often been equated with lexicostatistics, but it is
advisable to take the latter as a wider field of statistics in the service of historical
vocabulary studies, including stylostatistics for determining disputed authorship.
Stylostatistics can also be used for establishing relative chronology within the
output of one author. But the prime function oflexicostatistics is the determina-
tion of the degree of lexical relationship among related languages. This can be
expressed in dips calculated, for example, by the formula
d = 14 log c
2log r
or by other similar means. When used for lexicostatistical subgrouping such a
method tells relative closeness only, and its potential value is great for language
families not yet worked out in detail by the conventional methods. For many
languages only word lists are available, so a lexicostatistical subgrouping gives
a useful interim result and may give valuable hints for the other methods as well.
There is a certain parallel to biological subgrouping ascertained by counting the
agreements between DNA of the various forms of life. Although the method
yields numerical indices (compare Figure 16-2) between languages, these need
not be interpreted to the letter, if nonnumerical evidence points to the contrary.
As always in historical investigation, one-sided rigidity must be avoided. Note
that low numerical values mean diversity, and such figures can be used for
migration theory. If low figures cluster in one geographic area, it means older
settlement (see §21.22).
[22.14] Of the three uses of lexicostatistics, (1) time depth (glottochronol-

ogy), (2) subgrouping, and (3) genetic relationship, the first has run into the
most difficulty. With greater and greater time depth the percentage of cognates
diminishes rather rapidly; an example that shows the even millennia from the
nomographic curve with an assumed retention rate of 81 per cent follows:
millennia 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
percentage of
66 43 29 18 12 8 5 3 2
shared vocabulary
It is clear that spotting the cognates and loans after nine thousand years can be
rather haphazard, especially in view of the extensive phonological changes that
must be expected for such a time depth. Critical break-off points are the 3,000-
to 4,000-year range, with a time span of less than 1,000 years, say, 500 at least
(note that the comparative method obeys similar limitations, § 18.1). On the
other hand, distant relationship is a real phenomenon, and on the whole
glottochronology agrees with our notions, which were independently established.
The difficulties of spotting cognates can be seen clearly in English be/future,
and wright/organ (§ 8.12). Of course, glottochronological work requires that
the meanings be the same, which helps. It is generally required that time depth
be speculated upon only after comparative work. Point 3 does not mean that
lexicostatistics alone would prove genetic relationship. But the basic core
vocabulary is very valuable in giving a quick elicitation list for those items where
loans are least likely, and thus one can start comparative work conveniently
from here (see§ 18.6). It is clear that lexicostatistics is supplementary to other
methods, both as a preliminary starting point and in the final subgrouping and
chronological inferences.
Problems abound in every sector of the method, both in its basis and its
application (but of course this is true to differing degrees of the traditional
methods also). It is difficult to devise a universal, basic core vocabulary; for
example, how prevalent are 'snow', or even 'animal', 'tree', 'kill', and 'know'
as generic terms? Of course, there is no sharp dichotomy between basic and
nonbasic; once more we have a continuum that is broken up for practical
reasons (as in competence/performance). The two-hundred or so "words" in
the list do not all have the same probability for being replaced; rather, each
meaning has its own. Without going into all its shortcomings, it can be stated
that the method is still rather effective. In particular, it makes our intuitions
about time spans and basic vocabularies maximally explicit (see§ 18.10). In at
least half the cases it has given reasonable results, which is more than certain
proposed universals in culture can claim (see§ 21.14). Of course, there are cases
where a strong literary tradition, contact, or strong tabu effects have distorted
results of the method. The method is not without value, but neither is it omnip-
otent. Although claims about chronology are weak, further inquiry is justified
by the results so far. Lexicostatistics must contribute to and draw from the
general theory of culture change, and the numerical expressions of linguistic,
cultural, and biological distance should be correlated. We have returned to an
area where more has to be found out about language typology (how to pick out
the basic vocabulary) and the influence of society, for example, how it affects
the rate of change (see §§ 21.9-21.11), or the formation of tabus. No area of
genetic linguistics is settled for good. The student meets new challenges every-
where.
REFERENCES
General: Hockett 1948b, Kroeber 1963b, Beals and Hoijer 1965, Zipf 1965,
Lenneberg 1967, Spuhler (ed.) 1967, Jakobson 1969; 22.1 Crick 1962, 1966,
Nirenberg 1963, Yanofsky 1967, Beadle and Beadle 1967, Baltimore and Temin
and Mizutani 1970; 22.2 Chao 1967; 22.3 Darlington 1947, 1955, Brosnahan
1960, 1961, Hogben 1956; 22.5 Greenberg 1959, Hymes 1961; 22.6 Emmet 1958,
Segerstrale 1968; 22.7 Hoenigswald 1963, Maher 1966, Neumann 1967; 22.10
Huxley 1953, Brosnahan 1961, Brace and Montagu l965; 22.12 Paor 1967,
Deetz 1967; 22.13-22.14 Kroeber and Chretien 1937, Swadesh 1951, 1952, 1955,
Lees 1953, Gudschinsky 1956, Arndt 1959, Hymes 1960, Dyen 1962, 1964,
1965ab, Dyen and James and Cole 1967, Martinet (ed.) 1968, Sankoff 1970,
Lees 1953, Chretien 1962, Bergs1and and Vogt 1962, Teeter 1963, Fodor 1965,
H. Vogt 1965, L. Campbell 1971, Hymes and Sherzer, Rea, and Hattori in
Sebeok (ed.) 1963f. vol. 11.
APPENDIX I
SYLLABUS TO SOME INTRODUCTIONS TO

HISTORICAL LINGUISTICS
The following works are included: Bloomfield, Language (1933); R. A. Hall,

Introductory linguistics (1964); Hockett, A course in modern linguistics (1958);
Lehmann, Historical linguistics (1962); Sapir, Language (1921 ), Selected writings
(1949, David Mandelbaum, ed.). Note that in this syllabus comparative lin-
guistics is taken before historical.
I. Introduction: synchronic vs. diachronic linguistics; history and the nature

of historical research; beginnings of historical research in language.
Bloomfield, Chapter I (numbers mean chapters, except when otherwise
indicated).
2. Writing and language: written records. Lehmann 4; Bloomfield 17; Hall44,
45; Hockett 42, 43, 62.
3. The nature of linguistic change: kinds of linguistic change; lineal and
collateral relationships; the discovery of linguistic relationships and
groupings. Lehmann I.
4. Classification of languages: genealogical and typological; major language
families of the world.
Lehmann 2, 3; Bloomfield 4; Sapir 4, 5, 6; Hockett pp. 587-598.
5. Methods in comparative linguistics
(a) The comparative method: Lehmann 5; Bloomfield 18; Hall 50, 51;
Hockett 57-60.
(b) Internal reconstruction: Lehmann 6; Hall 49; Hockett 55.
(c) Lexicostatistics: Lehmann 7; Hall 66; Hockett 61.
(d) Dialect geography: Lehmann 8; Bloomfield 19; Hall 41-43; Hockett
56.
(e) On the nature of linguistic groupings: Lehmann 9.
6. Change in language
(a) Phonological change: Lehmann 10; Bloomfield 20-22; Hall 49, 52;
Hockett 52, 53.
(b) Grammatical change, analogy: Lehmann 11; Bloomfield 23; Hall
55-58; Hockett 50, 51, 54.
(c) Semantic change: Lehmann 12; Bloomfield 24; Hall 59, 60.
(d) Borrowing: Lehmann 13; Bloomfield 25-27; Hall 52, 53; Hockett
46-49.
(e) Standard languages, pidgins, creolized languages: Lehmann 13; Hall
61, 64, 65.
7. Linguistic change and changes in culture: Sapir, Selected writings, pp. 432-460.
399
APPENDIX II
READING LIST FOR

AN ADVANCED COURSE
More advanced courses in genetic linguistics often carry special emphasis on

certain aspects of the field or a certain language family. Thus it is impossible to
devise a reading list perfect for each situation in advance. The following one is a
rough model for the traditional central topics. It provides considerable historical
depth, as well as enough controversy for discussion. For a comprehensive seminar
list the instructor must often go beyond the items given in the Bibliography,
below, although this may not always be necessary, because the references after
each chapter also provide advanced reading.
I. Linguistic change in general: Coseriu 1958; Weinreich, Labov, and

Herzog 1968; Lass (ed.) 1969 (from the point of view of English); Wart-
burg 1969; Andersen 1972 (and see references for§ 9.16).
2. Sound change: F6nagy 1956-1957, 1967; Labov 1963, 1965; Koch 1970;
Andersen 1969, 1972 (and see references for§ 9.16).
3. Analogy: Schuchardt 1928; Hermann 1931; Kurylowicz 1945-1949;
Manczak 1958; Dinneen 1968; King 1969b; Leed 1970.
4. Semantic change: G. Stern 1931; Coseriu 1964.
5. Syntactic change: Havers 1931; Traugott in Lass (ed.) 1969, 1969, 1971;
Bever and Langendoen in Stockwell and Macaulay (eds.) 1971.
6. Methods in reconstruction: Hermann 1907; Bo'nfante 1945, 1946;
Hoenigswald 1946, 1950, 1960a; Allen 1953; Marchand 1956; Chafe 1959;
Ellis 1966; Bailey 1969; KatiCic 1970.
7. Syntactic reconstruction: Fokos-Fuchs 1962; Teeter 1964; Watkins
1965; 1966; R. Hall1968; Dressler 1971.
8. Semantic reconstruction: Benveniste 1954; Friedrich 1970.
9. Language relationship: Kroeber 1913; Schuchardt 1917; Hymes 1959.
10. Language subrelationship: Brugmann 1884; Hoenigswald 1966.
11. Language typology in historical linguistics: Jakobsen 1958; K. H.
Schmidt 1966; Kuipers 1968; Greenberg 1969a.
A convenient and useful shorter compilation that somewhat overlaps these

suggestions is Allan R. Keiter (ed.), A reader in historical and comparative
linguistics. New York, Holt (1972).
400
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INDEX
abbreviations, 41 Anatolian, 304, 307

abduction, 196-203, 227 Anglo-Norman, 76
ablaut, 250, 264-70 Anglo-Saxon, 35. See also Old English
abruptness of change, 77, 109, 129, 153 animal communication, 26
absolute change, 12 Annamese, 314-15
absolute (historical) order, 109 anomaly vs. analogy, 88
abstraction, 104 anticipation, 73-74, 76, 91
abstractness, 4, 10 Apache, 157
acculturation, 382 aphasia, 112-13
achronological restatements, 116 apocope, 72
acronyms, 41 application of method, 219
actuation problem, 202 apriorism, 362
adaptation, 92, 157-58 Arabic, 10, 127, 158, 162, 196, 231, 244, 271,
adaptive radiation, 395 311,392
addition to grammar: 195; of segments, 69 Arapaho, 387
additive order, 110 archaeological evidence, 163
adstratum, 154, 171 archaism, 154
affixive, 310-11 areal classification, 321-22
Afrikaans, 160 areal linguistics, 297- 98
age differences, 192 Armenian, 165, 304-305, 371
age-and-area hypothesis, 384-85 art, 15
agglutinating languages, 11, 311-12, 315 articulatory balance, 186, 198
agglutinative analog, 312 articulatory classification of change, 71-75
Akkadian, 23 articulatory expenditure, 198
Albanian, 172, 304- 305 articulatory optimization, 198
algebra, 17 artificial languages, 175-76
Algonkian, 387 aspects of methods, 213
allomorph, 6 assibilation, 72-73
allomorphic alternation, 144 assimilation, 71, 72-74
allophone, 5, 58-59 association, 13, 107, 187, 203
allophonic writing in reconstruction and proto- asterisk ( *), 231
languages, 239, 245, 249, 342 Athabaskan, 374, 387
all-pervasiveness of change, 179 attitude index, 192
alphabetic writing, 32-33 Avestan, 368
Altaic, 320, 321 avoidance of homophony (-nymy), 79, 80, 98-
alternation: 6; and comparative method, 250- 99, 181-82, 184
52 Aymara, 10, 392
ambiguity, 128, 136, 137, 197
American English, 48, 112, 139, 168, 182, 195, Baltic, 155, 160, 161, 164, 169, 173-74, 305
210-11,237,269,283,293,298,315 Baltic Finnic, 79, 99, 119, 127, 149, 154, 155,
American Finnish, 140, 147, 156-57, 168-69, 158, 159, 163, 164, 168, 173-74, 185, 189,
172, 177 253, 274, 280, 301, 303
American Indian languages, 160, 320, 370 Balto-Slavic," 304- 305, 367, 371
American Italian, 157 Bantu, 311, 313
American Lithuanian, 156 Basic English, 175, 176, 178
American Norwegian, 157 basic vocabulary, 187, 231, 340, 397
analogy: 28, 76, 77, 83, 84, 88-108, 123, 124, before-after relations, 129, 148
126, 129-30, 131, 133, 140, 141, 170, 180-81, bilingualism, 52, 140, 154, 157, 167-69 passim,
277; vs anomaly, 88; existence of, 106-107; 270-71, 292
faculty for, 105; nonproportional, 91-94; biological change, 390-93
phonetic, 196; preventive, 100; proportional, biological continuity, 20, 53
88-91, 93, 283; and rules, 146; as a type of biological reconstruction, 393-95
reasoning, 105 biuniqueness, 278
analysis: 212-13; and analogy, 348, 357 Black English. See Negro English
analysis-by-synthesis, 213 Blackfoot, 387
analytic languages, 311, 313, 314 bleeding order, 110
analyzability, 159-60, 373-74 blending (blends), 28, 42, 76, 142
429
430 INDEX
Boolean algebra, 342-46, 369-72 comparative linguistics, 3-4, 19, 20, 21, 43-45,
borrowing: 104, 144, 154-77, 180, 230-31 , 241, 202, 212-13, 327
316, 328-29, 332, 382, 392, 394; direction of, comparative method: 50, 229-56, 266, 278-82,
158-60; as evidence of cultural contacts, 298, 331, 385; and alternations, 250-52; in
162- 63; as evidence of earlier stages, 160- anthropology, 383; in biology, 394; and
61; and geographical position, 163-64; in- grammar, 364-66; limitations of, 244, 252,
ternal evidence of, 164-67; and levels of 254, 280; and segments or features, 245; in
grammar, 167-71; pronunciation borrowing, synchrony, 47-50, 282-84, 383-84
156, 157, 162; resistance to, 169, 188; and comparative-method machines, 203
structure of lexicon, 161-62; and stylistic competence, 107, 123, 124, 129
levels, 162; from within, 141, 145, 328 complementarity: of methods, 278; of methods
bow-wow theory, 28 of reasoning, 196-98, 202; of scliools of
Braille, 40 thought, 323-25, 341
brain order, 113 complementary distribution, 208, 215, 220-21,
break in traditions, 175 224, 237, 239, 268-70
Breton, 173 components, 6-11
British English, 42, 90-91, 201, 283 compounds, 38, 144
broad transcription, 207, 212, 222 concreteness, 10
buffer zone, 182-83 conditioning, 62, 229
Bulgarian, 284 confirmation, 240- 42
Burmese, 170, 172 conjunctive definition, 343, 369
consonant gradation, 97, 122, 221-22, 250-55,
345-46
call systems, 27 contamination, 42, 71, 76, 91, 95, 299
calque, 140 context: and protomeaning, 370; and semantic
capacity for language, 20, 27, 176, 198 reconstruction, 372
case syntax, 364-66 contiguity, 142
Catalan, 298 contrast, 188, 208-12, 214, 231, 233, 235, 247,
cause and effect, 13, 127-29, 194 248, 251
causes of change, 179-81, 193, 380 contrastive linguistics (analysis), 21, 316
Celtic, 171, 304-305 convergence, 172-74, 394
center of gravity (diversity), 387, 395, 397 coordination, 151
chance: exclusion of, 230, 231, 385 Coptic, 311
change: 13, 318; all-pervasiveness of, 179; bio- core pattern, 292
logical, 390-93; and description, 12; in eval- correspondence: 11, 27, 28, 159, 165-66, 170,
uation, 148-49; irreversibility of, 394; mech- 335-41 passim; among dialects, 48; form-
anisms of, 179-81, 195; as persistence and meaning, 100-101; language-writing, 34;
existence, 380, 393; primary, 124, 130; and sound-letter, 43
sign types, 14, 19, 133-34; and social regis- creation, 106, 125, 127, 153
ter, 128; and usage, 128; and variation, 84- creole, 176
85 cross-cultural comparison, 383
checking the reconstruction, 224, 239-42, 253- cultural association, 384
55, 318, 346, 366, 371, 386 cultural context, 153
Cheremis, 74, 164, 170, 299, 301 cultural diffusion, 291, 382
Cheyenne, 387 cultural expansion, 139
children's speech, 89, 92, 93, 101, 105, 113, 126, cultural reconstruction, 383-87
127, 176, 194-95, 200-201 cultural seriation, 384
Chinese, 38, 45, 79, 231, 311, 313, 317, 320 cultural situation, 146
Chinook Jargon, 173, 176 cultural universals, 383
Chiricahua, 157- 58 cultural variation, 190
choice: of labels, 243, 244; selection for survi- culture: 19-20, 310; and biology, 378-79;
val, 330, 391 change in, 199, 379-83
classification: areal, 321- 22; as explanation, cumulative evidence, 173, 385
179-80; genealogical, 317, 318-22; of lan- Czech, 75, 78, 199
guages, 11, 310-16; of mixed languages, 176-
77; of rule change, 123-25; of semantic Danish, 89
change, 148- 49; of signs, 12- 18; of sound dead languages, 23
change, 57; typological, 310-18 deadlocks on methods, 210-11, 220, 239, 242,
clines, 394 252-53, 340-41
clothing, 199, 379 decay dating, 395-96
Cockney, 77 deduction, 93, 103, 129, 151, 196-98, 200, 202,
code switching, 171 213, 225, 362
coinage, 139 deep structure, 123, 389-90
collateral relationship, 19 definition: of consonants, 7-9; of language,
color terms, 10- 11 12-13, 27, 31; of vowels, 7
combined evidence, 235, 252, 277 dephonologization, 70
comparative anatomy, 393 description, 129, 179-80, 198
INDEX 431
descriptive linguistics, 20 epigraphy, 43
descriptive order, 113 Eskimo, 10, 162, 311, 314-15, 392
descriptive prerequisite, 3 Eskimo-Alent, 387
determinatives, 33 Esperanto, 175, 176
Devanagari, 40 Estonian, 79, 80, 82, 91, 97, 98, 100, 102, 116,
devoicing, 117, 195, 196, 199-200 120, 139, 201, 211, 224, 280, 301
diachronic correspondence, 129, 153, 195, 198 etalon language, 316, 317
diachronic linguistics, 20 Etruscan, 23
diachrony, 21, 202-203 etymology, 326-33
diacritic features, 211, 226-27 euphemism, 139-40, 145-46
diagrammatic representation of lexical vs. European Pidgin Romance, 175
grammatical meanings, 17, 196 evidence: 112; of change and variation, 35-37;
diagrams: 16-17, 50, 170; between different for syntactic rules, 357-58
languages, 255; showing distinctive-feature evolution: 20, 153; and linguistics, 393
hierarchies, 195-96 exception features, 225
dialect, 289 exceptions, 64, 86, 127, 218, 225
dialect boundary, 290 excessive shortness, 184
dialect cohesion, 283-84, 292 excrescence, 67-69, 70, 72, 80
dialect correspondence, 47-50, 58 experimentation, 24, 333, 383
dialect geography: 182-83, 289-99, 304-309; explanation: 24, 84, 126, 131, 197, 383; of
in the service of comparative linguistics, 306 change, 179-81
dialect variation, 255, 282-84 extension, 91, 97, 98, 104, 107, 125, 127, 130,
dialectology, 47 148-49
diaphoneme, 283, 284, 292, 293-94 external causation, 180
diasystem, 292, 298-99, 317 extrapolation, 131, 201
diatopicality, 21
differentiation, 107, 143-45, 170, 382 factors of change, 179-81, 193, 380
diffusion, 155 facts, 18, 23-24, 112, 113
diglossia, 52 faculty for analogy, 105
directionality, 166, 362-63, 389-90 fading: 145-56, 148, 149-50, 153, 162, 199,
discovery procedures, 202-203, 362 356; degrees of, 151
disjunctive definition, 343, 369, 370 family trees, 44, 300-304, 307-309, 342-44,
dissimilation, 71, 74-75 381, 386
distant relationship, 320-21, 338, 397 fashion, 190
distinctive features: 6-9, 115, 158, 195-96, 245; feature phoneme, 211
shown diagrammatically, 195-96 feeding order, 110
distribution of phonemes, 167 field work, 21
division of linguistics, 20-22 figures of speech, 141, 148
Dravidian, 321 filling gaps, 120, 184-86, 395
drift, 194, 200, 252, 254, 352 Finnic, 300-301, 304
drum and whistle speech, 39 Finnish, 14, 72, 73, 74, 76, 79, 80, 83-84, 92,
drunkard's search, 324 103-104, 113, 114, 116, 119-20, 121-23,
Dutch, 57 124, 126, 129, 139, 140, 149-52 passim,
155-64 passim, 167-68, 169-72 passim, 182,
ease of articulation, 189, 198 185,186,203,209,211,219-22,224,225-27,
ecological influence, 381 228, 230, 231, 250-55, 274, 276-77, 280,
effect, 131 284, 290, 301, 320, 328, 344, 345-46, 348,
efficiency, 392 353-55,357,362,367,369
Egyptian (writing), 38, 39, 45 Finno-Ugric, 149, 163-64, 169, 300-301
elaboration, 143-44 flectionallanguages, 311-12
ellipsis, 138, 142, 143-44 flective languages, 310-11
empirical science, 24 Flemish, 183
English, 9-11, 14, 17, 26, 33-37, 40, 41, 42, 51, flip-flop, 112
57-59, 64-80 passim, 84-97 passim, 101, 102, focal area, 294
104, 108, 109, 110, 114-15, 119, 125, 126, folk etymology, 92, 142, 144, 160, 182, 201,
127, 136, 137, 140-49 passim, 151, 155, 158- 203, 369
62 passim, 164-65, 169, 172, 176, 177, 184, folklore investigation, 333-34
187, 188, 190-91, 196, 201, 203, 208, 209, form: 142; of rules, 114-17
210, 214-18, 219, 226-27, 229-42, 247, 249, Fox dialect, 48, 50, 53, 171
267, 297, 311-14 passim, 318, 320, 327, 329, Franco-Provencal, 298
333, 335, 352-53, 355, 356, 366-67, 368-73 Franklin, 171
passim, 387, 394, 396 French, 14, 42, 59, 69-74, passim, 80, 84, 85,
entelechy, 193 93, 101,109, 110, 126, 134-36,138,140, 142,
entropy, 391 143, 145, 148, 149, 154, 157, 160-61, 162, 165,
environment: 61, 231, 233, 235, 247, 248, 256; 167, 168, 171, 172, 173, 176, 182, 184, 187,
in evolution, 391; in syntax-semantics, 364- 190, 191, 230-31, 234, 294, 298, 317, 333,
65, 366 335, 356, 361, 370
432 INDEX
frequency, 101, 105, 181, 187-88, 191 heraldry, 15

function: of change, 141, 146; duplication of, heterogeneity of sound change, 86
382; of phonological rules, 196; primary and hierarchical depth, 370
secondary, 102, 161-62; of speech, 181, 189 hierarchical scales, 317-18
functional systems, 392-93 Hieroglyphic Hittite, 38
functional yield, 188 High German, 165, 290, 299
fusional, 313 Hindi, 164
historical connection, 166, 231
Gaulish, 171 historical events, 59-60
genealogical (genetic) classification, 317, 318- historical explanation, 24-25, 112, 129, 180,
22 393
general laws, 18, 24 historical gaps, 85
generalization, 97 historical hints, 218
generativeness, 106 historical limits, 84, 349
genetic code, 387-90 historical linguistics, 3, 19, 20, 213, 327
genetic drift, 390 historical method (in anthropology), 383-84
genetic explanation, 25, 180 historical order (and syntactic change), 361-62
genetic linguistics: 3, 19, 44-45, 47; and historical records, 23
typology, 316-18 historical truth, 240, 243, 252, 253
genetic relationship, 177, 319, 338, 396-97 history: 24-25, 349; of linguistics, 22, 323-25;
geographical differences, 192 role of (in change), 152, 327-29, 387
geographical distribution, 183, 386 Hittite, 23, 33, 38, 74, 272, 307, 358-59
Georgian, 244, 311 holes in patterns, 184-86, 194
German, 14, 15, 33, 34, 40, 42, 68, 71, 73, 75, homophony (-nymy): 33, 38, 144, 349, 372;
76, 81-82, 85, 86, 92, 93, 94, 97, 102, 107, avoidance of, 79, 80, 98-99, 181-82, 184;
116, 119-20, 122, 124, 136, 137, 140, 141, insidious, 182, 184
142, 145, 147-51 passim, 160-61, 169, 182-83, Hopi, 11, 316
187, 195, 199, 201, 210, 218-19, 229-42, Hungarian, 73, 74, 149, 163, 164, 300-301
284, 296, 329, 332, 338-40, 344, 367-68, Hupa, 374
371, 396 hypercorrection, 50, 90-91, 190, 193, 196, 200,
Germanic, 65-67, 71, 76, 89, 111, 139, 156, 282-83, 331
159, 161, 163, 164, 169, 171, 173-74, 229, hypothesis: 23-24, 113; testing of, 197-98, 202,
230, 231, 239, 240, 242, 245-49, 253, 267, 362
272, 275-76, 303, 304-305, 329, 330, 331, hypothetical inference, 196
356, 362, 367, 368, 371
glottochronology, 396-98 icon, 13, 16
Gothic, 66, 73, 145-49, 159, 161, 241, 242, iconic arrangement (order), 17, 38, 40, 98
264-67, 275-76, 336-37, 358 . iconic relation, 43
gradience, 123-24, 130 iconic tendency, 92
gradualness of change, 77, 129, 153 iconicity: 17, 88, 106, 142, 152, 255; and
grammar: 4, 17; of behavior, 378, 379 change, 45; in morphology, 99; of rules,
grammatical conditioning, 77-81, 99, 100, 102, 195-96; in semantic change, 141-42; in writ-
180, 187, 216-17, 218, 222, 224, 242, 248, ing, 37-38
280, 357 idealism, 324
grammatical criteria, 213 ideography, 31, 32
grammatical environment, 62, 118-19 idioms, 11, 28, 38
grammatical hierarchy, 365 Ilocano, 75
grammaticalization, 149-52 image, 16
grammatology, 31 imperfect learning, 194
graphemics, 32, 33 implicational universals (laws), 317-18, 363
great English vowel shift, 96 importation, 156
Greek: 23, 33, 40, 60, 66, 74-75, 86, 89, incorporating, 311
98-99, 102-103, 128-29, 138, 152, 159, 160, index: 13; formation of, 190
164-65, 170, 177, 198-99, 201, 230, 245-49, indexical elements, 91-92
267, 273, 296, 297, 304-306, 309, 311, 328- indexicality: 142, 148-49, 152; and change, 45,
29, 332, 344-45, 348, 349, 351, 358, 364-68, 141-41; in writing, 37-38
370, 371; alphabet, 39; orthography, 33 Indic, 305, 371
Grimm's law, 65-66, 111, 115-16, 188-89, Indo-European: 150, 160, 169, 176, 188, 239,
247; 256, 341 240, 244-50, 300, 313, 381; linguistics, 22-23
Gypsy. See Romany Indo-Hittite, 307, 309
Indo-Iranian, 304-305, 317, 366-67
Haida, 387 Indo-Semitic, 320
Haitian Creole French, 176 lndo-Uralic, 320
Hamito-Semitic, 321 induction: 24, 25, 93, 128, 129, 196-98, 202,
haplology, 71, 75 213, 225; in change, 103
Hawaiian, 156 inflecting, 311
Hebrew, 244 inflectional adjustment, 157
INDEX 433
inflectional suffixes: origin of, 149-50 Lapp, 68, 71, 79, 80, 88, 98, 102, 127, 130, 164,
Ingrian, 301 168, 169, 170, 203, 219, 222-25, 250-54, 274,
inheritance, 154, 231 276-77, 280, 284, 294-95, 300-302, 303, 327
injunctive, 360, 361-62 laryngeal theory, 266-73
innate capacity for language and analogy, 104, Latin, 23, 42, 59-61, 66, 69-80 passim, 83, 85,
112, 141, 194 86, 92-102 passim, 109-11 passim, 134-38
inner language, 107 passim, 142, 145, 146-47, 148, 150, 152, 160,
innovation: 43, 44, 102, 124, 298-99, 303, 306; 164-65, 166, 168, 169, 177, 182, 184, 230,
shared, 239, 303 234, 245-49, 267-72, 294, 297, 306, 312, 313,
input, 114 315, 317, 329-30, 331, 332, 356-59 passim,
internal analysis (of synonyms), 366-69 361, 364-68, 370-72 passim
internal causation, 180, 186 law and tendency, 85
internal reconstruction: 60, 70, 109, 218, 227, law of the instrument, 324
229, 249, 254-55, 264-72, 278-82, 331, 344- law of Waterloo, 59-60
46, 348, 357; of environments, 265 laws of semantic change, 147-48
internal-reconstruction machines, 203 least effort, 198
interplay between sound change and analogy, lectio difficilior, 44, 298, 318, 359
94-97 leveling, 91, 95, 97, 104, 107, 130
inverse derivation, 201-202 levels, 3-5, 78, 214
inverse spelling, 36, 43 lexicalization: 151-52; rules for, 134
inverted reconstruction, 345-46 lexicon, 17, 161-62
inverted word order, 202 lexicostatistics, 396-98
Iranian, 165, 305, 329, 371 limitations of comparative method, 244, 252,
Iroquois, 374 254, 280
irregular change, 187-88, 242, 253-54 linear relationship, 19
irregularity: 85-86, 94-95, 97, 105; and match- lingua franca, 175
ings, 339 linguistic collocation, 138
irreversibility of change, 394 linguistic cycle, 317
isogloss, 182-83, 290, 304-309 linguistic paleontology, 373
isolating languages, 11, 311-12, 315 linguistic sign: 6, 13, 365; arbitrariness of, 13-
Italian, 74, 136, 137, 170, 296, 315, 328-31, 332 14, 19, 255; its meaning-sound linkup, 100-
Italic, 304-305 102, 255, 302-303; one-to-many, 100-101;
item-and-arrangement, 212-13 one-to-one, 98, 133; in reconstruction, 365
linguistic variation, 141
Japanese, 156, 231, 296, 320 linguistics and social science, 377-78
Jukun, 259-63 literary criticism, 324-25
juncture, 209-210, 226 literature, 22
juxtaposition, 13 Lithuanian, 66, 74, 85, 116, 158, 160, 162, 246,
358-59, 368, 381
Kamassian, 301 Livian, 38, 64, 80, 84, 301, 303
Kannada, 172, 316 loan (word): 126-27, 138, 155-58, 162-69, 227-
Karelian, 79, 99, 149, 158, 254, 301 28, 241, 281, 339, 384; spotting of, 394
Kartvelian, 244, 315, 321 loan translation, 140, 144, 156, 169
Kekchi, 69 loanblend, 156
Kentish, 58 loanshift, 156
kinship terms, 10-11, 52 logogram, 33
Kituba, 173, 175 logography, 32, 38
koine, 176-77 logology, 41
Korean, 39, 231, 320 logosyllabic, 38
Kulturkreislehre, 385 loss: 69; as conditioning, 64; of marking, 127,
143, 153, 188; of motivation, 138-39, 202-
Lachmann's law, 83 203
lag, 73-74, 76, 91 Low German, 165,172,231,241,290,299
language: definition of, 12-13, 27, 31; indeter- Lude, 149, 172, 177, 301
minacy of (natural), 131; influence of writing Luwian, 38
on, 41; mixed, 171-72; origin of, 26-28;
written, 31 Macedonian, 284
language animal, 378 Malay(an), 75, 311
language change as culture change, 380-82 Malayo-Polynesian, 381
language classification, 11, 310-16 mapping relation, 50, 159, 166, 167, 253, 278-
language family, 300-309, 318-21 80, 283, 297
language learning (acquisition): 104, 112-13, mapping rules, 224-25, 255-56, 303, 364
125, 127, 128, 189, 194-95, 197-98, 203, 227, Marathi, 172
283; as borrowing, 154; diagram for, 197 marginal language, 176
languag.., relationship, 318 markedness: 102, 112, 125; as cause of change,
language types, 11, 310-15 188-89; positive and negative, 126-27; and
Lanuvian, 332 rule change, 125-27; reversal of, 127, 199 •·
434 INDEX
Martha's Vineyard, 191-92 Nootka, 373
matching: 50, 335-41; significance of, 338 norm, 50
maximal differentiation, 186 Northumbrian, 37
Mayan, 126 Norwegian, 169, 328
Mazatec, 316 Nostratic, 320, 321
meaning: 142; as a factor of change, 76; re- number: of contrasts, 243; of reconstructed
quirements for, 234 units, 236, 243-45; of sets of correspond-
mechanisms of change, 179-81, 195 ences, 236, 238, 243-45
Melanesian Pidgin English, 175, 176
memory, 101, 107, 129, 181, 187, 349 occupational differences, 192
merger, 69-70, 103, 130, 151, 186 Oceanic, 62
metaphor, 16, 28, 140, 141-42, 144, 152 Ojibwa, 92, 373
metathesis, 63, 71, 75, 98, 113 old and new forms, 382, 391
methods: application of, 219; aspects of, 213; Old Church Slavic, 75, 121, 160, 162, 165, 194,
domain of, 278-84; ingredients of, 229, 278- 245-46, 248, 366-68
79; interlocking of, 273; order of, 266, 274- Old Chuvash, 164
77, 280; penetration of, 274-77; priority of, Old English, 23, 35, 37, 42, 57-58, 61-62, 65-
274-75; reality of, 278; of science, 197; 70 passim, 73, 77, 80, 126, 139, 140, 141,
structure of, 278- 84. See also deadlocks on 150, 159, 182, 187, 188, 199, 234, 240, 242,
methods; limitations on comparative method 246, 266, 297, 314, 317, 328, 331, 336-38,
metonymy, 141-42, 144 366-67, 371, 381
Middle English, 35-36, 59, 69, 70, 80, 86, 90, Old French, 76, 86, 91, 150
93, 94, 96, 119, 140-41, 150, 332, 381 Old High German, 66, 81, 150, 241, 242, 246,
Middle High German, 81-82, 86, 185, 237 332
Middle Indic, 78 Old Icelandic, 23
migration theory, 386-87 Old Iranian, 163, 164
minimal pairs, 62, 167, 208-212, 215, 218, 219- Old Irish, 360-61
22, 251 Old Norse, 64, 86, 159, 164, 246, 328
misspellings, 36 Old Russian, 121
mixed language, 171-72 Old Swedish, 240, 241
mixing the levels, 78 Oneida, 79, 311, 312, 315-16, 368, 369
model: 131; as icon, 307 one meaning-one form, 92, 98, 100-101, 106,
monograms, 41 107, 118, 130, 141, 143-46, 170-71, 175, 177,
Mordvin, 164, 167-68, 301 181-84, 198, 200, 292, 328
morpheme: 6; order, 352 onomasiology, 134, 139, 143-44
morphological analysis, 351-52 onomatopoeia, 14-15, 86, 152
morphophoneme, 5-6, 214, 278-80 ontogeny, 113
morphophonemic alternation (variation), 60, ordering of rules, 114, 224-25, 293
81 origin of language, 26-28
morphophonemic analysis, 114-15, 213-28, origin vs. history, 282, 327, 329-31
229, 264-65, 267, 278-81 orthography, 33-35, 39-40, 42-43, 58, 82, 90,
morphophonemic conditioning: 116, 221; of 103, 145, 151, 175, 207-211, 215, 218, 233-
sound change, 70, 81-84, 94, 97-98, 99, 101, 34,235,237,239,240,249
180 optimality, 107
morphophonemic process, 64 Ostyak, 164, 301
morphophonemic rules, 85 output, 114
morphophonemic writing, 34-35 overall pattern, 292
morphophonemics, 251 overlapping sound changes, 191
morpho (pho) no logy, 214
Morse code, 40 Paiute, 373
motivated compounds, 140 palatalization: 72; Slavic, 121
motivation, 152 paleography, 43
mutation, 44, 153 Pali, 170, 172
pandialectal analysis, 279, 282-84
Nahuatl, 162 Papuan, 190
name, 142 paradigmatic alternation, 91
narrow transcription, 207, 222 paradigmatic leveling, 124
natural phonology, 127, 194-95, 198 paraphrase, 28
natural selection, 379, 391 parts for wholes, 141
naturalness (of systems), 188-89, 342, 345, 346 patch-up rule, 200
need-filling motive, 139, 155 patterning, 243
negation of rules, 227 penetration of methods, 274-77
Negro English, 51, 77, 181 Pennsylvania Dutch, 156
Neo-Latin, 175 perceptual contrast, differentiation, and values,
Ngaju-Dayak, 75 198
nomination, 139 perceptual space, 186
nonlinguistic universe, 3-5 performance: 123, 124; and change, 128
INDEX 435
Permian, 301 pronunciation pronunciation, 190
Persian, 162, 165, 314, 317, 329 proportion, 105
persistent rules, 203 protoculture and word meanings, 372-73
philological screening, 21, 43 proto-fornis, 274, 277
philology: 21, 22, 323-26, 333-34, 349; and Proto-Indo-European, 67, 111, 128, 164, 200,
empirical checking in reconstruction, 362 266-i3, 304-309, 315, 321, 330, 332, 333,
Phoenician syllabary, 45 346,351-52,358,360-62,370,371,372-73
phone, 5, 278-80 protophoneme, 278-79
phoneme: 5, 208, 278, 280; in change, 70-71; Proven9al, 290, 298
and morphophoneme, 217, 251; systematic, prowords, 41
214 psychological factors, 180
phonemic analysis, 207-12, 229, 231, 234, 278- psychological reality, 105, 131, 158, 165, 181,
79, 281, 284-85 202-203, 214, 282-83, 348-49
phonemic conditioning of sound change, 70-71 pull (drag) chain, 112, 186
phonemics, 207-208, 251 purpose, 194, 392
phonemization, 70 push chain, 112, 186
phonetic analogy, 196
phonetic change, 57 reality: of methods, 278; of reconstruction,
phonetic components, 6-9 341. See also psychological reality.
phonetic markers, 34 reasoning, modes of, 196-97, 202
phonetic reconstruction, 245, 271, 341-46 rebus principle: 38, 90; in reverse, 41
phonetic similarity, 208-209, 210-11, 234-35 reconstructed units, 255
phonetics: functional, 207-208, 212; general, reconstruction: 13, 21, 213, 317, 318, 335-74;
207; systematic, 207 continuous revision of, 239; correction of,
phonographic, 33 241, 242, 253; of dialect differences, 305-
phonological rules, 127 306; in a flow-chart, 346-48; living para-
phonological space, 186 digms in, 385-86; (always) positive, 352,
phonologization, 70 374; validity in scope of, 240, 242, 251, 253,
phonology: 4; natural, 127, 194-95, 198 255
phrases, 144 redundancy : 41, 176, 189; preservation of, 184
phylogeny, 113 referent change, 137
pictography, 31, 32 regeneration, 95, 390
picture writing, 31 regional dialects, 53
pidgin, 173, 174 register, 49
Police Motu, 173 regrammaticalization, 150
Polish, 162 regressive assimilation, 73
polysemic clashes, 181-84 regular change, 242, 255
polysemy: 144-45, 349, 372; avoidance of, regularity: 6, 57, 61, 88, 94-95, 104-105, 106,
181-83 119, 123, 124, 130-31, 193, 196, 202, 218,
polysynthetic languages, 11, 311, 313, 315 291; of analogy, 97-98, 101; of sound
Portuguese, 173, 315, 361 change, 85-86
postediting, 209-12, 224-27, 243, 281 reinterpretation: 92-93, 103, 128, 149, 150, 152,
Praeneste, 332 356, 359; of acoustic signal, 198-99
pragmatics, 18 relation of similarity, 88
predictability, 61, 146, 166, 184, 202 relationship models, 300-309
prediction, 19, 25, 89, 95, 101, 187, 193, 197, relative chronology: 67, 106, 109-12, 120-21,
203, 273 160-61, 203, 225, 254-55, 271, 294-97, 306,
predictive inference, 213 395; in biology, 393; of concrpts, 373-74; of
predictive power of reconstruction, 333 morphology, 352-55; of sound change vs.
pre-forms, 274, 277 analogy, 98-100; of types, 317-18
pre-language, 27 relexicalization, 202
premorpheme, 28 relic, 96, 124, 125, 151, 276-77, 306
prephoneme, 278-79 relic area, 294
prestige, 50, 53, 155 remodeling, 92
prevention of variation, 99 reordering, 124, 130, 195
preventive analogy, 100 resistance to borrowing, 169, 188
primary change, 124, 130 restriction, 127, 148-49
primitive language, 10 restructuring, 118-20, 124, 125, 130, 200-201,
principle of duality, 27, 28 203, 218
principle of phonetization, 38, 41 reversal: of acclimatization, 226; of base and
principles of etymological investigation, 331-32 derived values and forms, 201-202; in dis-
priority of methods, 274-75 tinctive-feature hierarchies, 199; of social
process mechanism, 212-13 value, 191; of word order, 202
productivity, 96, 102, 104, 105, 119, 125, 127, revision of reconstruction, 242, 253
130-31, 138, 151, 352-55 Rhenish fan, 290
progressive assimilation, 73 rhotacism (Latin), 59-60, 83, 1~0
pronunciation borrowing, 156, 157, 162 Roman writing, 39, 45
INDEX
Romance, 79, 85, 160, 165, 168, 175, 315-16, dary, 150; semantic, 146-47; in syntactic
332, 356, 361 boundary, 151
Romany, 165, 172, 173, 177, 243-44,253 shifters, 13, 359
Rotuman, 62-64, 70, 71, 75, 76, 80-81, 86, 110, shortening, 139
114, 117, 127 shorthand, 40
rule addition, 121, 124, 394 Siamese, 340
rule borrowing, 168-70 Sicilian, 90
ru le change, 117-23, 180, 181 sign : 13; and time, 18-20; types of, 12-18
rule inversion, 201-202 similarity, 142
rule loss, 124 simplicity, 131
rule order(ing), 298, 303 simplification, 129-30, 143-46, 171, 175, 180-
rule pool, 292-94 81, 189
rule reordering, 120-23 simultaneous process, 64, 111, 112
rule reversal, 119 singularity, 107
rule-governedness, 47, 124 Sioux, 147
rules: and iconicity, 106; negation of, 227; per- Slavic, 75, 85, 121, 155, 160, 163, 164, 194,
sistent, 203; and surface forms, 130 200, 244, 305
Russian, 17, 40, 76, 80, 91, 99-100, 124, 146, social dialects, 53
147, 150, 155, 158, 161, 162, 168, 170, 171- social evolution, 379-80, 382
72, 196, 199, 208, 218, 297, 327, 338-40, 344, social index, 193
367 social interpretation, 190
social layer, 49-50
social meaning, 53, 193
Saek, 340 social setting, 193
Samoan, 311 social stratification, 381
Samoyed, 300-301 social style, 146
Sanskrit, 23, 66, 74-79 passim, 165, 244, 245- social variation, 115, 153
49, 267-69, 273, 297, 306, 312, 314, 351, 358, sociolinguistics, 47, 52
360, 366-68, 370 sociology, 378
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, 382 soldier slang, 139-40
Scandinavian, 140, 164-65, 229, 284, 367 sound change: 28, 57-86, 94, 124, 131, 154,
scientific discourse, 23-24, 197, 202 156, 180, 194-96, 277, 330; and iconicity,
screening, 333 195-96; and indexicality, 189-92
segmentation, 221-22, 234, 336 sound correspondence, 48-49, 214-53, 264-66,
self-reproduction, 194 281, 283, 319-20
Selqup, 301 sound law, 58
semantic cases, 365 sound substitution, 156-58, 194-95
semantic change: 28, 133-53, 180, 201; pure, Spanish, 69, 75, 77, 98, 111, 134, 135, 150, 157,
133-36; reasons for, 136-41 165, 173, 298, 316
semantic components, 9-11 specialization, 107
semantic field, 9-11, 133-36, 161-62 speech disturbances, 112
semantic loan, 156 speech production: and analogy, 104-106; and
semantic marking, 51-52, 134-36, 144-46, 155- semantic change, 152-53
56, 161-62 spelling: change in, 34; etymological, 33
semantic merger, 135 spelling pronunciation, 42, 90
semantic orientation, 51 spelling reform, 42, 43
semantic reconstruction, 364-74 spelling spelling, 42, 43
semantic reinterpretation, 136 splits: of forms and meanings, 143-44; of
semantic split, 135 grammatical categories, 151; of languages,
semantics, 18 304; of paradigms, 81-82, 94-97, 130; of
semasiography, 32 sounds, 58-63, 69-70, 185, 186; in writing,
semasiology, 134, 139, 143-44 145
sememe, 6, 9, 369 sporadic changes, 85-86
semiotics, 18, 378 Sprachbund, 172-74
Semitic, 196, 271, 300, 311, 313 Sprachgefiihl, 107, 129
semivowel, 7-8 spread of change, 186, 190-91, 291
semology, 4 statistical inference, 187
Seneca, 374 statistical parameters, 190
sense, 142 strain toward consistency, 380
sentence connectives, 359-61, 369 stratigraphy, 294-96, 384-85
Serbo-Croatian, 185- 86, 196 strive toward symmetry, 184-87, 189
serializing, 311 structural analysis, 125
seriation: 166, 294-95, 298, 307, 358, 361, 370, structural change, 57, 61, 114, 129
393-95 ; methods of, 131 ; of types, 317-1 8 structural classification of sound change, 69-
sets of corresponding sound units, 214-53, 264- 70
66, 283 structural description, 114
~hift: 64-67, 111, 290; in morpheme boun- structural dialectology, 292
INDEX 437
structural linguistics, 20 tabu , 139, 183-84, 381, 391, 398
structuralism, 324-25 Tagalog, 75, 311
structure of methods, 278-82 Tai, 340
Sturtevant's paradox, 94-95 Tamil, 51, 52
style, 49 Tavgi, 301
subgrouping: 44, 163, 302-303, 344, 386, 396- taxonomy, 393
97; in biology, 393 technique (Sapir's), 313
Subiya, 311 teleology, 189, 193-94, 392-93
subordination, 151 temporal aspects of signs, 18-20
subrules, 114, 121-23 tendencies, 98, 107
substitution, 156-58 testing of hypotheses, 362
substratum, 171, 189 textual criticism, 43-44, 300, 302, 333
subtractive order, 110 Thai, 340
Sumerian, 23, 37, 90; cuneiform, 34, 45 theory, 22, 24, 362
superstratum, 171 thing change, 137
suppletion, 101, 203, 218 Tlingit, 387
suprasegmentals, 39, 168-69 Tocharian, 23, 304-309
surface structure, 123, 389-90 tongue twisters, 74
Swadesh list, 231 trade jargon, 173
Swahili, 314 trademarks, 15-16
Swedish, 14, 42, 73, 86, 137, 138, 139, 145, 146, tradition: 101, 125, 127, 153; break in, 175;
60, 165, 169, 172, 184, 229-42, 247, 296, of texts, 44
367-68, 370, 371 transformational relations, 166
Swiss German, 81, 185 transition area, 298-99
switches, 112, 113, 149 translation, 316, 370
syllabary, 38 transmission of change, 193
syllabic writing, 32, 33 trends, 131
syllable boundaries, 74- 254 Trinidad English, 181-82
syllable structure, 199-200, 221, 235, 250-55 Tulu, 51
syllogism, 196 Turkic, 163, 164, 169, 381
symbol: 13; and reconstruction, 19 Turkish, 73, 162, 231, 311, 313, 315
symbolic aspects, 88, 255 typological classification, 310-18
symbolic languages (Sapir's), 313 typological constraints, 340-41, 362, 385-86
symbolization, 27 typological seriation, 384
symmetry (of space), 192
synchronic description, 218 Ugric, 300-301
synchronic linguistics, 20 Ukrainian, 82, 196
synchronic mechanism, 63 umlaut, 61-64, 70, 73, 117-18
synchronic order, 112-14 unique alternations, 95, 218, 225
synchronic philologies, 22, 325 unique relics, 276- 77, 306
synchronic variation, 143-44, 155, 17Q-71, 19Q- unique sets, 230
92, 238 uniqueness in etymology, 291, 332-33
synchrony, 21, 202-203 units: 5-6; or clusters, 209-10; vs. rules, 11-
synchrony vs. diachromy: 227-28, 273, 279, 12, 114, 118-21 passim, 168, 212-13, 225- 26,
282, 284, 348-49, 362; in culture, 379 255-56,281,282,293-94,303,346-48
syncope, 72, 98 universal grammar, 292, 320
syncrisis, 21, 310, 383, 393 universal phonetics, 207
synonymy: 143-44; internal analysis of, 366-69 universal syntax, 173, 177
syntactic borrowing, 169-71 universal tendencies, 147, 186-88, 239, 297
syntactic change, 102-104, 128-29, 138, 149- universals: 112-13, 187-89, 197, 200, 316-18,
52, 169-71, 202, 355-56, 357, 359, 360-61, 341, 342, 385-86; of culture, 379; implica-
369 tional, 317, 363
syntactic conditioning, 80-81, 357 univocability, 107
syntactic context, 146 unordered application, 195
syntactic correspondence, 364 usage and change, 128
syntactic evidence in semantic reconstruction, Ural-Altaic, 320
368 Uralic, 274, 300-302, 303, 321, 330
syntactic haplology, 356, 358
syntactic reconstruction, 357-63 variations: 11, 47-53, allophonic, 58-59, 74,
syntax: in genetic classification, 318-20; and 144; and change, 52-53; free, 51, 52; in
semantics as conditioners of change, 80, morphology, 50- 51; prevention of, 99; ran-
329-30 dom, 53; in syntax, 51
synthesis: 212; Sapir's, 313-14 Veps, 79, 127, 149, 170, 301, 303
synthetic languages, 11, 311, 313, 315 Verner's law, 66-67, 111, 115-16, 150, 173,
system of relations, 181 189, 247, 256, 341
systematic phoneme, 214 Vogul, 301
systematic phonetics, 207 Votian, 79, 301
438 INDEX
Votyak, 164, 170, 301 writing: 31-45, 240; alphabetic, 32, 33; devel-
vowel harmony, 73 opment of, 37-40; its relation to language,
32; of writing, 40-41
writing materials, 40
wave theory, 304-309, 381
wear. 187, 373-74 Yakut, 314
Welsh, 173, 332, 333 Yana, 374
West Saxon, 37 Yiddish, 81, 85, 101, 168, 171,201
West Semitic syllabary, 39 yo-he-ho theory, 28
wholes for parts, 141, 371 Yurok, 387
wiyot, 387
word boundaries, 78 Zulu, 10
Wiirter und Sachen, 137, 291 Zyrien, 164, 170, 301

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AN INTRODUCTION TO

HISTORICAL AND ·coMPARATIVE

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY New York

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

Library of Congress catalog card number: 78-151169

In any course of historical and comparative linguistics there will be students

12. Internal Reconstruction 264

1-1. Language as a bridge between meaning and sound 4

10-3. Selection of East Lapp consonant alternations 223

LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS

A brief review of linguistics is presented, followed by a

[1.1 The Descriptive Prerequisite] For any discussion of language change

[1.2 Language and Its Levels] Human language is a particular kind of

Physical speech sounds

FIGURE 1-1. Language as a bridge between meaning and sound.

Morphophonemes lead us to the buildup of grammatical units, which we

[1.4 The Components of Units] The units are "composed" of smaller

FIGURE 1-3. Basic vowel chart defined by three articulatory parameters.

[1.5] An articulatory classification of consonants can also be done on the

[1.6] Semantic components are parallel to phonetic components. Whether

Generic meaning Generic meaning plus meanings

FIGURE 1-5. A table of semantic combinations showing parallelism to

(1.7] The areas in which the arbitrary division of reality by a particular

Examples of these best-structured areas are provided in many introductory text-

[1.10 Classification of Signs and Language] Let us now look at a generally

A language is a system of arbitrary vocal symbols by which the members of

In other words, language is a system for communication. Language is systematic

I. An icon expresses mainly formal, factual similarity between the meaning

What is arbitrary is that a particular sign be connected with a particular element

ENGLISH GERMAN FINNISH

The cock goes cock-a-doodle-doo in English, kikeriki in German, and coquerico

International Finnair Southern California Certina

[1.14] The relational character of language permeates all levels of gram-

[1.16] We have now characterized three basic types of signs as cardinal

An icon has such being as belongs to past experience. It exists only as an

The discussion of the sign types(§§ 1.10-1.16) will give the

like language. Culture is man's primary adaptive mechanism, and it supports

[1.18 Division of Linguistic Researclt] Linguistics is traditionally divided

Means of getting at data

In the philological study of language the total cultural setting (customs,

[1.21 History of Linguistics] Historical linguistics should not be confused

(1.22 "Dead" Languages) Another frequent misconception is that his-

(1.23 The Nature of Scientific Discourse, History, and Language) The

leading practitioners convince others to be primary. In other words, new theo-

[1.24] Also history, if it is not written as a chronicle, a mere annalistic

1. The lack of general laws makes induction impossible.

Many of these problems recur in historical linguistics, of course, but fortu-

and principles; in their subsequent application the (student) linguist is on his

Human language can now be defined by productivity, displacement, duality,

(1.28] With the expansion of experience, further blending of utterances

[1.29] The main defect in nineteenth-century speculation about the origin

1.1 General introductions: Bloomfield 1933, Hockett 1958, Gleason 1961, R.

WRITING AND LANGUAGE

The development ofalphabetical writing is used to exemplify

(2.1 Writing As a System of Signs and Its Connection to Language] Writing

Real or imagined world

FIGURE 2-1. The relation between language and writing.

[2.3] There is, generally, no exact one-to-one correspondence between

[2.5 Writing As Evidence of Change and Variation] Since writing mirrors

ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE (Tenth Century)

ANONYMOUS SONG (Thirteenth Century)