Don't touch my phonemes (was: minimal pairs ex: PIE e/o Ablaut)

[Stanley Friesen]

At 02:12 PM 11/20/00 -0500, Rich Alderson wrote:

>On 16 Nov 2000, Stanley Friesen (sarima at friesen.net) wrote:

>>> So it is not surprising that it is very difficult to contrast final
>>> aspirated and unaspirated stops.

>> Difficult, but I am not sure it is impossible.  Did Classical Greek lack
>> old rule reduces the cluster simply to /s/.

>> Or how about Sanskrit?  Did it have final unaspirated voiceless stops?

>Indeed.  All absolutely final stops are voiceless and unaspirated, though the
>sandhi rules conspire not to allow many absolutely final stops.  The citation
>forms of nouns, though, is a good example, being the nominative singular--lots
>of cluster simplification and the like going on.

Hmm, interesting.  From this I conclude that Sansktrit does not *contrast*
/t/ and /th/ finally, nor does Greek.  So apparently in many or most
languages that otherwise have this contrast it is neutralized finally.

Does anybody have any examples of a language that *retains* /t/ vs. /th/
finally?

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May the peace of God be with you.         sarima at ix.netcom.com