intervocalic DEvoicing can also happen / X > Y > X

[Miguel Carrasquer Vidal]

----------------------------Original message----------------------------
"Alan R. King" <mccay at redestb.es> wrote:
 
>As may have been noticed, however, the standard Welsh /d/ which in some
>dialects has become /t/ (by the account I just gave) itself derives
>ultimately from an earlier /t/.  In the evolution from proto-Celtic (or
>Latin, in the case of loanwords) to modern Welsh, intervocalic voiceless
>stops were regularly voiced, much as in western Romance languages.  The
>modern intervocalic voiceless stops come from original geminate stops -
>which explains their gemination in the modern language, as well as the lack
>of it in the voiced counterparts in standard Welsh.  So in an earlier stage
>of the development of Welsh we have approximately:
>
>VttV > VttV
>VtV > VdV
>
>and similarly for /p/ and /k/.  In northern Welsh ['kaddar] we then have a
>further step:
>
>'VCV > 'VCCV (hence 'VdV > 'VddV)
>
>while in the varieties that now pronounce ['katar] we presumably have a
>later reversal of t > d:
>
>'VdV > 'VtV
>
>Unless, of course, 'VtV in these varieties is actually a SURVIVAL of
>Celtic/Latin VtV.
 
I'm far from an expert on Welsh, and I'm not even sure I have the
basic facts right.  What I gather from the above and from Paul
Russel's "An introduction to the Celtic languages" is that:
 
-d-  > -D-   Adam > Addaf
-t-  > -d-   carita:tem > cardod
-tt- > -T-   cattus > cath
 
Apparently, new geminates -tt- arose from syncope, giving -d-
(cadair) and -tt- (eto /etto/) as the only allowed intervocalic
stops.
 
Now the lenitions of -d- to /D/ and -t- to /d/ seem to be the oldest.
It is also reasonable to suppose that after they had taken place,
geminate /tt/ in /kattu(s)/ was simplified to /katu(s)/ (or directly
spirantized to /kaTu(s)/), and did in any case not merge with the new
/tt/.  If -t- in the /katar/ varieties is a survival of Celtic/Latin
-t-, then that must mean that *tt did not pass through a stage *t,
but spirantized directly, at least in those varieties:
 
d   > D
t   > t
tt  > T
--  > tt
 
As opposed to the rest of Welsh:
 
               SW   NW
d   > D        D    D
t   > d        d    dd
tt  > t  > T   T    T
--  > tt       tt   tt
 
But that would put the /katar/ varieties of Welsh above Cornish and
Breton in the branching tree, which doesn't seem very likely.
 
So it must be:
 
               SW   NW   tW
d   > D        D    D    D
t   > d        d    dd   t
tt  > t  > T   T    T    T
--  > tt       tt   tt   tt
 
What's missing in the above is a variety of Welsh that has eliminated
geminates: D, d, T, t.  One would expect one.
 
 
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv at wxs.nl
Amsterdam