Breaking (linguistics)
Encyclopedia
In historical linguistics
, vowel breaking (sometimes called vowel fracture) is the change of a monophthong
into a diphthong
or triphthong
. The change into a diphthong is also known as diphthongization. Vowel breaking is often distinguished from diphthongization and defined more narrowly as a harmonic (i.e., assimilatory
) process involving diphthongization triggered by a following vowel or consonant. The original pure vowel typically breaks into two segments, where the first segment matches the original vowel and the second segment is harmonic with the nature of the triggering vowel or consonant. For example, the second segment may be /u/ (a back vowel) if the following vowel or consonant is back (e.g., velar
or pharyngeal
), and the second segment may be /i/ (a front vowel) if the following vowel or consonant is front (e.g., palatal
). Thus, vowel breaking in this restricted sense can be viewed as an example of assimilation
of a vowel to a following vowel or consonant.
, where the short front vowel
s have developed a glide up to [j], and then in some areas back down to schwa: pat [pæjət], pet [pɛjət], pit [pɪjət].
, a vowel /i/ was inserted between a front vowel and a following /h/ , and a vowel /u/ was inserted between a back vowel and a following /h/ . This is a prototypical example of the narrow sense of "vowel breaking" as described above: The original vowel breaks into a diphthong that assimilates to the following consonant, gaining a front /i/ before a palatal consonant
and /u/ before a velar consonant
.
Old English breaking is a process in prehistoric Old English whereby stressed short and long i, e, æ become short and long diphthongs spelled io, eo, ea (respectively), when followed by h or by r, l + another consonant (short vowels only), and sometimes w (only for certain short vowels).
Examples are:
Back umlaut is a process in late prehistoric Old English whereby short i, e, æ become short diphthongs spelled io, eo, ea (respectively) before a back vowel in the next syllable, if the intervening consonant is of a certain nature. The specific nature of which consonants trigger back umlaut and which block them varies from dialect to dialect.
stressed short e becomes ja or (before u) jǫ regularly in Old Norse except after w, r, l. Examples are:
According to some scholars, the diphthongisation of e is an unconditioned sound change, whereas other scholars speak about epenthesis
or umlaut
.
, the Vulgar Latin
vowels e and o in stressed
position sometimes underwent breaking. The result of breaking varies between languages: e and o become ie and ue in Spanish
, but ea and oa in Romanian
.
In some languages breaking is absent in some cases.
(PIE) i, u has a kind of breaking before an original laryngeal
in Greek
, Armenian
and Tocharian
, whereas the other Indo-European languages have monophthongs. Typical examples are:
However, the hypothesis is not adopted by most handbooks.
Historical linguistics
Historical linguistics is the study of language change. It has five main concerns:* to describe and account for observed changes in particular languages...
, vowel breaking (sometimes called vowel fracture) is the change of a monophthong
Monophthong
A monophthong is a pure vowel sound, one whose articulation at both beginning and end is relatively fixed, and which does not glide up or down towards a new position of articulation....
into a diphthong
Diphthong
A diphthong , also known as a gliding vowel, refers to two adjacent vowel sounds occurring within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: That is, the tongue moves during the pronunciation of the vowel...
or triphthong
Triphthong
In phonetics, a triphthong is a monosyllabic vowel combination involving a quick but smooth movement of the articulator from one vowel quality to another that passes over a third...
. The change into a diphthong is also known as diphthongization. Vowel breaking is often distinguished from diphthongization and defined more narrowly as a harmonic (i.e., assimilatory
Assimilation (linguistics)
Assimilation is a common phonological process by which the sound of the ending of one word blends into the sound of the beginning of the following word. This occurs when the parts of the mouth and vocal cords start to form the beginning sounds of the next word before the last sound has been...
) process involving diphthongization triggered by a following vowel or consonant. The original pure vowel typically breaks into two segments, where the first segment matches the original vowel and the second segment is harmonic with the nature of the triggering vowel or consonant. For example, the second segment may be /u/ (a back vowel) if the following vowel or consonant is back (e.g., velar
Velar consonant
Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....
or pharyngeal
Pharyngeal consonant
A pharyngeal consonant is a type of consonant which is articulated with the root of the tongue against the pharynx.-Pharyngeal consonants in the IPA:Pharyngeal consonants in the International Phonetic Alphabet :...
), and the second segment may be /i/ (a front vowel) if the following vowel or consonant is front (e.g., palatal
Palatal consonant
Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate...
). Thus, vowel breaking in this restricted sense can be viewed as an example of assimilation
Assimilation (linguistics)
Assimilation is a common phonological process by which the sound of the ending of one word blends into the sound of the beginning of the following word. This occurs when the parts of the mouth and vocal cords start to form the beginning sounds of the next word before the last sound has been...
of a vowel to a following vowel or consonant.
Southern American English
Vowel breaking is characteristic of the "Southern drawl" of Southern American EnglishSouthern American English
Southern American English is a group of dialects of the English language spoken throughout the Southern region of the United States, from Southern and Eastern Maryland, West Virginia and Kentucky to the Gulf Coast, and from the Atlantic coast to most of Texas and Oklahoma.The Southern dialects make...
, where the short front vowel
Front vowel
A front vowel is a type of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a front vowel is that the tongue is positioned as far in front as possible in the mouth without creating a constriction that would be classified as a consonant. Front vowels are sometimes also...
s have developed a glide up to [j], and then in some areas back down to schwa: pat [pæjət], pet [pɛjət], pit [pɪjət].
Middle English
In early Middle EnglishMiddle English
Middle English is the stage in the history of the English language during the High and Late Middle Ages, or roughly during the four centuries between the late 11th and the late 15th century....
, a vowel /i/ was inserted between a front vowel and a following /h/ , and a vowel /u/ was inserted between a back vowel and a following /h/ . This is a prototypical example of the narrow sense of "vowel breaking" as described above: The original vowel breaks into a diphthong that assimilates to the following consonant, gaining a front /i/ before a palatal consonant
Palatal consonant
Palatal consonants are consonants articulated with the body of the tongue raised against the hard palate...
and /u/ before a velar consonant
Velar consonant
Velars are consonants articulated with the back part of the tongue against the soft palate, the back part of the roof of the mouth, known also as the velum)....
.
Old English
There are two processes in Old English that are examples of harmonic vowel breaking, called Old English breaking and back umlaut.Old English breaking is a process in prehistoric Old English whereby stressed short and long i, e, æ become short and long diphthongs spelled io, eo, ea (respectively), when followed by h or by r, l + another consonant (short vowels only), and sometimes w (only for certain short vowels).
Examples are:
- PG *fallan → feallan "fall"
- PG *erþō → eorþe "earth"
Back umlaut is a process in late prehistoric Old English whereby short i, e, æ become short diphthongs spelled io, eo, ea (respectively) before a back vowel in the next syllable, if the intervening consonant is of a certain nature. The specific nature of which consonants trigger back umlaut and which block them varies from dialect to dialect.
Old Norse
Proto-GermanicProto-Germanic language
Proto-Germanic , or Common Germanic, as it is sometimes known, is the unattested, reconstructed proto-language of all the Germanic languages, such as modern English, Frisian, Dutch, Afrikaans, German, Luxembourgish, Danish, Norwegian, Icelandic, Faroese, and Swedish.The Proto-Germanic language is...
stressed short e becomes ja or (before u) jǫ regularly in Old Norse except after w, r, l. Examples are:
- PG *ek(a) "I" → (east) ON jak, SwedishSwedish languageSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
jag, DanishDanish languageDanish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
and Norwegian BokmålBokmålBokmål is one of two official Norwegian written standard languages, the other being Nynorsk. Bokmål is used by 85–90% of the population in Norway, and is the standard most commonly taught to foreign students of the Norwegian language....
jeg (but JutlandicJutlandicJutlandic or Jutish is a term for the western dialects of Danish, spoken on the peninsula of Jutland....
æ, a, IcelandicIcelandic languageIcelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...
ek → ég, NynorskNynorskNynorsk or New Norwegian is one of two official written standards for the Norwegian language, the other being Bokmål. The standard language was created by Ivar Aasen during the mid-19th century, to provide a Norwegian alternative to the Danish language which was commonly written in Norway at the...
)- FaroeseFaroese languageFaroese , is an Insular Nordic language spoken by 48,000 people in the Faroe Islands and about 25,000 Faroese people in Denmark and elsewhere...
has both. The standard form is , while the dialects of SuðuroySuðuroySuðuroy is the southernmost of the Faroe Islands. The island covers 163.7 km². In 2010 there were 4763 inhabitants, but there has been a gradual decline in the population numbers ever since the 1950s....
have jeg.
- Faroese
- PG *hertōn "heart" → ON hjarta, SwedishSwedish languageSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
hjärta, FaroeseFaroese languageFaroese , is an Insular Nordic language spoken by 48,000 people in the Faroe Islands and about 25,000 Faroese people in Denmark and elsewhere...
hjarta, DanishDanish languageDanish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
hjerte - PG *erþō "earth" → Proto-Norse *erþū → ON jǫrð, SwedishSwedish languageSwedish is a North Germanic language, spoken by approximately 10 million people, predominantly in Sweden and parts of Finland, especially along its coast and on the Åland islands. It is largely mutually intelligible with Norwegian and Danish...
, DanishDanish languageDanish is a North Germanic language spoken by around six million people, principally in the country of Denmark. It is also spoken by 50,000 Germans of Danish ethnicity in the northern parts of Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, where it holds the status of minority language...
jord, FaroeseFaroese languageFaroese , is an Insular Nordic language spoken by 48,000 people in the Faroe Islands and about 25,000 Faroese people in Denmark and elsewhere...
jørð
According to some scholars, the diphthongisation of e is an unconditioned sound change, whereas other scholars speak about epenthesis
Epenthesis
In phonology, epenthesis is the addition of one or more sounds to a word, especially to the interior of a word. Epenthesis may be divided into two types: excrescence, for the addition of a consonant, and anaptyxis for the addition of a vowel....
or umlaut
Germanic umlaut
In linguistics, umlaut is a process whereby a vowel is pronounced more like a following vowel or semivowel. The term umlaut was originally coined and is used principally in connection with the study of the Germanic languages...
.
Romance languages
In many of the Romance languagesRomance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...
, the Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin
Vulgar Latin is any of the nonstandard forms of Latin from which the Romance languages developed. Because of its nonstandard nature, it had no official orthography. All written works used Classical Latin, with very few exceptions...
vowels e and o in stressed
Stress (linguistics)
In linguistics, stress is the relative emphasis that may be given to certain syllables in a word, or to certain words in a phrase or sentence. The term is also used for similar patterns of phonetic prominence inside syllables. The word accent is sometimes also used with this sense.The stress placed...
position sometimes underwent breaking. The result of breaking varies between languages: e and o become ie and ue in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, but ea and oa in Romanian
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
.
In some languages breaking is absent in some cases.
- Latin mortem "death" (acc.Accusative caseThe accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions...
) → Spanish muerte (breaking), but FrenchFrench languageFrench is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
mort (no breaking) - Latin festa "feast" (neuterGrammatical genderGrammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
plural) → Spanish fiesta, but Middle FrenchMiddle FrenchMiddle French is a historical division of the French language that covers the period from 1340 to 1611. It is a period of transition during which:...
feste, Modern French fête (no breaking)
Proto-Indo-European
Some scholars believe that Proto-Indo-EuropeanProto-Indo-European language
The Proto-Indo-European language is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European languages, spoken by the Proto-Indo-Europeans...
(PIE) i, u has a kind of breaking before an original laryngeal
Laryngeal theory
The laryngeal theory is a generally accepted theory of historical linguistics which proposes the existence of one, or a set of three , consonant sounds termed "laryngeals" that appear in most current reconstructions of the Proto-Indo-European language...
in Greek
Greek language
Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Armenian
Armenian language
The Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
and Tocharian
Tocharian languages
Tocharian or Tokharian is an extinct branch of the Indo-European language family. The name is taken from the people known to the Greeks as the Tocharians . These are sometimes identified with the Yuezhi and the Kushans. The term Tokharistan usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria, which the...
, whereas the other Indo-European languages have monophthongs. Typical examples are:
- PIE * → * "alive" → Gk.Greek languageGreek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Toch. BTocharian languagesTocharian or Tokharian is an extinct branch of the Indo-European language family. The name is taken from the people known to the Greeks as the Tocharians . These are sometimes identified with the Yuezhi and the Kushans. The term Tokharistan usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria, which the...
śāw-, śāy- (but Skt.SanskritSanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
jīvá-, Lat.LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
vīvus) - PIE * → * "front side" → Gk.Greek languageGreek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
"face", Toch. BTocharian languagesTocharian or Tokharian is an extinct branch of the Indo-European language family. The name is taken from the people known to the Greeks as the Tocharians . These are sometimes identified with the Yuezhi and the Kushans. The term Tokharistan usually refers to 1st millennium Bactria, which the...
pratsāko "breast" (but Skt.SanskritSanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
prátīka-) - PIE * → * "long" → Gk.Greek languageGreek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...
, Arm.Armenian languageThe Armenian language is an Indo-European language spoken by the Armenian people. It is the official language of the Republic of Armenia as well as in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The language is also widely spoken by Armenian communities in the Armenian diaspora...
*twār → erkar (Skt.SanskritSanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
dūrá-, Lat.LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
dūrus).
However, the hypothesis is not adopted by most handbooks.