Hostname: page-component-74656f9884-54qdv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-11-09T22:32:20.308Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Sonorant Clusters in Greek

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Paul Kiparsky
Paul Kiparsky*
Affiliation:
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The split of IE *VRs and *VsR into VRR in Lesbian and Thessalian and VR in the other dialects cuts a striking isogloss through ancient Greece. This split may be related to other developments of Greek by applying Jakobson's feature system to four Greek sound changes, all of them in essence well known and widely accepted. It is then shown that this suffices to solve, with no modification of the rules, the problem of the reflexes of IE *ws and *sy in Greek, and accounts for such hitherto ill-explained developments as *awsōs > Doric āwṓs, Lesbian aúōs ‘dawn’; *awsēr > Ionic āḗr, Lesbian aúēr ‘lower atmosphere’; *dewsomai > Attic déomai, Lesbian and Thessalian deúomai ‘need’; *dhusyō > Ionic thūō, Aeolic thuíō ‘rage’; and gen. *-osyo > Attic and Ionic *-ōo > -ō, Aeolic -oio.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 43 , Issue 3-Part1 , September 1967 , pp. 619 - 635
Copyright
Copyright © 1967 Linguistic Society of America

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

References

Bechtel, Friedrich. 1908. Die Vocalcontraction bei Homer. Halle, Niemeyer.Google Scholar
Brugmann, Karl. 1916. Grundriss der vergleichenden Grammatik der indogermanischen Sprachen. 2nd ed., Vol. 2, part 2. Strassburg, Trübner.Google Scholar
Buck, Carl D. 1955. The Greek dialects. 3rd ed. Chicago, University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Chadwick, John. 1956. The Greek dialects and Greek prehistory. Greece and Rome n.s. 3. 38–50.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chantraine, Pierre. 1942. Grammaire homérique I. Paris, Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Chantraine, Pierre. 1961. Morphologie historique du grec. 2nd ed. Paris, Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Chomsky, Noam, and Halle, Morris. 1968. Sound pattern of English. New York, Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Cowgill, Warren. 1966. Greek dialectology in the light of Mycenean. Ancient Indo-European Dialects, ed. by Birnbaum, Henrik and Puhvel, Jaan, pp. 77–95. Los Angeles, University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diver, William. 1958. On the prehistory of Greek consonantism. Word 14. 1–25.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grammont, Maurice. 1948. Phonétique du grec ancien. Lyon, IAC.Google Scholar
Hakulinen, Lauri. 1933. Über die semasiologische Entwicklung einiger meteorologischaffektivischen Wortfamilien in den ostseefinnischen Sprachen. (Studia Fennica, 1:1.) Helsinki, Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura.Google Scholar
Hirt, Hermann. 1912. Handbuch der griechischen Laut- und Formenlehre. 2nd ed. Heidelberg, Winter.Google Scholar
Hockett, Charles F. 1965. Sound change. Lg. 41. 185–204.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. 1965. Phonological change. MIT dissertation.Google Scholar
Kiparsky, Paul. 1967. A propos de l'histoire de l'accentuation grecque. Langages, 6.Google Scholar
Kuryłowicz, Jerzy. 1958. L'accentuation des langues indo-européennes. 2nd ed. Wroclaw and Kraków, Wydawnictwo Polskiej Akademii Nauk.Google Scholar
Lejeune, Michel. 1955. Traité de phonétique grecque. 2nd ed. Paris, Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Meillet, Antoine, and Vendryes, J. 1963. Traité de grammaire comparée des langues classiques. 3rd ed. Paris, Champion.Google Scholar
Porzig, Walter. 1954. Sprachgeographische Untersuchungen zu den altgriechischen Dialekten. Indogermanische Forschungen 61. 147–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Postal, Paul. 1967. On the mentalistic character of so-called ‘sound change’. In: Aspects of phonological theory. New York, Harper & Row.Google Scholar
Risch, Ernst. 1955. Die Gliederung der griechischen Dialekte in neuer Sicht. Museum Helveticum 12. 61–76.Google Scholar
Schwyzer, Eduard. 1953. Griechische Grammatik I. 2nd ed. München, Beck.Google Scholar
Albert, Thumb., and Scherer, A. 1959. Handbuch der griechischen Dialekte II. Heidelberg, Winter.Google Scholar
Wackernagel, Jakob. 1955. Kleine Schriften. Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.Google Scholar