Proto-Algonquian (commonly abbreviated PA) is the
proto-language
In the tree model of historical linguistics, a proto-language is a postulated ancestral language from which a number of attested languages are believed to have descended by evolution, forming a language family. Proto-languages are usually unattest ...
from which the various
Algonquian languages
The Algonquian languages ( or ; also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Indigenous languages of the Americas, indigenous American languages that include most languages in the Algic languages, Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language f ...
are descended. It is generally estimated to have been spoken around 2,500 to 3,000 years ago, but there is less agreement on where it was spoken. The Algonquian family, which is a branch of the larger
Algic language family, is usually divided into three subgroups:
Eastern Algonquian
The Eastern Algonquian languages constitute a subgroup of the Algonquian languages. Prior to European contact, Eastern Algonquian consisted of at least 17 languages, whose speakers collectively occupied the Atlantic coast of North America and adj ...
, which is a
genetic subgroup, and
Central Algonquian
The Central Algonquian languages are commonly grouped together as a subgroup of the larger Algonquian family, itself a member of the Algic family. Though the grouping is often encountered in the literature, it is an areal grouping, not a geneti ...
and
Plains Algonquian, both of which are
areal groupings. In the historical linguistics of North America, Proto-Algonquian is one of the best studied, most thoroughly reconstructed proto-languages. It is descended from
Proto-Algic
Proto-Algic (sometimes abbreviated PAc) is the proto-language from which the Algic languages (Wiyot language, Yurok language, and Proto-Algonquian) are descended. It is estimated to have been spoken about 7,000 years ago somewhere in the American ...
.
History of research
Most Algonquian languages are similar enough that their relatedness has been recognized for centuries and was commented on by the early English and French colonists and explorers. For example, in 1787 (over a decade before
Sir William Jones' famous speech on Indo-European), the theologian and linguist
Jonathan Edwards Jr. deduced that the Algonquian languages of the eastern and central United States were "radically the same" ('radically' meaning having a common 'root', since ''radix'' is Latin for 'root'), and contrasted them with the neighboring
Iroquoian languages
The Iroquoian languages are a language family of indigenous peoples of North America. They are known for their general lack of labial consonants. The Iroquoian languages are polysynthetic and head-marking.
As of 2020, all surviving Iroquoian la ...
. The earliest work on reconstructing the Algonquian proto-language was undertaken by the linguists
Truman Michelson
Truman Michelson (August 11, 1879 – July 26, 1938) was a linguist and anthropologist who worked from 1910 until his death for the Bureau of American Ethnology at the Smithsonian Institution. He also held a position as ethnologist at George Was ...
and
Leonard Bloomfield
Leonard Bloomfield (April 1, 1887 – April 18, 1949) was an American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. He is considered to be the father of American distributionalism ...
. In 1925 Bloomfield reconstructed what he called "Primitive Central Algonquian", using what were at the time the four best-attested Algonquian languages:
Fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
,
Ojibwe
The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains.
According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
,
Menominee
The Menominee (; mez, omǣqnomenēwak meaning ''"Menominee People"'', also spelled Menomini, derived from the Ojibwe language word for "Wild Rice People"; known as ''Mamaceqtaw'', "the people", in the Menominee language) are a federally recog ...
, and
Plains Cree Plains Cree may refer to:
* Plains Cree language
* Plains Cree people
Plains Indians or Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains and Canadian Prairies are the Native American tribes and First Nation band governments who have historically liv ...
. Following his initial reconstructions, investigations of other languages revealed that his "Primitive Central Algonquian" was essentially equivalent to Proto-Algonquian. Bloomfield wrote a refinement and expansion of his reconstruction in 1946, and his two papers remain the starting point for all research and reconstructions of Proto-Algonquian. In the years since there has been an enormous amount of comparative work undertaken on the Algonquian family.
Urheimat
There remains some disagreement over the Algonquian ''
Urheimat
In historical linguistics, the homeland or ''Urheimat'' (, from German '' ur-'' "original" and ''Heimat'', home) of a proto-language is the region in which it was spoken before splitting into different daughter languages. A proto-language is the r ...
'' (homeland of the protolanguage). The initial theory, first put forth by
Frank T. Siebert, Jr. in 1967 based on examining of the ranges of numerous species of plants and animals for which reliable Algonquian
cognate
In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...
s existed, holds that Proto-Algonquian was spoken between Lake Huron's
Georgian Bay
Georgian Bay (french: Baie Georgienne) is a large bay of Lake Huron, in the Laurentia bioregion. It is located entirely within the borders of Ontario, Canada. The main body of the bay lies east of the Bruce Peninsula and Manitoulin Island. To ...
and
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
, in
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
, Canada, and at least as far south as
Niagara Falls
Niagara Falls () is a group of three waterfalls at the southern end of Niagara Gorge, spanning the border between the province of Ontario in Canada and the state of New York in the United States. The largest of the three is Horseshoe Falls, ...
. Research a generation later suggests that in fact it was spoken farther west than this, perhaps "somewhere immediately west of
Lake Superior
Lake Superior in central North America is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface areaThe Caspian Sea is the largest lake, but is saline, not freshwater. and the third-largest by volume, holding 10% of the world's surface fresh wa ...
" or on the
Columbia Plateau
The Columbia Plateau is a geologic and geographic region that lies across parts of the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. It is a wide flood basalt plateau between the Cascade Range and the Rocky Mountains, cut through by the Columbia ...
.
Phonology
Vowels
Proto-Algonquian had four basic vowels, ''*i'', ''*e'', ''*a'', ''*o'', each of which had a
long
Long may refer to:
Measurement
* Long, characteristic of something of great duration
* Long, characteristic of something of great length
* Longitude (abbreviation: long.), a geographic coordinate
* Longa (music), note value in early music mensur ...
counterpart (commonly written ''*i·'', ''*e·'', ''*a·'', ''*o·''), for a total of eight vowels. The same inventory of eight vowels was found in Proto-Algic, but Proto-Algonquian did not inherit its inventory directly from Proto-Algic. Rather, several sound changes left pre-Proto-Algonquian without short *''i'' and *''o''.
It is not clear that they had redeveloped by the time of Proto-Algonquian. All instances in which Bloomfield reconstructed ''*o'' can now be reconstructed as ''*we'' based on evidence from some of the Eastern languages (for example, Bloomfield's ''*nekotwi'' "one" is now reconstructed as ''*nekwetwi'' based on forms like
Munsee
The Munsee (or Minsi or Muncee) or mə́n'si·w ( del, Monsiyok)Online Lenape Talking Dictionary, "Munsee Indians"Link/ref> are a subtribe of the Lenape, originally constituting one of the three great divisions of that nation and dwelling along t ...
''nkwúti''). There are still a handful of instances where ''*o'' can be reconstructed, usually as the result of a
morphophonological
Morphophonology (also morphophonemics or morphonology) is the branch of linguistics that studies the interaction between morphology (linguistics), morphological and phonology, phonological or phonetic processes. Its chief focus is the sound chan ...
process of vowel shortening. Goddard concludes that "an independent phoneme ''*o'' is of no great antiquity in Proto-Algonquian", but recommends continuing to use it in reconstructions. Likewise, Berman states that "PA ''*i'' is probably also of recent origin", derived from earlier (pre-Proto-Algonquian) ''*ye'' sequences and morphophonological shortening.
Consonants
Proto-Algonquian had a smaller number of consonants than Proto-Algic. The reconstructed consonants are as follows (given in the
Americanist phonetic notation
Americanist phonetic notation, also known as the North American Phonetic Alphabet (NAPA), the Americanist Phonetic Alphabet or the American Phonetic Alphabet (APA), is a system of phonetic notation originally developed by European and American an ...
common in the literature):
The phoneme given in the table as ⟨r⟩ was reconstructed by Bloomfield as ''*l'', but Goddard has more recently argued that it should be reconstructed as ''*r'', largely because the earliest attestations of the majority of languages show some sort of rhotic as its reflex, which in many languages subsequently changed to a lateral within the historical period. The precise pronunciation of the phoneme written ⟨θ⟩ is unknown. It has merged with the reflex of ''*r'' in all Algonquian languages except for
Cree
The Cree ( cr, néhinaw, script=Latn, , etc.; french: link=no, Cri) are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada ...
and the
Arapahoan languages
The Arapahoan languages are a subgroup of the Plains group of Algonquian languages: Nawathinehena, Arapaho, and Gros Ventre
The Gros Ventre ( , ; meaning "big belly"), also known as the Aaniiih, A'aninin, Haaninin, Atsina, and White Clay, ar ...
.
Leonard Bloomfield
Leonard Bloomfield (April 1, 1887 – April 18, 1949) was an American linguist who led the development of structural linguistics in the United States during the 1930s and the 1940s. He is considered to be the father of American distributionalism ...
originally suggested that it could have been either an
interdental
Interdental consonants are produced by placing the tip of the tongue between the upper and lower front teeth. That differs from dental consonants, which are articulated with the tongue against the ''back'' of the upper incisors. No language is kn ...
fricative or a
lateral fricative
A lateral is a consonant in which the airstream proceeds along one or both of the sides of the tongue, but it is blocked by the tongue from going through the middle of the mouth. An example of a lateral consonant is the English ''L'', as in ''Larr ...
. One piece of evidence for the interdental fricative is that this is the reflex it has in Arapaho. However, other researchers have argued for its reconstruction as a lateral fricative, , in part because of the aforementioned merger in most languages with the phoneme traditionally reconstructed as ''*l''.
As with ''*i'' and ''*o'', it is unclear whether ''*č'' was an independent phoneme in Proto-Algonquian. Almost all instances where ''*č'' is reconstructed are before ''*i'', ''*i·'', or ''*y'', where it does not contrast with ''*t'' (see below), or are cases of diminutive consonant symbolism. However, Goddard recommends continuing to write it in reconstructions, since it seems to have been present in the clusters ''*čp'' and ''*čk''; since it can be reconstructed before ''*a'' in the term ''*čapo·nk-'' "splash"; and since ''*t'' does appear before ''*i·'' in some reconstructions of the onomatopoeic noun ''ti·nti·wa'' "blue jay" (however, see
Wiktionary
Wiktionary ( , , rhyming with "dictionary") is a multilingual, web-based project to create a free content dictionary of terms (including words, phrases, proverbs, linguistic reconstructions, etc.) in all natural languages and in a number ...
for more).
Clusters
Reconstruction of the consonant clusters has been relatively difficult, and the paths the clusters take in their evolutions to the daughter languages have been complex. The current view is that the permissible consonant clusters were (first member on the left, second member across the top):
In several cases the actual phonetic identity of the first member of the clusters was unknown, and Bloomfield's choice of symbols to represent them was purely arbitrary. Thus, ⟨x⟩ does not represent *
⟨ç⟩ does not represent *
and ⟨ʔ⟩ does not necessarily represent *[]. Goddard argues that Bloomfield's arbitrary symbol ⟨x⟩ be reconstructed as ''*s'', and Bloomfield's ⟨ç⟩ be reconstructed as ''*r''. While a glottal stop phoneme is not otherwise reconstructed, given that Bloomfield's ⟨ʔ⟩ in clusters seems to represent the neutralization of ''*p'' and ''*k'' and its realization in Menominee and Cheyenne is a glottal stop, it probably was indeed phonetically . The cluster written ⟨Hm⟩ shows up as ''p'' or ''m'' in most of the daughter languages, but as ''hm'' in
Munsee
The Munsee (or Minsi or Muncee) or mə́n'si·w ( del, Monsiyok)Online Lenape Talking Dictionary, "Munsee Indians"Link/ref> are a subtribe of the Lenape, originally constituting one of the three great divisions of that nation and dwelling along t ...
(for example, PA ''*wi·kiwa·Hmi'' "house" becomes Ojibwe ''wiigiwaam'', Fox ''wîkiyâpi'', and Munsee ''wíikwahm''). The first member of the cluster may have been either *h or .
The clusters ''*št'' and ''*hr'' are each reconstructed on the basis of only a single correspondence set (''*št'' in ''*weštikwa·ni'', "his/her head"; and ''*hr'' in ''*re·hre·wa'', "s/he breathes") and may not have been part of Proto-Algonquian. David Pentland, for example, argued that Ojibwe ''oshtigwaan'', claimed as the only form requiring the reconstruction of ''*št'', is a borrowing from Cree. However, evidence from Munsee and
Blackfoot
The Blackfoot Confederacy, ''Niitsitapi'' or ''Siksikaitsitapi'' (ᖹᐟᒧᐧᒣᑯ, meaning "the people" or " Blackfoot-speaking real people"), is a historic collective name for linguistically related groups that make up the Blackfoot or Bla ...
seem to also point toward ''*št'' as a valid separate cluster in PA (Munsee ''wìilùshtíikan'', Blackfoot ''moʼtokááni'', "head, hair").
Finally, all consonants and consonant clusters could be followed by ''*w'' or ''*y'' (although the sequences ''*čw'' and ''*hy'' did not occur; and ''*t'' and ''*θ'' were regularly replaced before ''*y'', for which see below).
Phonological processes
Several
allophonic
In phonology, an allophone (; from the Greek , , 'other' and , , 'voice, sound') is a set of multiple possible spoken soundsor ''phones''or signs used to pronounce a single phoneme in a particular language. For example, in English, (as in ''s ...
processes,
morphophonemic
Morphophonology (also morphophonemics or morphonology) is the branch of linguistics that studies the interaction between morphology (linguistics), morphological and phonology, phonological or phonetic processes. Its chief focus is the sound chan ...
processes, and
phonological constraints can be reconstructed. Among the most significant of these processes was that ''*t'' and ''*θ'' became ''*č'' and ''*š'' respectively before ''*i'', ''*i·'', and ''*y''. For example, the initial ''*went-'' "from there" (as in ''*wentenamwa'' "s/he takes it from there") is realized as ''*wenč-'' in the word ''*wenči·wa'' "s/he comes from there", since it precedes ''*i·''.
There were several restrictions on phonotactics and the shape of the PA word that can be reconstructed. All words began with a single consonant (other than ''*h'') or vowel, or with a consonant plus ''*w'' or ''*y''; there were no sequences of consecutive vowels; and the word always ended in a short vowel. The vowels ''*i'' and ''*o'' never occurred in initial syllables. A sequence of consonant+semivowel could not be followed by ''*o'' or ''*o·''. There was also a restriction which prevented two-syllable nouns from ending in a sequence of short vowel + consonant + short vowel.
In most cases, when the pronominal prefixes ''*ne-'' (first person), ''*ke-'' (second person), and ''*we-'' (third person) were added to a vowel-initial stem, an
epenthetic
In phonology, epenthesis (; Greek language, Greek ) means the addition of one or more sounds to a word, especially in the beginning syllable (''prothesis (linguistics), prothesis'') or in the ending syllable (''paragoge'') or in-between two syll ...
''*-t-'' was inserted between the prefix and the stem. Thus, the prefixes became ''*net-'', ''*ket-'', and ''*wet-'' respectively. For example, ''*ne-'' + ''*-ehkwa-'' = ''*netehkwa-'' "my louse". This feature goes back to
Proto-Algic
Proto-Algic (sometimes abbreviated PAc) is the proto-language from which the Algic languages (Wiyot language, Yurok language, and Proto-Algonquian) are descended. It is estimated to have been spoken about 7,000 years ago somewhere in the American ...
(compare
Wiyot
The Wiyot ( Wiyot: Wíyot, Chetco-Tolowa: Wee-’at xee-she or Wee-yan’ Xee-she’, Euchre Creek Tututni: Wii-yat-dv-ne - "Mad River People“, Yurok: Weyet) are an indigenous people of California living near Humboldt Bay, California and a s ...
''du-'' + ''híkw'' = ''dutíkw'' "my louse"). There were a handful of irregular exceptions to this pattern, however. For example, the prefixes lost their vowels before several kinship terms, as in ''*ne-'' + ''*-o·hkomehsa'' = ''*no·hkomehsa'' "my grandmother."
![Algonquian langs](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Algonquian_langs.png)
Several rules for
internal sandhi in morpheme combinations can be reconstructed. The most basic was the insertion of a "connective i" between two consonants. For example, ''*po·n-'' "cease" + ''*-m'' "act by speech on an animate object" = ''*po·nime·wa'' "s/he stops talking to him/her." In a few idiosyncratic cases, however, this rule did not operate, and instead the consonants were changed in various ways. For instance, the combination ''θ+p'' produced when the root ''*eθ-'' "thither, thus" was added to the final ''*-pahto·'' "run" simplified to ''*xp'': ''*expahta·wa'' "s/he runs thither." One regular exception to the "connective i" rule was when the conjunct suffix ''*-ki'' was added to a verb stem ending in a consonant, for example ''*ki·šekat-'' "be day" + ''*-ki'' = ''*ki·šekaxki'' "when it is day." Note that Bloomfield here actually reconstructed this word as ''*ki·šekaθki'', but evidence from other Algonquian languages has shown that the cluster should be reconstructed as ''*xk''. When two vowels became contiguous, if one was a long vowel and one was short, the short vowel dropped: ''*naka·-'' "stop" + ''*-en'' "by hand" = ''*naka·ne·wa'' "s/he stops him/her by hand." If both were long, an epenthetic ''*y'' was inserted between the two.
Grammar
Proto-Algonquian nouns had an
animate/inanimate contrast: nouns representing animate beings (and some traditional items viewed as having spiritual powers) were classed as ''animate'', while all other nouns were ''inanimate''. The plural marker differed in form depending on whether the noun was animate or inanimate: animate nouns took a plural suffix ''*-aki'', while inanimate nouns took a plural suffix ''*-ari''. Another important distinction involved the contrast between nouns marked as ''proximate'' and those marked as ''
obviative
Within linguistics, obviative (abbreviated ) third person is a grammatical-person clusivity marking that distinguishes a non- salient (obviative) third-person referent from a more salient (proximate) third-person referent in a given discourse cont ...
''. Proximate nouns were those deemed most central or important to the discourse, while obviative nouns were those less important to the discourse. When two third person participants appeared in a sentence, one was marked as proximate and the other as obviative, in order to distinguish which one was the subject and which was the object (since verbs inflected for whether they had a proximate or obviative subject and a proximate or obviative object). In a given stretch of discourse, there will not be two proximate or two obviative participants.
There were personal pronouns which distinguished three persons, two numbers (singular and plural),
inclusive and exclusive first person plural, and proximate and obviative third persons. Demonstrative pronouns have been more difficult to reconstruct, as many of the daughter languages have innovated a great deal.
PA had four classes of verbs:
transitive verbs with an animate object (abbreviated TA), transitive verbs with an inanimate object (TI),
intransitive
In grammar, an intransitive verb is a verb whose context does not entail a direct object. That lack of transitivity distinguishes intransitive verbs from transitive verbs, which entail one or more objects. Additionally, intransitive verbs are ...
verbs with an animate subject (AI), and intransitive verbs with an inanimate subject (II). Transitive verbs had two paradigms, termed ''objective'' and ''absolute''. Objective verbs were used when the object of the verb was not present as an overt noun elsewhere in the sentence, while absolute verbs were used when the object of the verb ''was'' marked with an overt noun in the sentence. Objective verbs could also be used when an object was present, and in such cases indicated that the object was
definite
In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases, distinguishing between referents or senses that are identifiable in a given context (definite noun phrases) and those which are not (indefinite noun phrases). The prototypical d ...
, as opposed to indefinite.
[The verb system is surveyed by Hockett (1966) with particular reference to ]Potawatomi
The Potawatomi , also spelled Pottawatomi and Pottawatomie (among many variations), are a Native American people of the western Great Lakes region, upper Mississippi River and Great Plains. They traditionally speak the Potawatomi language, a m ...
; see also Teeter (1965) and Weggelaar (1974).
See also
*
Algonquian languages
The Algonquian languages ( or ; also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Indigenous languages of the Americas, indigenous American languages that include most languages in the Algic languages, Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language f ...
**
Plains Algonquian languages
The Plains Algonquian languages are commonly grouped together as a subgroup of the larger Algonquian family, itself a member of the Algic family. Though the grouping is often encountered in the literature, it is an areal grouping rather than a ...
**
Central Algonquian languages
The Central Algonquian languages are commonly grouped together as a subgroup of the larger Algonquian family, itself a member of the Algic family. Though the grouping is often encountered in the literature, it is an areal grouping, not a geneti ...
**
Eastern Algonquian languages
The Eastern Algonquian languages constitute a subgroup of the Algonquian languages. Prior to European contact, Eastern Algonquian consisted of at least 17 languages, whose speakers collectively occupied the Atlantic coast of North America and adj ...
*
Algic languages
The Algic languages (also Algonquian–Wiyot–Yurok or Algonquian–Ritwan) are an indigenous language family of North America. Most Algic languages belong to the Algonquian subfamily, dispersed over a broad area from the Rocky Mountains to ...
*
Algonquian sound laws
Notes
References
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External links
Proto-Algonquian online dictionary*
Algonquian languages
The Algonquian languages ( or ; also Algonkian) are a subfamily of Indigenous languages of the Americas, indigenous American languages that include most languages in the Algic languages, Algic language family. The name of the Algonquian language f ...
-
Ethnologue
''Ethnologue: Languages of the World'' (stylized as ''Ethnoloɠue'') is an annual reference publication in print and online that provides statistics and other information on the living languages of the world. It is the world's most comprehensiv ...
page
Native Languages of the Americas: Algonquian Language FamilyProto-Algonkian Roots and Word Formativesby John Hewson
Proto-Algonquian- handout by Daniela Henze (2010)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Proto-Algonquian Language
Algonquian languages
Algic languages
Algonquian