How sonority shaped the fate of consonant clusters in Italiot Greek

Eirini Apostolopoulou

Università degli Studi di Verona

Universitetet i Tromsø — Norges arktiske universitet

This paper investigates the syllable structure of the Italiot Greek (IG) dialects, i.e. Calabrian Greek (CG) and Salentinian Greek (SG) (Rohlfs 1950; Karanastassis 1997) and suggests a common motivation behind the diachronic changes consonant clusters have undergone. The analysis is couched within Optimality Theory (Prince & Smolensky 1993/2004).

At the surface level, no rising sonority clusters are synchronically attested in IG, with the exception of obstruent-liquid sequences, e.g. mávro ‘black’, kladí ‘branch’ (examples from Karanastassis 1984‒1992). Obstruent-nasal clusters turn into geminate nasals; for example, kanːó ‘smoke’ (< pn), línːo ‘lamp’ (< xn), alemːéno ‘ground (/aleC[cor]-mén-ο/) (cf. dːarméno ‘skinned’, with a liquid-final root).

Further evidence comes from the evolution of the stop-fricative clusters ps and ks in CG. In the Rochudi and Gallicianò sub-dialects, one finds the variants spomí (< ps) ‘bread’, where the order of the segments has been inverted, and ʃːílo (< ks)‘wood’, where the cluster has given its place to a geminate. On the other hand, in Bova, both clusters have become t͡ːs, i.e. t͡ːsomí, t͡ːsílo. Concerning obstruent-obstruent clusters coming from sonority plateaux, e.g. ft and xt(< pt and kt, respectively), a change in the Place of Articulation (PoA) has led to neutralization: both dorsals and labials have turned into coronals. Each CG variety opted for a different path; consider for instance tːhoxó / tːhéni (Gallicianò) ~ θtoxó / θténi (Rochudi) ~ stoxó / sténi (Bova) (cf. Standard Greek ftoxó ‘poor’ / xténi ‘comb’). Interestingly enough, SG demonstrates similar cases of neutralization regarding C[lab or dor]C[cor] clusters. In particular, labialization of the dorsals is observed, followed by further coronalization, e.g. fsomí~sːomí, fsílo~sːílo. ftoxó~tːoxó, fténi~tːéni (see Tzitzilis 2004).

We maintain that the evolution of consonant clusters in IG is conditioned by minimal sonority distance requirements that impose restrictions on complex onsets and on codas. Branching onsets can host only obstruent-liquid clusters; therefore, clusters of a different sonority profile need to be syllabified as coda-onset. Crucially, in case the latter do not comply with the Syllable Contact Law (SCL, Davis 1998; Murray & Vennemann 1983; Gouskova 2001), which dictates that the sonority between a coda and an onset is required not to rise, repair strategies may be employed: (a) coalescence, which results in flat sonority geminates that do satisfy the requirements imposed by the SCL (ps > t͡ːs); (b) local metathesis (ps > sp), which yields a falling sonority cluster; and (c) lenition in terms of PoA (kt > ft), according to the markedness hierarchy dorsals > labials > coronals (de Lacy 2006; see Seigneur & Pagliano 2003 for Romanian), which targets consonants in coda position. Note that, on the basis of independent evidence (long-distance rhotic metathesis, syntactic doubling), we take word-initial pre-consonantal fricatives as well as the first part of word-initial geminates to be heterosyllabic (Goad 2011). The diatopic variation arising due to the application of different phonological processes is formalized in terms of Property Theory (Alber, DelBusso & Prince 2016). The microtypology across the IG varieties is namely determined by the minimal ranking conditions between faithfulness constraints Linearity (=no metathesis) and Ident (=no change).

References

Alber, B., DelBusso N. & A. Prince. 2016. From intensional properties to Universal support. Language: Phonological Analysis 92. 2: e88‒e116. ROA 1235.

Davis, S. 1998. Syllable contact in Optimality Theory. Journal of Korean Linguistics 23: 181‒211.

de Lacy, P. 2006. Markedness: reduction and preservation in phonology. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Goad, H. 2011. The representation of sC clusters. In M. van Oostendorp, C. Ewen, E. Hume & K. Rice (eds), The Blackwell companion to phonology, 898‒923. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

Gouskova, M. 2001. Falling sonority onsets, loanwords, and syllable contact. In M. Andronis, C. Ball, H. Elston & S. Neuvel (eds.), CLS 37: The main session. Chicago, IL: Chicago Linguistic Society.

Karanastassis, A. 1997. Grammar of the Greek dialects of South Italy. Athens: Academy of Athens.

Karanastasis, A. 1984‒1992. Historical dictionary of Greek of South Italy. Athens: Academy of Athens.

Murray, R. W. & Th. Vennemann. 1983. Sound change and syllable structure in Germanic phonology. Language 59: 514‒528.

Rohlfs, G. 1950. Historisches Grammatik der unteritalienischen Gräzität, München: H. Beck.

Seigneur, D. & C. Pagliano. 2003. On the Rumanian kt > pt shift: Coda lenition or melodic contamination? In T. Geerts, I. van Ginneken & H. Jacobs (eds.), Romance languages and linguistic theory 2003, 327‒342. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.

Tzitzilis, Ch. 2004. Das Mittelgriechische in Süditalien und das Problem der Herkunft der neugriechischen Dialekte Süditaliens. In Byzantina et Neograeca vindomonensia 24, 464‒482. Wien: Verlag der. Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.