[dʱ]→[∅]Certainty: 4/5Commonality: 3/5
Voiced aspirated alveolar plosive to Empty sound / Zero
The voiced aspirated alveolar plosive /dʱ/, a sound characteristic of many Indo-Aryan languages, can undergo a complete phonetic transformation, resulting in its total loss or 'emptying' from a word. This process is a form of extreme lenition, where the consonant weakens over time until it disappears entirely, often leaving no trace or sometimes influencing surrounding vowels.
Phonetic Effects
Lenition, Consonant Loss, Deaspiration, Fricativization
Language Examples
/dʱ/→/∅/— Aspirated consonants, including /dʱ/, have been lost in Sinhala.
/dʱ/→/∅/— Aspirated consonants, including /dʱ/, have been lost in Dhivehi.
/dʱ/→/∅/— Aspirated consonants, including /dʱ/, have been lost in Pashai.
/dʱ/→/∅/— Aspirated consonants, including /dʱ/, have been lost in Grangali.
/dʱ/ (word-final, via intermediate plosive)→/∅/— While /dʱ/ typically reduces to /z/ in Gāndhārī, word-final plosives are lost completely, suggesting a potential path to zero if /dʱ/ first deaspirated to /d/ and then became word-final.
Related Transformations
More Lenition Shifts
Sources & References
Spotted a mistake or have a better example?
EchoDrift is community-driven. You can suggest a change directly through GitHub.
Propose an Edit on GitHub