[t]→[∅]Certainty: 5/5Commonality: 5/5
Voiceless alveolar plosive to Empty sound / Zero
The elision of [t] is a common lenition process, particularly in word-final positions or in complex consonant clusters where the stop is simplified to increase ease of articulation.
Phonetic Effects
Elision, Cluster Reduction, Lenition
Language Examples
PIE *-t (word-final)→∅ (Latvian)— Latvian systematically dropped word-final *-t; e.g., PIE nominative *-nt → Latvian zero. Cf. Lithuanian 'ėst' (to eat) vs Latvian 'ēst' (earlier *ēsti → *ēst → ēst with different retention).
listen [st]→[ˈlɪsən]— Loss of the dental stop in the /st/ cluster.
Christmas→[ˈkrɪsməs]
patrem (Latin)→pai [∅]— Complete elision of the intervocalic dental stop.
Proto-TNG *-t (word-final)→∅— Trans-New Guinea languages, including Kalam (Trans-New Guinea, Madang Province, Papua New Guinea), systematically delete word-final stops. Proto-Trans-New Guinea CVC syllables in final position lose the final consonant in most daughter languages, yielding predominantly open CV syllable structure. The alveolar stop *-t is deleted word-finally alongside other final obstruents.
Related Transformations
More Romance 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