[tʰ]→[z]Certainty: 5/5Commonality: 3/5
Voiceless aspirated alveolar plosive to Voiced alveolar fricative
The transformation from a voiceless aspirated alveolar plosive (/tʰ/) to a voiced alveolar fricative (/z/) is a multi-stage lenition process. This complex shift typically involves deaspiration, spirantization (fricativization), and voicing, often progressing through intermediate fricative stages such as a voiceless dental fricative (/θ/) and a voiced dental fricative (/ð/).
Phonetic Effects
Deaspiration, Spirantization, Voicing, Alveolarization
Language Examples
tʰ→θ— The voiceless aspirated alveolar plosive /tʰ/ (represented by the letter theta) underwent spirantization to a voiceless dental fricative /θ/.
θ→ð— The voiceless dental fricative /θ/ (derived from /tʰ/) underwent voicing to a voiced dental fricative /ð/.
ð→z— The voiced dental fricative /ð/ shifted to a voiced alveolar fricative /z/, particularly in contexts before nasals (e.g., Latin 'asinum' > Old French 'asne' [az.nə] from an earlier [að.nə]).
ð→z— A sound shift from /ð/ to /z/ (or /r/) has been proposed to underlie the new 3rd person singular suffix in runic inscriptions (e.g., 'sitiz' 'sits' from earlier forms with /ð/).
Related Transformations
More Romance Shifts
Sources & References
- Spirantization - Brill Reference Works.
- How did the Greek aspirates become fricatives? - Linguistics Stack Exchange.
- Greek Influence on the English and Spanish Alphabets.
- Manner change in early French unharmonic obstruent-sonorant clusters: Re-examining native lexicon and ecclesiastic loanwords in a constraint-based analysis.
- LANGUAGE CHANGE IN THE RUNIC INSCRIPTIONS OF DENMARK BETWEEN 500 AND 700 - Syddansk Universitet.
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