[v]→[b]Certainty: 5/5Commonality: 4/5

Voiced labiodental fricative to Voiced bilabial plosive

The shift from [v] to [b] is a form of fortition known as betacism. It involves the strengthening of a labial fricative into a stop. This process is most famously seen in Spanish, where the distinction between /b/ and /v/ was lost as they merged into a single phoneme.

Phonetic Effects

Betacism, Fortition

Language Examples

Svan / Mingrelian (Kartvelian) Kartvelian

Proto-Kartvelian *w/*v→[b] (Svan)— Proto-Kartvelian initial *w/v → Svan b in many roots. E.g., PK *wil- (to see) → Svan bil-, while Georgian preserves x-il-. Fortition of labial approximant/fricative to stop is systematic in Svan.

Spanish Romance

vino [v] (Latin)→vino [b/β]— In Spanish, the labiodental fricative strengthened/merged with the bilabial stop.

veneris→viernes [b]

Related Transformations

Inverse: Spirantization

More Romance Shifts

[ã] → [õ] — Raising [a] → [ã] — Assimilatory Nasalization [a] → [∅] — Elision [a] → [ə] — Vowel Reduction [ai] → [e] — Monophthongization

Sources & References

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