The Proto-Tibeto-Burman language is the reconstructed ancestor of the Tibeto-Burman languages. Among other researchers Paul K. Benedict and James Matisoff have made proposals for the reconstruction of this language.
Contents
Phonology
The phonology of Proto-Tibeto-Burman here is from Matisoff's 2003 reconstruction, much of which is based on Benedict's earlier reconstructions.
Consonants
Proto-Tibetan–Burman has at least 23 consonants (Matisoff 2003:15). Some descendants of Proto-Tibetan–Burman, especially the Qiangic languages, have developed dozens of sibilant fricatives and affricates.
Proto-Tibeto-Burman also has many final nasals, stops, and liquids.
Vowels
Proto-Tibeto-Burman vowels can be split into primary and secondary sets. Modern-day Tibeto-Burman languages have anywhere from five vowels (Written Tibetan and Jingpho) to dozens of monophthongs and diphthongs (Loloish and Qiangic languages) (Matisoff 2003:157). Matisoff (2003) also notes that languages which have greatly simplified or eliminated final consonants tend to have more vowels. The open front unrounded vowel *a is by far the most common and stable vowel in Tibeto-Burman languages.
Matisoff (2003) reinterprets diphthongs from Paul Benedict's reconstruction as long vowels.
Preservation of stops
Sino-Tibetan languages go through a series of four stages in which final stops and nasals gradually decay (Matisoff 2003:238-239).
- The six final stops and nasals, *-p, *-t, *-k, *-m, *-n, *-ŋ, are all intact. Written Tibetan, Lepcha, Kanauri, Garo, and Cantonese are currently in this stage.
- One or more final consonants have been reduced or dropped. In Jingpho and Nung, the velars (*-k) are replaced by glottal stops (-ʔ), while in other languages they are completely dropped. In Mandarin Chinese, all final stops are dropped, and *-m has merged with *-n.
- All finals stops become glottal stops or constrictions (such as creaky voices), and final nasals may be replaced by nasality in the preceding consonant. Languages currently in this stage include modern Burmese and Lahu.
- There are no glottal or nasal traces of former final consonants left in the syllables.
Syntax
Proto-Tibeto-Burman was a verb-final (subject–object–verb or SOV) language.
Syllable structure
According to James Matisoff, Proto-Tibeto-Burman syllables typically consist of the following structure (Matisoff 2003:11-13).
(P2) — (P1) — Ci — (G) — V(:) — Cf — (s)
The following types of changes in syllable structure have been attested in Tibeto-Burman languages (Matisoff 2003:155). (Note: "Sesquisyllable" is a word coined by James Matisoff meaning "one-and-a-half syllables.")
Below are the sources of the syllable changes (i.e., reversal of the list above).
Verbal agreement
According to many authors such as James Bauman, George van Driem and Scott DeLancey, a system of verbal agreement should be reconstructed for proto-Tibeto-Burman. Verbal agreement has disappeared in Chinese, Tibetan, Lolo-Burmese and most other branches, but was preserved in Kiranti languages in particular. This is a topic of scholarly debate, however, and the existence of a PTB verbal agreement system is disputed by such authors as Randy LaPolla.
Prefixes
Matisoff postulates the following derivational prefixes.
Other constructed prefixes include *l- and *d-.
Circumfixes
Circumfixes have also been reconstructed for Proto-Tibeto-Burman.
In Written Tibetan, s- -n and s- -d are collective circumfixes used in kinship terms (Matisoff 2003:453).
Suffixes
Three Proto-Tibeto-Burman dental suffixes, *-n, *-t, and *-s, are highly widespread, but their semantics are difficult to reconstruct (Matisoff 2003:439). The suffixes *-s, *-h, and *-ʔ are often developed into tones in many Tibeto-Burman languages, and are thus highly "tonogenetically potent" (Matisoff 2003:474).
Vocabulary
Among other researchers Paul K. Benedict and James Matisoff have proposed reconstructed vocabulary items. One resource for Matisoff's proposals for Proto-Tibeto-Burman vocabulary reconstruction is his Sino-Tibetan Etymological Dictionary and Thesaurus (STEDT) [2], based at the Department of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley.