Metathesis in Language 2.0

Greek (Attic)

Language Family
Indo-European
Subgroup
Hellenic
Area
—

Summary

Fricatives in sequences of vowel (V) + sonorant (R) + s underwent debuccalization, metathesis and then assimilation to vowels in Attic Greek: *VRs > VRh > VhR > V:R

Type(s) of metathesis

Type Status Optionality Position Location
a. CC Diachronic Obligatory Adjacent Root-internal

Case types and qualities

Examples

*owsata > *owhata > *ohwata > oúata 'ear'
*enemsa > *enemha > *enehma > enè„ma 'distributed'

Conditions

No conditions could be found

Motivations

The metathesis is not entirely transparent in Attic Greek (as all historical *VRs have become V:R), but Kiparsky (1967) proposes this sequence of sound change in order to account for the systematic distribution of V:R in Attic-Ionic Greek and VR: in Lesbian-Thessalian Greek.

Symbols

Comments

See also Steriade (1982) for discussion.

Bibliography

Kiparsky, P. 1967. Sonorant clusters in Greek. Lg. 43. vol. 3. 619-35.
Steriade, Donca. 1982. Greek prosodies and the nature of syllabification. Cambridge, MA: MIT dissertation.