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UC Berkeley Dissertations, Department of Linguistics UC Berkeley Dissertations, Department of Linguistics Title The Origins of Burmese Creaky Tone Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/31d7d6gm Author Thurgood, Graham Publication Date 1976 eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California The Origins of Burmese Creaky Tone By Graham Ward Thurgood A.B. (California State University, San Jose) 1968 M.A. (California State University, San Jose) 1972 C.Phil. (University of California) 1975 DISSERTATION Submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Linguistics in the GRADUATE DIVISION of the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY . & \. 7?7jC Committee in Charge DEGREE CONFERRED DECEMBER 11, 1976 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. To Martini who showed me what scholarship isi and to Jim» who turned me on to Southeast Asia. ii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. PREFACE I wish to thank the members of my committee for their help. Jimi Matisoff spent countless hours enthusiastically and cheerfully discussing stylistic and substantive issues with me. A substantial part of the merit of this work is due to his guidance. Paul Benedict and Mary Haas have also exerted their influence through their numerous invaluable suggestions. Less directly involved, but equally influential is Martin Birnbach who taught me much of what I know about scholarship. Other people numerous other people have influenced this work. Many of them are thanked individually within. The contributions of several people however should be acknowledged here. Julian Wheatley with whom I spent numerous fruitful and delightful hours disagreeing over the details of Lolo- Burmese reconstruction also provided me with vital translations of many of the Chinese sources cited within. Jim Bauman gave me useful comments on a preliminary outline of this work. Marc Okrand did likewise for large portions of Chapter ?. Ed Hillard willingly discussed the Chin languages with me when I had questions about that language area. Hector Javkin and Bill Ewan provided a critical sounding board for my ideas on phonetics and phonetic change. Finally Lyn Derderian kindly proof-read a final draft of this work. iii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. The contributions of those mentioned above and within have eliminated many of the errors of fact and judgement in earlier versions of this work. I thank these people for giving so freely of their time, energy, and imagination. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Preface iii Table of Contents v List of Figures and Tables xiii Chapter 1» An Introduction; 1 101’ The problem. 1 110. Language subgrouping. 3 120. The Burmese syllable canon’ 5 121. The syllable initial consonants. 6 122. The syllable ending. 8 122.1 The open syllables. 8 122.2 The nasalized syllables. 9 122.3 Final glottal stop. 9 123. Conclusion. 9 130. Previous work. 9 131. Benedict's analysis. 11 131.1 Phonological sources of *3. H 131.2 Morphological sources. 14 131.2.1 Subordination. 14 13 1 .2 .2 Word formation. 15 1 3 2 . Bradley's analysis. 16 133. Lehman and Maran. 18 134. Conclusion. 20 l4oi An outline of this work". 20 Chapter 2» Prefixes. 22 201. Introduction. 22 v Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission 210. Proto-Tibeto-Burman prefixes. 23 211. The individual prefixes. 24 2121 The prefixes *b- and *m-. 24 213. The directive prefixes *r-» *l-» *s-» *d-f and *g-l 26 213.1 The *s- ‘'directive• prefix. 26 214. The vocalic prefix *a-. 27 214.1 The Lolo-Burmese *a-» *aq-, and *ak-. 29 220. The semantic history of the prefixes. 30 221. Wolfenden's outline. 31 222. The Tibetan evidence. 33 230. Prefixes in Kuki-Chin. 34 231. The overt prefixes. 36 231.1 The *b- and *m- prefixes, 36 231.2 The *r- prefix. 37 231.3 The *d- prefix! 37 231.4 The *g- prefix. 37 231.5 The *a- prefix. 38 2 3 2 . Covert effects of prefixes. 39 233. Conclusion. 41 240. Other prefixes. 41 241. The *s- prefix. 42 242. The *k- prefix. 43 243. The *m- body part and animal prefix. 48 2 5 0 . Prefixes in Lolo-Burmese. 50 2 5 1 . Fossil forms, 51 2 5 2 . Effects of prefixes on tone height. 53 253. Checked syllables. 53 2 5 3 .1 Matisoff's prefixes. 54 25312 Lisu reflexes. 63 253.3 Akha checked-provenience reflexes. 65 vi Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 254. Open syllables, 65 2 5 5 . #ry- clusters and their reflexes. 67 256. Prefixes and root-initial consonants. 69 257. The two-manner series and prefixes. 69 2 5 8 . Simplex-causative pairs. 71 258 .1 Lolo-Burmese pairs. 71 2 5 8 .2 Proto-Burmese pairs. 74 2 5 8 .3 SummaryI 79 290. Conclusion. 79 Chapter 3* Reconstruction, 81 301. Introduction. 81 302. The history of Lolo-Burmese reconstruction. 81 3 0 3 . Subgrouping. 82 320. Reconstruction of PLB *(k-)way/*(k-)ray. 83 321. The *(k-)way/*(k-)ray particle and creaky tone. 85 322. The form of the *(k-)way/*(k-)ray particle. 87 3 2 3 . The distribution of e£» -yye, -yye?; e in Archaic Burmese. 88 324. The Written Burmese retention of kaiVrai?. 89 330. The proto-tones. 90 331. A historical perspective 91 332.' Lolo-Burmese tonal reflexes 1 92 333" loloish languages’ 93 3341 Burmish language si 97 3351 Tonal reflexes in Burmese dialects. 99 390. Conclusion. 99 Chapter 4* The Origins of Lolo-Burmese proto­ tone 3. 101 401. Introduction. 101 410. The prefixal sources. 101 vii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 411. The Written Tibetan evidence, 102 412. The Luslxai evidence, 103 413. Final *-1 and *-r! 103 414. The *s- animal/body part prefix. 106 415. Apparent counterexamples. 107 420. Other sources. 109 490, Conclusion. 109 Chapter 5 1 The Development of Creaky Tone Within Burmese. Ill 501. Introduction. Ill 510. The statistical distribution. Ill 520. Variation! 114 521. The Lolo-Burmese comparisons. 116 522' Written Burmese variation! 117 522.1 Lexical creaky tone! 118 522.2 Grammatical creaky tone. 119 530! Secondary development of Burmese creaky tone 1 the verbs. 119 531. The position of *(k-)way/*(k-)ray. 124 532. The tonal provenience. 124 533. The voiced initial. 124 534. Patterns of tonal alternation in Written Burmese. 125 540'. Nouns. 129 54l! Orthographic representation of short vowels. 130 541.1 The inherent a vowel as a schwa. 131 54l!2 The orthographic - u? as simply a short u! 132 541.3 Orthographic creaky tone pronounced / - V ! 135 542. Borrowings. 135 viii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 543. Deverbal nouns. 137 544. Trees and other plants. 14-5 544 ~1 The inherent a vowel as a schwa. 14? 544.2 The orthographic -u? as simply a short u. 151 544.3 Borrowingsi 153 544.4 Residue.' 154 5 4 5 . -a2. < */-«-/ and “Hi < short u. 155 546. Animals and body parts. 156 547. Others. 157 550. Grammatical creaky tone. 158 551. Induced creaky tone* subordination. 159 551.1 In numeral compounds. 160 551.2 In derived nouns of the form mevtev. 161 55-1.3 In genitives. 161 551.4 In the relative clause markers tai? and mai?. 162 551.5 Pronouns and demonstratives in attributive position. 162 551.6 Before kui ’object* to* and hma ’at* in'. 163 551.7 Summary. 164 552. Emphatic induced creaky tone. 164 552^1 Before the postposition kui 'emphatic* even', 165 552.2 Vocatives and interjections. 165 552.3 Vocatives and kinship terms. 168 552|4 On verb particles. 169 552.5 Summary. 169 560. Particles. 170 570. Conclusion. 177 ix Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Chapter .6* The Writing System. 179 601. The writing system. 179 610. Written Burmese i transliteration and mod e m pronunciation) 179 611. The open syllables. 182 611.1 The orthographic ambiguity of the inherent a. 183 611.2 Orthographic creaky tone pronounced /-?/. 185 612. The nasalized syllables. 187 613. Orthographic induced creaky tone. 187 613.1 With the open syllables. 188 613.2 Withethe nasalized syllables, 188 620. The history of Burmese. 189 630. Pre-transitional period writings. 190 640. Archaic Burmese, 190 641. The tones. 191 650) Old Standard Burmesej Inscriptional Burmese. 192 651) The vowels. 194 651)1 Interpretation of -uiw ■£ S ) 195 652. The tones. 198 652.1 Interpretation of hre?pauk. 203 652.2 Interpretation of ?auk mrac) 203 652.2.1 The Sanskrit ’vowe1-support * sign. 204 653. Consonant clusters. 208 660. Written Burmese. 209 661) The tones. 210 670. Modern Burmese. 212 Chapter 7* Consonants. Phonation Types, and Tone. 213 701) Introduction. 213 x Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 710. The early Burmese 'tonal' system, 214 720, Lolo-Burmese *3 . 216 730, Consonantsi phonation types, and pitch height. 218 73li On defining tone in South East Asia. 219 732i On the correlation of phonation types and pitch. 220 732.1 The origins of pitch/phonation type correlations! 220 732.2 From the finals. 221 732.3 From the initials. 221 732.4 Further developments. 222 732.5 Unexpected correlations. 223 733. Phonation types affecting consonants. 224 733! 1 The Akha evidence. 225 733.2 The Mandarin. Taishan. and Cantonese splits. 226 733.3 The Ahi-Sani split. 227 733.4- Jinghpho. 231 733.5 Thai.
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