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The Uralic/Finno-Ugric Languages and Their Common Linguistic Heritage

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The Uralic/Finno-Ugric Languages and Their Common Linguistic Heritage http://homepage.univie.ac.at/Johanna.Laakso/Padova2006/ The Uralic/Finno-Ugric languages and their common linguistic heritage Sámi Finnic Mordvin Mari Permic Hungarian Ob-Ugric Samoyed languages languages languages languages languages languages languages (Erzya, (Komi, (Mansi, Moksha) Udmurt) Khanty) Proto-Sámi Proto- Proto- Proto- Proto- Proto-Ob- South North Finnic Mordvin Mari Permic Ugric Proto-Sámi- Proto- Finnic Samoyed Proto-Finno- Proto-Ugric Permic Proto-Uralic / Proto-Finno-Ugric Tripartite family tree (following U.-M. Kulonen) as a compromise alternative to the traditional binary tree and the alternative “comb” model (“family bush”). Sámi (“Lapp”) Ter Sámi, Akkala (Babino) Sámi almost extinct? languages Kildin Sámi 800 speakers Skolt Sámi 500 speakers Inari Sámi 400 speakers North Sámi 30 000 speakers Lule Sámi 2000 speakers South Sámi 500 speakers Finnic languages Finnish (and Tornedal Finnish / meänkieli in Northern ca. 5 million speakers Sweden, Kven Finnish in Northern Norway etc.) Karelian (Karelian proper, Olonetsian, Ludian) ca. 65 000 speakers in sum Veps 6000 speakers Ingrian a few hundred speakers? Vote very few speakers Estonian (and Southeastern Estonian a.k.a. Võro-Seto) ca. 1 million speakers Livonian very few speakers Mordvin languages Erzya, Moksha ca. 750 000 speakers in sum Mari (“Cheremis”) West (Hill) Mari, East (Meadow) Mari (and the ca. 550 000 speakers in sum languages easternmost dialects) Permic languages Komi (“Komi-Zyryan”, and Komi-Permyak) ca. 350 000 speakers in sum Udmurt (“Votyak”) ca. 500 000 speakers Ugric languages Hungarian ca. 15 000 000 speakers Ob-Ugric: Khanty (“Ostyak”) ca. 13 000 speakers Ob-Ugric: Mansi (“Vogul”) ca. 3 000 speakers Samoyed languages Nganasan (“Tavgy”) ca. 1000 speakers Nenets (“Yurak”): Tundra Nenets, Forest Nenets ca. 27 000 speakers in sum Enets (“Yenisey Samoyed”) very few speakers Selkup (“Ostyak Samoyed”) ca. 1700 speakers http://homepage.univie.ac.at/Johanna.Laakso/Padova2006/ Proto-Uralic/Proto-Finno-Ugric – contemporary and neighbour of Proto-Indo-European? – agglutinative (?) language with rich suffixal morphology, ?SOV word order, AN, GN, postpositions – word structure: underived stems disyllabic (content words) or monosyllabic (deictics &c) – rather poor consonant system (word-initial consonant clusters avoided), reconstructions of the vowel system debated – morphology: o for nouns: at least 5-6 cases, 3 numbers, possessive suffixes o for verbs: verbal nouns/derivational suffixes developing into tense/mode markers? – vocabulary: at least some 200 reconstructible words, e.g. o low numerals: *ükti ‘1’, *käktä ‘2’, *kolmi ‘3’, *ńeljä ‘4’, *wi(t)ti ‘5’, *ku(t)ti ‘6’ o body parts: *käti ‘hand’, *śüδämi ‘heart’, *weri ‘blood’, *päŋä ‘head’... o basic activities & functions: *meni- ‘go’, *ïmta- ‘give’, *wetä- ‘pull’, *elä- ‘live’, *kaxli- ‘die’, *sewi- ‘eat’, *juxi- ‘drink’... o people, relatives: *iśä ‘father’, *poji ‘boy/son’, *mińä ‘daughter-in-law’... o plants & animals: *puxi ‘tree’, *kala ‘fish’, *šiŋiri ‘mouse’, *lunta ‘goose/bird’, *pesä ‘nest’, *muna ‘egg’, *śorwa ‘horn’... o nature, environment, time, weather: *weti ‘water’, *śükśi ‘autumn’, *tälwä ‘winter’, *lumi ‘snow’, *üji ‘night’... o tools & technology: *suksi ‘ski’, *jïŋsi ‘bow’, *ńïxli ‘arrow’, *śolmi ‘knot’, *wäśkä ‘?metal’... o society: *nimi ‘name’, *arwa ‘price’, *sala- ‘steal’ o spatial relationships, quantity, quality: *ala- ‘under-’, *wüli- ‘up-’, *piδkä ‘long/tall’, ?*pilmitä ‘dark’, *wuδ'i ‘new’, *čupa ‘thin’... .
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