| Proto-Uralic | |
|---|---|
| (may be equivalent to Proto-Finno-Ugric) | |
| Reconstruction of | Uralic languages |
| Region | near theUral Mountains orSayan Mountains[1] |
| Era | 7,000–2,000 BCE |
| Lower-order reconstructions | |
Proto-Uralic is theunattestedreconstructed language ancestral to the modernUraliclanguage family. The reconstructed language is thought to have been originally spoken in a small area in about 7000–2000 BCE (estimates vary), and then expanded across northern Eurasia, gradually diverging into a dialect continuum and then a language family in the process. The location of the area orUrheimat is not known, andvarious strongly differing proposals have been advocated, but the vicinity of theUral Mountains is generally accepted as the most likely.
According to the traditional binary tree model, Proto-Uralic diverged intoProto-Samoyedic andProto-Finno-Ugric. However, reconstructed Proto-Finno-Ugric differs little from Proto-Uralic, and many apparent differences follow from the methods used. Thus, Proto-Finno-Ugric may not be separate from Proto-Uralic. Another reconstruction of the split of Proto-Uralic has three branches (Finno-Permic, Ugric and Samoyedic) from the start.
In the early 21st century, these tree-like models have been challenged by the hypothesis of larger number of proto-languages giving an image of a linguistic "comb" rather than a tree.[2] Thus, the second-order groups of the Uralic phylum would then be: Sami, Finnic, Mordvinic, Mari, Permic, Hungarian, Mansi, Khanty and Samoyedic, all on equal footing. This order is both the order of geographical positions as well as linguistic similarity, with neighboring languages being more similar than distant ones.
Similarly to the situation forProto-Indo-European, reconstructions of Proto-Uralic are traditionally not written inIPA but inUPA.
Proto-Uralic hadvowel harmony and a rather large inventory of vowels in initial syllables, much like the modern Finnish or Estonian system:
| Front | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | |
| Close | i/i/ | ü/y/ | ï/ɯ/ | u/u/ |
| Mid | e/e/ | o/o/ | ||
| Open | ä/æ/ | a/ɑ/ | ||
Sometimes a mid vowel *ë/ɤ/ is reconstructed in place of *ï, or a low back rounded *å/ɒ/ in place of *a.[3]
There were no monophonemic long vowels nor diphthongs, though sequences of vowel and semivowel within a single syllable (such as *äj) could exist.
Vowel inventory in non-initial syllables was restricted: only a two-way contrast of open and non-open vowels is incontestably reconstructible.[4] The actual realization of this contrast is a question of debate: one view considers this twoarchiphonemic vowels⫽a⫽ and⫽i⫽, realized as four allophones[æɑ],[iɯ] as pervowel harmony. However, other scholars such as Zhivlov posit the existence of disharmonic *i-a stems in Proto-Uralic, which would imply that vowel harmony was not allophonic.[5]
For the non-open vowel(s), most branches reflect a reduced vowel[ə]; only two branches give evidence for a specific value:
Whilevowel reduction is a common sound change, Finnic is known to haveadstrate influence from language groups that would not have known reduced vowels (namely theBaltic languages and the earlyGermanic languages), so a value of[ə] already in Proto-Uralic remains a possibility.[6]
Although these three or four stem types were certainly the most prominent ones in Proto-Uralic, it is possible that other, rarer types may have existed as well.[7] These include for example kinship terms such as "sister-in-law", found as *kälü in both Proto-Finnic and Proto-Samoyedic. Janhunen (1981) and Sammallahti (1988) reconstruct here instead a word-final labial glide: *käliw.
A general difficulty in reconstructing unstressed vowels for Proto-Uralic lies in their heavy reduction and loss in many of the Uralic languages. Especially in theUgric andPermic languages, almost no trace of unstressed vowels appears in basic word roots. The original bisyllabic root structure has been well preserved in only the more peripheral groups: Samic and Finnic in the northwest, Samoyedic in the east. The main correspondences of unstressed vowels between these are as follows:
| Proto-Uralic | Proto-Samic | Proto-Finnic | Proto-Samoyedic | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| *-a | *-ē[eː] | *-a[ɑ] | *-å[ɒ] | [8] |
| *-ä | *-ä[æ] | *-ä[æ] | [9] | |
| *-ə | *-ë[ɤ] | *-e | ∅ | after original open syllables[10] |
| *-ə | after original closed syllables[11] |
Developments in Mordvinic and Mari are rather more complicated. In the former, Proto-Uralic *-a and *-ä are usually reduced to *-ə; *-a is however regularly retained whenever the first syllable of the word contained *u. Proto-Uralic *-ə is regularly lost after open syllables, as well as in some other positions.[12]
A number of roots appear to diverge from the main picture of unstressed syllables in a different way: while Finnic, Samic and Samoyedic languages all have one of the "typical" stem shapes, they may not quite match. Words in these classes often feature discrepancies in the vowels of the first syllable as well, e.g. Finnic *a or *oo (suggesting Proto-Uralic *a or *ë) against Samic *ā (suggesting Proto-Uralic *ä) or *oa (suggesting Proto-Uralic *o).[6]
A number of such cases may result simply from conditional vowel shifts in unstressed syllables. In fact, multiple vowel shifts are reconstructed in branches of Uralic sensitive to a particular combination of stem vowel and following reduced vowel, in which both change at once. A shift *a-ə > *o-a can be posited for Samic as well as theMordvinic languages. E.g.:[13]
| Proto-Samic | Mordvinic | Proto-Finnic | Proto-Samoyedic | Hungarian | other reflexes | meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| *čoarvē < *ćorwa | Erzyaсюро/sʲuro/ Mokshaсюра/sʲura/ < *śorwa- | *sarvi | - | szarv | 'horn' | |
| *čoalē < *ćola | Erzyaсюло/sʲulo/ Mokshaсюла/sʲula/ < *śola- | *sooli < *sali | - | [14] | 'intestine' | |
| *koalō- < *kola(w)- | Erzyaкуло-/kulo-/ Mokshaкуло-/kulə-/ < *kola- | *koole- < *kali- | *kåə- | hal | 'to die' | |
| *koamtē < *komta | Erzya and Moksha кунда/kunda/ < *komta | *kanci < *kanti | - | kendő | Mariкомдыш/komdəʃ/ | 'lid' |
The change is, however, masked by the shift of *ë to *a (which later develops to Proto-Samic *uo) in words such as:
| Proto-Samic | Mordvinic | Proto-Finnic | Proto-Samoyedic | Hungarian | other reflexes | meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| *ńuolë < *ńalə | Erzya, Mokshaнал/nal/ | *nooli < *nali | *ńël | nyíl | 'arrow' | |
| *suonë < *sanə | Erzya, Mokshaсан/san/ | *sooni < *sani | *cën | ín | 'vein, sinew' | |
| *θuomë < *δamə | Erzyaлём/lʲom/ Mokshaлайме/lajmɛ/ | *toomi < *tami | *jëm | - | 'bird cherry' | |
| *vuoptë < *aptə | - | *(h)apci < *apti | *ëptə | - | 'hair' |
In a second group, a change *ä-ä > *a-e appears to have taken place in Finnic in words such as:[15]
| Proto-Finnic | Proto-Samic | Proto-Samoyedic | Hungarian | other reflexes | meaning |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| *loomi < *lami | - | - | - | Erzyaлеме/lʲeme/ | 'scab' |
| *pooli < *pali | *pealē | *pälä | fél | Erzyaпеле/pelʲe/ | 'half' |
| *sappi | *sāppē | - | epe | Erzyaсэпе/sepe/ | 'gall' |
| *talvi | *tālvē | - | tél | Erzyaтеле/tʲelʲe/ | 'winter' |
| *vaski | *veaškē | *wäsa | vas | Mari-вож/βoʒ/ 'ore' | 'copper, bronze' ~ 'iron' |
In the consonant system,palatalization, or palatal-laminal instead of apical articulation, was a phonemic feature, as it is in many modern Uralic languages. Only one series of stops (unvoiced unaspirated) existed:
| Bilabial | Dental | Palatal(ized) | Retroflex | Velar | unknown | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plosive and Affricate | p/p/ | t/t/ | (ć/t͡sʲ~t͡ɕ/) | č/t̠͡ʂ/ | k/k/ | |
| Nasal | m/m/ | n/n/ | ń/nʲ~ɲ/ | ŋ/ŋ/ | ||
| Sibilant | s/s/ | ś/sʲ~ɕ/ | (š/ʂ/) | |||
| Spirants | δ/ð/ | δ´/ðʲ/ | ||||
| Lateral | l/l/ | (ľ/lʲ~ʎ/) | ||||
| Trill | r/r/ | |||||
| Semivowel | w/w/ | j/j/ | ||||
| unknown | /x/? | |||||
The segments symbolized by č and š were likely retroflex.[16] The phonetic nature of the segment symbolized by *x is uncertain, though it is usually considered a back consonant;[17][x],[ɣ],[ɡ], and[h] have been suggested among others. Janhunen (1981, 2007) takes no explicit stance, leaving open the option for even a vocalic value. The segment has some similarity to the Indo-Europeanlaryngeals (to which it can correspond in loanwords): it is reconstructed by certain scholars in syllable-final position in word-stems where a contrastive long vowel later developed (similar toTurkishğ), best preserved in the Finnic languages, and where Samoyedic features a vowel sequence such as *åə. The correlation between these two stem classes is however not perfect, and alternate possibilities exist for explaining both vowel length in Finnic and vowel sequences in Samoyedic.[18] *x is also reconstructed word-medially, and in this position it also develops to a Finnic long vowel, but has clear consonantal reflexes elsewhere: *k in Samic, *j in Mordvinic and *ɣ in Ugric. If a consonant, it probably derives from lenition of *k at a pre-Uralic stage; it is only found in words ending in a non-open vowel, while *k is infrequent or nonexistent in similar positions.[17]
The phonetic identity of the consonant*δ´ is also subject to some doubt. It is traditionally analyzed as the palatalized counterpart of thevoiced dental fricative*δ, that is, as[ðʲ]; however, this atypologically rare sound value for which no direct evidence is found in any Uralic language, and a pure palatal fricative[ʝ] is another option; a third option is a palatal liquid like, e. g., Czechř.[17] Some others propose to adjust the sound values of both this consonant and its plain counterpart. UgricistLászló Honti has advanced a reconstruction withlateral fricatives:[ɬ],[ɬʲ] for*δ, *δ´,[19] whileFrederik Kortlandt reconstructs palatalized[rʲ] and[lʲ], alleging that they pattern like resonants.[20]
The phonemes in parentheses—*ć, *š, *ĺ—are supported by only limited evidence, and are not assumed by all scholars. Sammallahti (1988) notes that while instances of *ć are found in all three of Permic, Hungarian and Ob-Ugric, there are "very few satisfactory etymologies" showing any correlation between the branches in whether *ć or *ś appears. In the other languages, no consistent distinction between these consonants is found.
The evidence for the postalveolar sibilant *š however is "scarce but probably conclusive" (ibid): it is treated distinctly from *s only in the more western (Finno-Permic) languages, but certain loans from as far back as theProto-Indo-European language have reflexes traceable to a postalveolar fricative (including *piši- or *peši- "to cook"). The possibility of *ĺ is not considered by him at all.
In contrast, Janhunen,[17] who considers Samoyedic evidence necessary for conclusions about Proto-Uralic, doubts that *š can be reconstructed, preferring to consider it a secondary, post-Proto-Uralic innovation (p. 210). He agrees with Sammallahti in omitting *ĺ and in only considering a single palatal obstruent as necessary to reconstruct; for the latter he suggests the sound value of a palatal stop,[c] (p. 211).
More recently, reflexes of Proto-Uralic *š have been found in Samoyedic, e.g. PU *kajšaw > Proto-Samoyedic *kåjtåw.[21]
No finalconsonant clusters were allowed, so words could end with a maximum of one consonant only. The single consonants*δ *x *ŋ *r also could not occur word-initially, though at least for the first of these, this may be a coincidental omission in the data. A reconstruction*δäpδä "spleen" exists but is not found in Samoyedic and the most stringent criteria for a Proto-Uralic root thus excludes it. A similar case is*repä "fox", a loanword from Indo-Iranian.
Inside word roots, only clusters of two consonants were permitted. Since*j and*w were consonants even between a vowel and another consonant, there were no sequences of a "diphthong" followed by two consonants, like in e.g. Finnishveitsi. Whilevoicing was not a phonemic feature, double (i.e.geminate) stops probably existed (*ïppi "father-in-law",*witti "five",*lükkä- "to push"). The singleton–geminate contrast in most descendant languages developed into a voiced–voiceless distinction, although Finnic is a notable exception, e.g. Finnishappi,lykkää.
When, due to suffixation, consonant clusters arose that were not permitted, the non-low vowel was inserted as a prop vowel. This process was obscured in the Finnic languages by an opposing process which syncopated unstressed*e in many cases.
Proto-Uralic did not have contrastive tone. The majority view considers stress to have been fixed on the first syllable, although this is not universally accepted.[22]
Consonant gradation may have occurred already in Proto-Uralic: if it did, it was probably an allophonic alternation involving voicing of the stop consonants: [p] ~ [b], [t] ~ [d], [k] ~ [g].[23]
Grammatically, Proto-Uralic was anagglutinativenominative–accusative language.
Proto-Uralic nouns are reconstructed with at least six noun cases and three numbers, singular, dual and plural. However, the dual number has been lost in many of the contemporary Uralic languages.Grammatical gender is absent in reconstructions given that no Uralic language has ever been attested to have gender systems. Definite or indefinite articles are not reconstructed either.
The plural marker of nouns was *-t in final position and *-j- in non-final position, as seen in Finnishtalot andtalojen ("house" nom. pl. and gen. pl.). Thedual marker has been reconstructed as *-k-.
The reconstructed cases are:
The cases had only one three-way locative contrast of entering, residing and exiting (lative, locative and ablative respectively). This is the origin of the three-way systems as the three different ones in KarelianFinnish (illative/inessive/elative, allative/adessive/ablative, translative/essive/exessive). Thepartitive case, developed from the ablative, was a later innovation in theFinnic andSamic languages. Further cases are occasionally mentioned, e.g.Robert Austerlitz's reconstruction of Proto-Finno-Ugric[citation needed] includes a seventh,adverbial.
A further noun case likely already found in Proto-Uralic is thetranslative *-ksi. Theabessive *-ktak / *-ktäk is not completely certain as it could also have been a derivational category rather than a noun case. So as many as seven or eight noun cases can be reconstructed for Proto-Uralic with high plausibility.[24]
The nouns also hadpossessive suffixes, one for each combination of number and person. These took the place of possessive pronouns, which did not exist.
Verbs were conjugated at least according to number, person and tense. The reconstructions of mood markers are controversial. Some scholars argue that there were separate subjective and objective conjugations, but this is disputed; clear reflexes of the objective conjugation are found in only the easternmost branches, and hence it may also represent an areal innovation. Negation was expressed with the means of anegative verb*e-, found as such in e.g. Finnishe+mme "we don't".
Merlijn De Smit of Stockholm University has argued forergativity in Proto-Uralic, reinterpreting the accusative case as a lative one and arguing for a marked subject via the genitive case and a verbal ending, *mV-. Support for this theory comes from the Finnish agent participle constructions, e.g.miehen ajama auto — car driven by the man,Naisen leipoma kakku — the cake that woman baked.[25] In these constructions the subject, which is usually unmarked, is in the genitive case, while the direct object, usually marked with -n is unmarked.
This resembles a passive construction such aspater amatur a filio,filio being declined in the ablative case, except that the word order in Finnish is reversed.
This construction also occurs inUdmurt,Mari,Mordvinic (the-mV participle is absent), andKarelian. However, unlike Finnish, the construction is also used with intransitive sentences, characterized by the same -mV suffix on the verb, e.g. Udmurtgyrem busy, "a ploughed field, a field that has been ploughed",lyktem kišnomurt, "the arrived lady, the lady who has arrived". The-mV participle ending in Mari denotes a preterite passive meaning, e.g. in Eastern Mariomsam počmo, "the door (has been) opened",təj kaləkən mondəmo ulat, "you are forgotten by the people", andmemnan tolmo korno, "the road that we have come".[26]
This is problematic for the ergative theory because the-mV participle, labelled theergative marker, is a passive marker in most of the languages that use it, and the Finnish agent participle constructions may in fact derive from similar constructions in Baltic languages, e.g.Lithuaniantėvo perkamas automobilis orautomobilis (yra) tėvo perkamas. Notable is the unmistakable resemblance between the Baltic and Finnic verbal suffixes, and the fact that-mV is missing in both Estonian and Mordvinic, despite being two very close relatives of Finnish. However, the Baltic participle in-ma does not represent the most common Indo-European ending of a passive participle, even though it does have parallels in other Indo-European languages.[27] Even if the ending derives from Proto-Uralic and not the Baltic languages, the transition from a passive to ergative construction is very common and has been observed inIndo-Aryan,Salish, andPolynesian. The transition begins when the unmarked subject of the passive sentence, usually marked in active sentences (if the language is inflectional), is re-analyzed as an unmarked absolutive, and the marked agent as ergative.[28]
Proto-Uralic was aSOV language withpostpositions and withoutfinitesubordination.[29][30]
Approximately 500 Uralic lemmas can be reconstructed. However, not all of them contain reflexes in every Uralic branch, particularly theSamoyedic branch.[31]
The reconstructed vocabulary is compatible with aMesolithic hunter-gatherer culture and a north Eurasian landscape (spruce,Siberian pine, and various other species found in the Siberiantaiga), and contains interesting hints onkinship structure. On the other hand, agricultural terms cannot be reconstructed for Proto-Uralic. Words for ‘sheep’, ‘wheat / barley’ and ‘flour’ are phonologically irregular within Uralic and all have limited distribution. In addition, the word for ‘metal’ or ‘copper’ is actually aWanderwort (cf. North Saamiveaiki, Finnishvaski ‘copper, bronze’, Hungarianvas, and Nganasanbasa ‘iron’).[31]
 | You can helpexpand this section with text translated fromthe corresponding article in Finnish. (April 2024)Click [show] for important translation instructions.
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Examples of vocabulary correspondences between the modern Uralic languages are provided in thelist of comparisons at theFinnish Wikipedia.
Additional selected plant names from the Uralic Etymological Database:[32]
| scientific name | common name | proto-form | proto-language | no. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Picea abies | spruce,fir | *kawse, *kaxse | Proto-Uralic | 429 |
| Rubus chamaemorus | cloudberry,cranberry, knotberry | *mura | Proto-Uralic | 564 |
| Populus tremula | aspen | *pojɜ | Proto-Uralic | 787 |
| Pinus cembra | Siberian pine | *soksɜ (*saksɜ), *se̮ksɜ | Proto-Uralic | 903 |
| Larix sibirica | larch | *näŋɜ | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 591 |
| Amanita muscaria | fly agaric | *paŋka | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 706 |
| Ledum palustre | wild rosemary | *woĺɜ | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 1163 |
| Ribes nigrum | black currant | *ćɜkčɜ(-kkɜ) | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 83 |
| Lonicera xylosteum | honeysuckle | *kusa | Proto-Finno-Permic | 1346 |
| Ulmus | elm | *ńolkɜ, *ńalkɜ | Proto-Finno-Permic | 1446 |
| Pinus sylvestris | Scots pine | *pe(n)čä | Proto-Finno-Permic | 1475 |
| Viburnum opulus,Acer campestre | snowball tree,field maple | *šewɜ | Proto-Finno-Permic | 1612 |
| Populus tremula | aspen | *šapa | Proto-Finno-Volgaic | 1609 |
| Ribes | currant | *ćɜkčɜ-tɜrɜ | Proto-Finno-Volgaic | 1209 |
| Acer platanoides | maple | *wakš-tɜre (*wokštɜre) | Proto-Finno-Volgaic | 1683 |
Selected Proto-Uralic animal vocabulary:[31]
Additional selected animal names from the Uralic Etymological Database:[32]
| scientific name | common name | proto-form | proto-language | no. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Salmo | a species oftrout | *kȣmɜ | Proto-Uralic | 440 |
| Mustela martes | pine marten | *lujɜ | Proto-Uralic | 494 |
| Salvelinus alpinus,Salmo trutta,Hucho taimen | salmon spp. | *ńowŋa | Proto-Uralic | 642 |
| Stenodus nelma | nelma, Siberian white salmon | *ončɜ | Proto-Uralic | 669 |
| Tetrastes bonasia | hazel grouse | *piŋe (*püŋe) | Proto-Uralic | 770 |
| Mustela erminea | ermine | *pojta | Proto-Uralic | 786 |
| Tinca tinca | tench | *totke | Proto-Uralic | 1068 |
| Picus | a species ofwoodpecker | *kȣ̈rɜ | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 446 |
| Apis mellifera | Western honey bee | *mekše | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 534 |
| Tetrao urogallus | male ofcapercaillie | *paδ̕tɜ | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 688 |
| Hirundo rustica | swallow | *päćkɜ | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 711 |
| Acipenser sturio | sturgeon | *śampe | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 932 |
| Gavia arctica | black-throated diver | *tokta | Proto-Finno-Ugric | 1062 |
| Tetrao urogallus | capercaillie | *kopa-la (*koppa-la), *kopa-ľ́a (*koppa-ľ́a) | Proto-Finno-Ugric or Proto-Finno-Volgaic | 353 |
| Parus | tit | *ćȣńɜ | Proto-Finno-Permic | 1206 |
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