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| Sound change andalternation |
|---|
| Fortition |
| Dissimilation |
I-mutation (also known asumlaut,front mutation,i-umlaut,i/j-mutation ori/j-umlaut) is a type ofsound change in which aback vowel isfronted or afront vowel israised if the following syllable contains/i/,/iː/ or/j/ (avoiced palatal approximant, sometimes calledyod, the sound ofEnglish⟨y⟩ inyes). It is a category of regressivemetaphony, orvowel harmony.
The term is usually used by scholars of theGermanic languages: it is particularly important in the history of the Germanic languages becauseinflectional suffixes with an/i/ or/j/ led to many vowel alternations that are still important in themorphology of the languages.
I-mutation took place separately in the various Germanic languages from around 450 or 500CE in theNorth Sea area and affected all the early languages,[1] except forGothic.[2] It seems to have taken effect earliest and most completely inOld English andOld Norse. It took place later inOld High German; by 900, its effects are consistently visible only in the spelling of Germanic*/a/.
I-mutation exists in many other languages but is often referred to by different names. However, in theRomance languages, it is more commonly calledmetaphony (fromAncient Greek, meaning "process of changing sounds," which translates into German asumlaut:um "about" withlaut "sound").[3] Meanwhile, inCeltic languages, it is referred to asaffection.[citation needed] A type of i-mutation is also observed inAnatolian languages, includingHittite,Luwian,Lycian andLydian.[4][5][6][7]
InMiddle Korean, I-backward-sequenced vowels (ㅐ, ㅔ, ㅒ, ㅖ, ㅚ, ㅟ, ㅢ) were diphthongs, i.e.ㅐ[ɐj],ㅔ[əj],ㅒ[jɐj],ㅖ[jəj],ㅚ[oj],ㅟ[uj],ㅢ[ɯj~ɰi]. However, in early modern Korean, they aremonophthongized by umlaut, i.e.ㅐ[ɛ],ㅔ[e],ㅒ[jɛ],ㅖ[je],ㅚ[ø],ㅟ[y] with only one exception:ㅢ.[8] However, in late modern Korean,ㅟ is diphthongized to[ɥi].[9] Also,ㅚ is unstable and standard Korean allows to pronounce both[ø] and[we].[10][11]
In modernKorean language, there are two types of I-mutation, or I-assimilation:I-forward-assimilation (ㅣ 순행 동화) andI-backward-assimilation (ㅣ 역행 동화). Assimilation occurs when ㅣ is in front of (forward) or behind (backward) the syllable. In standard Korean, only a few words are allowed to assimilate, however, exceptions are often observed in some dialects and casual usage.[12] I-forward-assimilation adds[j] sound, but I-backward-assimilation causes vowel to umlaut.