A Case for Old Frisian Vowel Balance as Prosodically-driven Vowel Reduction

Abstract

Abstract Drawing on data from the Old Frisian Riustring manuscripts, modern Frisian dialects, as well as older and more modern Scandinavian dialects and languages, this article argues for two points: first, that Vowel Balance is ultimately a reduction process, and second, that a foot-based analysis can account for Vowel Balance. In Old Frisian, i and u appear after light stems while e and o are found after heavy and polysyllabic stems; in some other languages and dialects, vowels after heavy and polysyllabic stems are reduced supporting an interpretation of e and o as reduced allophonic variants of i and u respectively. Two caveats can be made for arguments in favour of interpreting Vowel Balance as a reduction process, namely the case of trimoraic Vowel Balance in disyllabic words, and the reinterpretation of the contrast between i~e in Old Frisian as a means of marking the prosodic contrast between stem size. These caveats help clarify how prosody can shape stems both in terms of additional manifestations of Vowel Balance, and extending the vowel alternations based on light-heavy stem contrast to words which would not have otherwise undergone Vowel Balance.