From PIE to OCS: ALG or MAC?

Abstract

From PIE to OCS: ALG or MAC?*0. The Slavonic languages present a real challenge to I(ndo-)E(uropean) studies. (In keeping with British usage, Slavonic will be used throughout this review.) The problem is that their development was most peculiar, especially in the field of morphology. In order to grasp the problem one has to bear in mind the characteristic traits of IE morphology. It is assumed that IE prior to its dissolution was a highly inflecting language. Its morphology relied basically on ablaut, accent, and desinences to convey grammatical information. Furthermore, the desinences in nominal inflection were largely of the -(V)C# type.The phonological development of the Slavonic languages led to the annihilation of most of these means to express grammatical information. At some stage in this development, in Common Slavonic (CS) the basic syllable structure presented a clear case of a langue a syllables ouvertes (in Martinet's terminology), which means, inter alia, that no consonants were allowed in word-final position. At the same time the role of ablaut was greatly reduced in morphology and it was practically abolished in nominal inflection. To complete the picture the accentual system was subject to comprehensive remodelling.As a result of these developments large-scale syncretism of grammatical forms might be expected. This in turn could have led to the breakdown of the inflectional system (as was the case with nominal inflection in the Romance languages). Surprisingly neither happened in the case of the Slavonic languages. The oldest recorded form of Slavonic, Old Church Slavonic (OCS), shows only a comparatively modest amount of syncretism in its inflectional paradigms. In nominal inflection, indeed, the most productive type (the so-called twofold nominal declension, cf. Lunt 2001: 54) is syncretic to a minimal degree only. What is more, the inflectional system did not break down: the nominal inflection in Slavonic is actually one of the most conservative in IE.How is this to be explained? Why did the system of nominal inflection not break down when elsewhere syncretism resulted in the abolition of the respective categories or forms (cf. the syncretism of aorist and imperfect after the shortening of -aa-/-ea- in Church Slavonic and the eventual loss of these tenses in most Slavonic languages)? The answer is simple: the break-down of the system was avoided because syncretism did not occur on a large scale, even though it should have. And syncretism did not ensue because many of the desinences of nominal inflection in Slavonic do not correspond to those we might expect as a result of regular sound-change.So far the matter seems to be rather straightforward. It is, however, not satisfactory for IE linguistics. The desinences attested in Slavonic that do not match those that regular sound-change would bring about call for an explanation. There are three possible ways to explain them:a. It is assumed that special rules apply to word-final syllables. These special rules are generally referred to as auslautgesetze (or ALG in Orr's shorthand).An argument in favour of this approach can be seen in the fact that many IE languages show a different development in auslaut as compared to other positions. Usually this can be attributed to the influence of accent (cf. Germanic or Armenian: they show large-scale reduction in final syllables or even complete loss due to the influence of initial or penultimate accent, respectively, whereas other syllables undergo no changes at all or changes that are clearly different).This argument, however, is more of a typological nature and does not necessarily apply to Slavonic. The comparison with Baltic makes this clear. Both Slavonic and Baltic had a free and mobile accent, but Slavonic underwent much more radical changes in auslaut than Baltic. In Baltic there is only a loss of final occlusives: *-s# and *-R# were retained in P(roto-)B(altic) and even final nasals leave traces in writing and in some Lithuanian dialects to this day. …