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PHONIC CHARACTERISTICS | |
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segments | |
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sequences | |
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Vowel system | |
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oral plosives | |
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nasal plosives | |
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vibrants | |
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affricates | |
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fricatives | |
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laterals | |
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approximant | |
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Consonant system | |
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| All the Basque dialects, with the exception
of Souletin and some of the bordering speeches, have five oral
vowel phonemes,/i/,
/e/,
/a/,
/o/,
/u/,
that constitute a system with three levels of opening (two close,
two mid and one open vowel) and two parameters of localisation (two
front and two back vowels; the open vowel is central). Souletin
-and certain bordering speeches of Low Eastern Navarrese- also have
a sixth vowel [y],
front, close, and labialized, written normally as <>;
its phonemic character is questionable.Souletin -and also Roncalese
until its recent extinction- also have nasal vowels: [i)],[y)],[e)],[a)],[u)];
leftovers from a double vowel system both oral and nasal, which
resulted from an elision of an old intervocalic nasal consonant
that also existed in the remaining dialects and disappeared in different
ages (the last one to disappear was the one of Biscayan between
the XVI and the XVIIth century). Nowadays, the phonemic character
of all these specific vowels of Souletin is doubtful and a revision
is recommended. On the other hand, lengthened vowels can appear,
originated by the elision of an intervocalic consonant (basically//
eta /R/). Generally speaking, a great instability has always existed in the vowel quality which has motivated the appearance of frequent changes (assimilation, dissimilation and metathesis), favoured by a certain phonetic context (vibrants, nasals, palatals), and with a diatopic distribution. |
| The contiguous appearance of two vowels
in a spoken chain produces hiatus or diphthongs, depending on its
heterosyllabic or homosyllabic pronunciation. There has always been
a tendency towards vowel reduction both in hiatus and diphthongs.
Similarly, the secondary vowel sequences frequently appear through
the loss of specific intervocalic consonants (basically [B,
D, ,
R]). The diphthongs resulting from the vowel phonemes are the following: [ei], [eu9], [ai9], [au9], [oi9], [ui9], all of them decreasing. The absence of increasing diphthongs is a traditional feature of the language; instead, hiatus, consonantic epenthesis and reductions are produced. However, nowadays the presence of increasing diphthongs is always more frequent. The occurrences of hiatus can be of a different kind: it can occur within a lexical element by derivation or composition, in verbal forms, etc.; in these realisations the hiatus or its results are generally fixed. Another kind of hiatus is produced by the adjunction of a morpheme to a lexical or verbal basis; in these cases the use of this morpheme is optional and therefore also the existence of the hiatus and its different diatopic realisations. In this last group certain sequences stand out, those that are produced by the juncture of the determiner [-a]with each of the vowels in final position of the word: [-ia], [-ea], [-aa], [-oa], [-ua] and also [-ya] for Souletin; these sequences registrate, as mentioned, a great variety of results, so that even cases of polymorphism exist, which is both social and individual in the same locality. Therefore, they have been included in this present work. |
The Basque oral plosives are four pairs in four different places of articulation:
Each pair is distinguished by the feature of voiced or voiceless (although not in initial or in final position). On the other hand, the voiced /b/, /d/ and /g/ have approximant variants [B], [D] and [], preferably in intervocalic position. It is relevant to point out that the palatal pair is in a different situation from the rest: the phonemic character of the voiced sound is dubious; its phonetic realisation has unequal appearance and in some dialects its presence is sporadic. On the other hand, the voiceless sound has a growing and generalised tendency towards affrication. Thus, there can be said to be a phonemic reduction of the plosives. In the Iparralde dialects (Labourdin, Low Western and Eastern Navarrese and Souletin), there was until recently also a voiceless aspirated plosive: bilabial /pH/ dental /tH/ velar /kH/ Nowadays, they only appear with a certain regularity in the Souletin dialect. |
There are three nasal plosives distributed in three different places of articulation:
The nasal palatal does not exist regularly in all dialects and even when it appears its phonemic character could be disputed. |
Basque has two vibrant phonemes in the alveolar area:
The phonemic character of these elements is only manifest in intervocalic position, as it is neutralised in the other positions. The vibrant do not appear in initial position,except for non-assimilated loans. The vibrant phonemes occur in different variants: the most important ones are the approximant [] (preferably in intervocalic position) and the assibilated [r&] (in plosive position, especially final and sibilant). In the Iparralde dialects and due to the influence of French, there also exists a uvular vibrant [{] that tends to substitute the alveolar one. In Souletin the loss of the simple intervocalic vibrant has also occurred- except for a few exceptions due to homophony. All in all, the phonemic situation of these elements is vague. |
Basque has three affricate phonemes of sibilant nature in a reduced articulatory space:
The palatal phoneme is fronted and can therefore be considered prepalatal. The voiceless affricate phonemes have voiced variants that change in frequency and origin according to the dialects: thus, for example, in the Iparralde dialects, basically in Souletin, they are of external origin (French loans), whereas in Biscayan in the coastal areas, they are of internal origin (evolution of the palatal approximant (/j/). All the Basque dialects have maintained this threefold distinction until recent times, although graphic confusions have been found since at least the XVII century in Biscayan. Nowadays, a confluence of the dorsoalveolar and the apicoalveolar phoneme is occurring. As a result the system is reduced to two voiceless affricates: one palatal and the other alveolar (preferably dorsal). In some cases, like in Biscayan, this process has come to its conclusion. |
The fricatives are constituted by six elements of very diverse nature, distributed in five places of articulation:
Three of them are sibilant fricative phonemes, correlates of their corresponding affricate phonemes. Basque therefore has the corresponding sibilant system:
Like in the previous case, voiced articulations that vary equally in frequency and origin from one dialect to the other occur. The palatal [Z] appears in Souletin and in some Biscayan speeches as a result of the evolution of the voiced approximant/j/ in initial position, and as epenthesis in the cases of hiatus in some speeches, especially Biscayan. The next step in this evolution corresponds to the voiceless fricative [S] that is, at present, maintained in the Salancen and Aezcoan speeches. Furthermore, in the Western dialects, it can also appear as epenthesis in certain heterosyllabic vowel sequences. On the other hand, voiced fricative sibilants occur in the Iparralde dialect in French lexical loans. The Basque dialects have distinguished the three fricatives until recent times, although it was done in a less regular way than with the affricates. However, graphic substitution of the dorsal by the apical occur, especially in Biscayan as early as the XVI century. At present, the confluence of the two alveolar phonemes, especially in the dialects of Hegoalde, is an expanding process, already concluded in Biscayan. The result of this reduction is the apical fricative, as opposed to what happens to the affricates. The consonant system of old Basque did not have the labiodental fricative /f/ that incorporated itself at different times in different dialects. At present, there is no homogeneous dialectal distribution, because it does not appear in the Eastern subdialect of Biscayan, in Guipuzcoan and in some speeches of the High Northern Navarrese, where it is generally substituted by a voiceless plosive bilabial in loans. The velar fricative /x/ is an element of quite recent appearance in the language, as the first testimonies belong to the XVII century. Generally speaking, it comes form the evolution of the palatal approximant /j/ ([j > Z > S > x]) although it can appear at the same time in other cases of diverse origin. This element occurs only in the dialect of Hegoalde, but also just with a distinctive value in Guipuzcoan and in some varieties of Biscayan and High Northern Navarrese. The glottal fricative //, common to all the dialects in old times, has been gradually lost in the last nine centuries. In the Hegoalde dialect this process ends in the XVI century, whereas in the Iparralde dialect it is conserved until the XX century. Nowadays, only the Souletin dialect maintains it with a distinctive value. |
The Basque language has lateral phonemes in the following articulatory parameters:
The palatal lateral, similar to the palatal nasal does not appear regularly in all dialects and even when it does its phonemic character is debatable. |
| The palatal approximant /j/ has only phonemic character in the Labourdin, the Low Western and Eastern Navarrese dialects, in some Biscayan and High Northern Navarrese subdialects and in the only subdialect that exists in High Southern Navarrese. The remaining dialects have inclined, with a different stage of evolution, towards the velar fricative, trying out intermediate solutions (voiced and voiceless palatal fricative) as has been indicated when describing the corresponding elements. Souletin has inclined towards [Z] while showing a marked tendency towards [S]. |
| The Basque consonants are characterised according to six manners and seven places of articulation. Its distribution in the different places of articulation is logically not homogeneous, because a concentration of occurrence is produced in the alveolar and palatal region, whereas there is only one element each for the labiodental and glottal area. |
