| Proto-Mon–Khmer | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spoken in | Southeast Asia | |||
| Language family |
Austro-Asiatic
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| Language codes | ||||
| ISO 639-3 | – | |||
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The Proto-Mon–Khmer language is the reconstructed ancestor of the Mon–Khmer languages, which is a primary branch of the Austro-Asiatic language family. Much work has been done on the reconstruction of Proto-Mon–Khmer in Harry L. Shorto's Mon–Khmer Comparative Dictionary. However, very little work has been done on Proto-Austro-Asiatic itself, since the Munda languages are not well documented. If Mon–Khmer is not a valid taxon, as some recent classifications would have it, then Proto-Mon–Khmer becomes synonymous with Proto-Austro-Asiatic.
Sidwell (2007, 2009) suggests that the likely homeland of Austro-Asiatic/Mon–Khmer is near central Vietnam, and that the family is not as old as frequently assumed.
Contents |
Proto-Mon–Khmer has a total of 21 consonants, 7 distinct vowels which can be lengthened and glottalized, and 3 diphthongs (Shorto 2006).
| Labial | Alveolar | Palatal | Velar | Glottal | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unvoiced stop | p /p/ | t /t/ | c /c/ | k /k/ | ʔ /ʔ/ | |||||
| Voiced stop | b /b/ | d /d/ | j /ɟ/ | g /g/ | ||||||
| Glottalized | ɓ | ɗ | ||||||||
| Nasal | m /m/ | n /n/ | ɲ /ɲ/ | ŋ /ŋ/ | ||||||
| Semivowel | w /w/ | y /j/ | ||||||||
| Liquid | r /r/, l /l/ | |||||||||
| Fricative | s /ç/ | h /h/ | ||||||||
Proto-Mon–Khmer is rich in vowels. The vowels are:
| Height | Front | Central | Back | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Close | i /i/, ii /iː/ | u /u/, uu /uː/ | |||||
| Mid | e /e/, ee /eː/ | ə /ə/, əə /əː/ | o /o/, oo /oː/ | ||||
| Open | a /a/, aa /aː/ | ɔ /ɔ/, ɔɔ /ɔː/ |
The diphthongs are:
Common structures include *CV(C) and *CCV(C) roots. *CVC roots can also be affixed either via prefixes or infixes, as in *C-CVC or *C⟨C⟩VC (Shorto 2006). Sidwell (2008) gives the following phonological shapes for two types of stems.
Note: R is one of the optional medial consonants /r, l, j, w, h/.
Sidwell (2008) considers the two most morphologically conservative Mon–Khmer branches to be Khmuic and Aslian. On the other hand, Vietnamese morphology is far more similar to that of Chinese and the Tai languages and has lost many morphological features found in Proto-Mon–Khmer.
The following Proto-Mon–Khmer affixes, which are still tentative, have been reconstructed by Paul Sidwell (Sidwell 2008:257-263).
Like the Tai languages, Proto-Mon–Khmer has an SVO, or verb-medial, order. Proto-Mon–Khmer also makes use of noun classifiers and serial verb constructions (Shorto 2006).