Proto-Samoyed or Proto-Samoyedic is the reconstructed ancestral language of the Samoyedic languages, i.e. Nenets (Tundra and Forest), Enets, Nganasan, Selkup, as well as extinct Kamas and Mator. Samoyedic is one of the principal branches of the Uralic language family, and its ancestor is Proto-Uralic.
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A fairly complex system of vowel phonemes is reconstructed for Proto-Samoyed:
| Front | Back | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unrounded | Rounded | Unrounded | Rounded | |
| Close | i [i] | ü [y] | ï [ɯ] | u [u] |
| Mid | e [e] | ö [ø] | ë [ɤ] | o [o] |
| Open | ä [æ] | a [ɑ] | å [ɒ] | |
| Reduced | ø̈ [ə̟] | ø [ə̠] | ||
Two of the vowel contrasts are only retained in Nganasan: the distinction of front and back reduced vowels, and that of *i versus *e. For the remainder of the family, following the mergers *e → *i and *ø̈ → *ø, a further shared change is raising of *ä → *e.[1]
Even though the number of vowel phonemes was high, there were no long vowels or phonemic diphthongs. A peculiar feature of the reconstructed vowel system is the occurrence of vowel sequences, which consisted of any full vowel followed by the reduced vowel /ə/: for example, *tuə 'feather', *kåəså 'man'. These sequences were not diphthongs, because the vowels belonged to separate syllables. Evidence of the vowel sequences has been preserved in only part of the Samoyed languages, primarily in Nganasan and Enets.
Proto-Samoyed had vowel harmony like many other Uralic languages. Harmony determined whether a front vocalic or a back vocalic allomorph of a suffix was used. However, the restrictions imposed by vowel harmony were not absolute because also disharmonic word-stems can be reconstructed. Such stems break vowel harmony by combining front and back vowels: e.g. Proto-Samoyed *kålä 'fish'.
In contrast to the vowel system, the consonant system is rather simple with only 13 phonemes:
| labial | dental | palatal | velar | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| stop | p | t | k | |
| affricate | c | |||
| sibilant | s | |||
| nasal | m | n | ń | ŋ |
| lateral | l | |||
| trill | r | |||
| semivowel | w | j |
The exact sound value of the affricate is not entirely clear; it may originally have been retroflex [ʈ͡ʂ] rather than dental or alveolar [t͡s]. It has remained distinct only in Selkup, merging elsewhere with *t.
As in Proto-Uralic, the ancestor of Proto-Samoyedic, initial consonant clusters were not allowed, so words could begin with a maximum of one consonant. Also carrying over from Proto-Uralic was the feature that the consonants *r and *ŋ were not allowed word-initially. Proto-Samoyedic had however innovated a limited amount of final consonant clusters. In all of these, the first consonant in the cluster was the semivowel *j, as in *wajŋ 'breath'. Inside words clusters of two consonants were common. Clusters of three consonants were also possible only if the first consonant of the cluster was *j, as in *wajkkə 'neck'.
As in Proto-Uralic, the first syllable of words was always stressed, and hence there was no contrastive stress. There were no contrastive tones.
Palatalization of consonants, most prominently *k, has occurred in all recorded Samoyedic languages. This is however a post-Proto-Samoyedic development, as the details differ in each branch due to vowel developments. [2]
Other widespread developments include prothesis of *ŋ, initial lenition of *p, and fortition of the semivowels *w, *j.
Proto-Samoyed was a fairly typical agglutinative language with only little morphophonological alteration.
Three numbers were distinguished: singular, dual and plural. Possession was indicated with possessive suffixes.
Nouns distinguished seven cases:
Verbs were conjugated for mood, tense, number and person. There were also separate subjective and objective conjugations.
Most Proto-Samoyedic phonemes continue the corresponding Proto-Uralic phonemes unchanged. The most prominent changes are:[2][3]
Examples:
Janhunen, Juha 1998. Samoyedic. In: Daniel Abondolo (ed.), The Uralic Languages, pp. 457–479. London / New York: Routledge.