Metaphony (Romance languages)

In the Romance languages, metaphony was an early vowel mutation process that operated in all Romance languages to varying degrees, raising (or sometimes diphthongizing) certain stressed vowels in words with a final /i/ or /u/ or a directly following /j/. This is conceptually similar to the umlaut process so characteristic of the Germanic languages. Metaphony is most extensive in the Italo-Romance languages, and applies to nearly all languages in Italy; however, it is absent from Tuscan, and hence from standard Italian.

Metaphony in the southern Italian languages (those to the south of Tuscany) is triggered by final /i/ and /u/. High-mid vowels /e o/ are raised to /i u/, and low-mid vowels /ɛ ɔ/ are either raised to /e o/ or diphthongized to /je wo/.^[1] Metaphony is not triggered by final /o/. The main occurrences of final /i/ are as follows:

• The plural of nouns in -o (< nominative plural -ī).
• The plural of nouns in -e (either a regular development of third-declension plural -ēs, or from analogical plural -ī).
• The second-person singular present tense (a regular development of -ēs in verbs in -ere, -ēre, -īre, and analogical in verbs in -āre; in Old Italian, the regular ending -e is still found in -are verbs).
• The first-person singular past indicative (< -ī).

The main occurrences of final /o/ are as follows:

• The first-person singular present indicative (< -ō).
• Masculine "mass" nouns, and "neuter" (mass-noun) demonstratives (disputed origin).

The main occurrence of final /u/ is in masculine "count" nouns (< -um).

Metaphony in the northern Italian languages (those to the north of Tuscany) is triggered only by final /i/. In these languages, as in Tuscan, final /u/ was lowered to /o/; this evidently happened prior to the action of metaphony. In these languages, metaphony also tends to apply to final /a/, raising it to /ɛ/ or /e/.

In most Italian languages, most final vowels have become obscured (in the south) or lost (in the north), and the effects of metaphony are often the only markers of masculine vs. feminine and singular vs. plural.

In some of the Astur-Leonese dialects, in northern Spain, the same distinction between final /o/ and /u/ exists (right down to the distinction between mass and count nouns), along with a very similar sort of metaphony triggered by final /u/. In these dialects, nouns with final /u/ have a plural in /os/ (< -ōs).^[3]

Sardinian likewise has a distinction between final /o/ and /u/ (again with plural /os/), along with metaphony. In the conservative Logudorese and Nuorese dialects, the result of metaphony is a non-phonemic alternation between [e o] (when final /i/ or /u/ occurs) and [ɛ ɔ] (with other final vowels). In Campidanese, final /e o/ have been raised to /i u/, with the result that the metaphonic alternations have been phonemicized.

Raising of /ɔ/ to /o/ by a following final /u/ occurs sporadically in Portuguese.^[3] Example: porcum, porcōs "pig, pigs" > PIR ˈpɔrku, ˈpɔrkos > Portuguese porco ˈporku vs. porcos ˈpɔrkus; novum, novōs, novam, novās "new (masc., masc. pl., fem., fem. pl.)" > PIR ˈnɔvu, ˈnɔvos, ˈnɔva, ˈnɔvas > Portuguese novo ˈnovu vs. novos, nova, novas ˈnɔvus, ˈnɔva, ˈnɔvas. In this case, Old Portuguese apparently had /u/ in the singular vs. /os/ in the plural, despite the spelling ⟨-o -os⟩; a later development has raised plural /os/ to /us/. Unlike elsewhere, this development is only sporadic and only affects /ɔ/, not /ɛ/. Furthermore, the mass/count distinction is expressed very differently: Only a few "mass neuter" demonstratives exist, and they have a higher rather than lower vowel (tudo "everything" vs. todo "all (masc.)", isto "this (neut.)" vs. este "this (masc.)"). In addition, the original pattern has been extended to some nouns originally in /o/, e.g. todo /o/ "all" vs. plural todos /ɔ/ < tōtum, tōtōs.

In all of the Western Romance languages, metaphony was triggered by a final /i/ (especially of the first-person singular of the preterite), raising mid-high stressed vowels to high vowels. (This does not normally occur in the nominative plural noun forms in Old French and Old Occitan that have a reflex of nominative plural /i/, suggesting that these developments were removed early by analogy.) Examples:

• vīgintī "twenty" > *vigintī > PIR /veˈenti/ > Italian venti; but > pre-PWR /veˈinti/ > PWR /veˈinte/ > Old Spanish veínte (> modern veinte /bejnte/), Old Portuguese veínte (> viínte > modern vinte), Old French vint (> modern vingt /vɛ̃/).
• fēcī, fēcit "I did, he did" (preterite) > Italian feci, fece; but > pre-PWR /ˈfedzi, ˈfedzet/ > /ˈfidzi, ˈfedzet/ > PWR /ˈfidze, ˈfedzet/ > Old Spanish fize, fezo^[4](> fize, fizo > modern hice, hizo), Portuguese fiz, fez, Old French fis, fist (< *fis, feist).

Romanian shows metaphony of the opposite sort, where final /a/ (and also /e/, especially in the case of /o/) caused a diphthongization /e/ > /ea/, /je/ > /ja/, /o/ > /oa/:^[3] cēram "wax" > ceară; equam "mare" > /*ɛpa/ > /*jepa/ > iapă; flōrem "flower" > floare; nostrum, nostrī, nostram, nostrās "our (masc. sg., masc. pl., fem. sg., fem. pl.)" > /*nostru, nostri, nostra, nostre/ > nostru, noştri, noastră, noastre.

See also

• Romance languages
• Germanic umlaut

Notes