u/an_05

An attempt of reconstructing ఏడు చేపల కథ (a popular Telugu folk tale) in Proto-Telugu (≥ 600 BCE).

It is based on Classical Telugu rendering & back-tracing of historical phonological changes of Telugu (based on established comparative & historical linguistics).

Story:

>>aṉaṅgaṉ-aṉaṅgaṉ okka eḏayṉḏ uṇḍiyaṉ. āyaṉakk ēḻuvar koḻuṅkkuḷ uṇḍir. okkañāṇḍᵊ awar vēṇṭṭa(m)kku pōyir. ēḻᵊ kaymppaḷaṉ teyccir. awaṉṯṯiṉ eṉḏam-beṭṭir. awaṉṯṯoḷaṉ okkoṉṯṯi eṉḏa(ñ)-ciladᵊ. kaymppā! kaymppā! yendukk eṉḏa(ñ)-cilad aṉiṉaṉ, pul mōypp aḍ(d)am āyeṉ ani ceppiyaṉ. pul mōyppā! pul mōyppā! yendukk aḍ(d)am waccittiv aṉiṉaṉ, ā ñaṉṉun mēya(ñ)-cilad aṉiyaṉ. ā! ā! yendukkᵊ mēya(ñ)-cilad aṉiṉaṉ, paṇiyawaṉḏᵊ mēyppa(ñ)-cilad aṉiyaṉ. paṇiyawaṉḏā! paṇiyawaṉḏā! yendukkᵊ mēyppa(ñ)-cilad aṉiṉaṉ, tāttamma tiṇḍiṉ peṭṭa(ñ)-cilad aṉiyaṉ. tāttammā! tāttammā! tiṇḍiṉ endukkᵊ peṭṭa(ñ)-cilad aṉiṉaṉ, piḷḷayawaṉḏᵊ yēḻciyaṉ aṉiyaṉ. piḷḷayawaṉḏā! piḷḷayawaṉḏā! yendukkᵊ yēḻpp aṉiṉaṉ, cīmay kuṭṭiyaṉ aṉiyaṉ. cīma(y)ā! cīma(y)ā! yendukkᵊ kuṭṭitiv aṉiṉaṉ, ñā paciṇḍi puṯṯamoḷaṉ veraḷ peṭṭiṉaṉ, ñāṅ kuṭṭaṉā? aṉiyaṉ.

Meaning:

Once upon a time, there was a king who had seven sons. One day they went hunting and brought back seven fish, which they set out to dry in the sun. But one of the fish didn't dry. "Fish! Fish! Why didn't you dry?" "The haystack got in my way," it said. "Haystack! Haystack! Why did you get in the way?" "The cow didn't graze on me," it said. "Cow! Cow! Why didn't you graze?" "The servant didn't take me out to graze," it said. "Servant! Servant! Why didn't you take the cow for grazing?" "The grand mother didn't give me food," he said. "Grand Mother! Grand Mother! Why didn't you give him food?" "The baby was crying," she said. "Baby! Baby! Why were you crying?" "An ant bit me," he said. "Ant! Ant! Why did you bite him?" "If someone sticks a finger in my golden burrow, shouldn't I bite?" it replied.

PS: This is an enthusiastic attempt in reconstructions; discussions & disagreements are welcomed, but require proper counter-arguments rather than random cancelling.

Proto-Telugu (≥ 600 BCE):

*(ceraytti kūṭṭin tinaḍamnakku pōdamā? maṟaliyum calippinan tininadi aṟugadu. poḻudunan elavolayu kadū..! warammu! nīw waccinanum cariyē celadā nēnē tiṇḍin tecciyadan)

Modern Telugu (2026 CE)

rēti kūṭin tinaḍāniki pōdāmā? maḷḷī calpitē tinnadi aragadu. poddunna lēvāli kadā..! rā! nuw occinā sarē lēdā nēnē tiṇḍin testānu

Translation: Shall we go and have dinner? If we postpone, it won’t digest. We have to wake up in the morning, right..! Come! Whether you come or not, I’ll bring the food.”

Proto-Dravidian abstract noun derivative is reconstructed as *-may.

With reflexes:

Literary Tamil: -may Malayalam: -ma Kannada: -me Telugu: -mi

However, the Telugu form does not yield the expected -ma (< *-may) form as seen with some nouns: *pok-ay > pog-a, *wil-ay > vel-a; rather carries -i.

In Proto-Dravidian, both *-ay and *-i occur as neuter derivates independently, while having the same function. *el-i, *nar-i, *pol-i, etc.

It is not required to derive all -i from -ay.

Is it likely that, Telugu's -mi is related to this particular *-i, rather than deriving it from *-ay.

This abstract derivation is largely found in literary languages of SD & SCD. And it is likely that Telugu constructed its suffix as *-mi, while SD as *-may. So, I propose to reconstruct *-may ~ *-mi as variants within Dravidian.

Footnotes: There are evidences to reconstruct *-iy itself to Proto-Dravidian, alongside *-ay, having the same function and reflexes, occuring in both nouns and also verbs, with its direct attestation in Telugu as a reflex -iy(a).

Open for discussions.

Can anyone summarise Krishnamurti's 1991 paper on Indo-Aryan & Dravidian (esp. Telugu-Kannada) aerial convergence in specific syllable structures, which yielded in simplified geminates like: NPP > NP, V:PP > V:P & PP>P at 3rd syllable (these changes are also visible in spoken Tamil).

Is this due to the superstrate/donor phonological influence of Prakrits on Dravidian languages?

Prakrits themselves retained geminates by shortening the preceding vowels. And they always voiced/lenited/elided the intervocalic voiceless stops — how can they cause the emergence of intervocalic voiceless singletons in Dravidian?

1.Vowel Harmony — probably the characteristic feature of Telugu

*edir(u) > eduru, *maraṅkaḷ(u) > mrākulu

2. De-gemination of stops after: a. A long vowel, b. A nasal, c. In the third syllable — as a shared South Asian aerial convergence

*pōrā-ṭṭ-am > pōrā-ṭ-am *kūntt- > kūnta (>kū̃ta) *kuduppu > kudupu

3. Apical displacement & initial voicing — probably an irregular sound change, leaving out an extremely large unaffected residues, shared with other South Central Dravidian languages

*varay(u) > vrāy(u) [varuju - unaffected] oḷan > ḷōn (> lō) (all forms attested)

tūṟu > dūru [tūrpu - unaffected] *kuriñci > guriñci

4. Unrestricted palatalisation of *k/*q — shared with Tamil-Malayalam, with more liberty

(*qewi) > *kewi > cewi kēy > cēy (both forms attested) [many forms like kaymōḍpu, kēlu, kayduvu, kaykonu, etc. survived this change]

5. Loss of initial *c — moderately significant & very large residues survive, shared with South Central & South Dravidian languages

*cāṟu > āṟu *cīntt- > īta

6. Palatalisation of -t after y — regular & shared with many other Dravidian languages *vay-ttu > vay-ci > vēsi *kāy-nttu > kāycu > kācu

7. Deretroflexation of ḻ, ḷ and ṇ — prominent & shared with the Dravidian languages particularly along the eastern half of the subcontinent (including Modern spoken Tamil)

tōḻan > tōḍa(n) paṇi > pani manumarāḷ(u) > manumarālu

8. Merger of -ṯ- with -r-, -ṯṯ- with -ṭṭ-/-ṭr- & -n̠ṯ- with -ṇḍ-/-ṇḍr- — shared with all modern spoken languages (except Malayalam) *vēṯ(u) > vēṟu > vēru *puṯṯ- > puṭṭa *ewan̠ṯu > ewan̠ḏu [-n̠ḏ- is directly attested] > ewaṇḍu (> ewaḍu)

9. Loss of certain suffixes like -(a)y — shared with all modern spoken languages *kaḍ-ay > kaḍ-a

10. Realisation of ñ- and yaH/yā- as ne/na and e/ē — shared with all modern spoken languages (except Malayalam in case of ñ-) *ñamVl > nemali, namili *ñāngVl > nāṅgali (>nāgali) *yaHwar > ewar(u) *yāḻ > ēḍu

The changes 1,2,6,9,10 are both regular & pre-historic; the changes 3,4,5 are irregular & partly pre-historic; the change 7 is largely regular, but historic; the change 8 is regular & partly pre-historic

Telugu degeminated voiceless stops in cases like *NPP>NP, *PP>P (after a long vowel, after a nasal and at the third syllable of a trisyllabic word).

But the degeminated stops retained their voiceless nature resulting in voiceless hard stops at intervocalic positions.

This doesn't seem to be due to Prakrit influence, as Prakrits have pervasive weakening/lenition/elision of intervocalic stops since early times.

Rather, Telugu maintained those stops as hard voiceless consonants alone.

Comments?

Proto-Dravidian is reconstructed with an inanimate marker *-ay, which took different forms in daughter languages: -ay in Old Tamil, -æ in Colloquial Tamil, -e in Kannada, -a in Malayalam & Telugu.

I propose for an allomorph *-iy to be reconstructed to Proto-Dravidian for the following reasons:

1. Telugu attests this marker directly in inscriptions and literature, and it is the source of all of the -e markers. pall-iy(a) > pall-e (village), tēn-iy(a) > tēn-e (honey), toTT-iy(a) > toTT-e (bucket/basket), etc. An epenthetic -a can be assumed to be added to this *-iy marker in Telugu in cases leading to the formation of -e. The function of this -iy(a) is same as that of -ay in Tamil.

2. We can directly derive all the -i inanimate markers across the Dravidian languages from this allomorph.

*-iy > -i (loss of -y)

eg: *aw-ay ~ *aw-iy > aw-i (Telugu) *man-ikk-ay ~ *man-ikk-iy > maniki (Telugu) And all other cases where the inanimate marker -i is conventionally derived from -ay in some Dravidian languages.

Summary: *-iy which is the allomorph of *-ay in Proto-Dravidian, can be explained as the source for the reflex -i in all Dravidian languages; it also explains the source of -iy(a) and -e in Telugu. (But it is not the source for -e in Kannada, it is derived from *-ay alone).

We have some instances where the human plural *-ir is reconstructed to Proto-Dravidian as seen in Tamil and Kannada. On the similar lines, we can either reconstruct this *-iy as an allomorph for the inanimate *-ay or revise the *-ay itself as *-Vy (a/i/e).

Open for comments & discussions.