Proto-Romance
Reconstruction ofRomance languages
RegionRoman Empire
Erac. 3rd–4th centuries CE?
Reconstructed
ancestors
Lower-order reconstructions

Proto-Romance is the comparatively reconstructed ancestor of all Romance languages. It reflects a late variety of spoken Latin prior to regional fragmentation.[1]

Phonology

Vowels

Monophthongs

Front Central Back
Close i u
Near-close ɪ ʊ
Close-mid e o
Open-mid ɛ ɔ
Open a

Diphthong

The only phonemic diphthong was /au̯/.[2]

Phonetics

Constraints

Consonants

Per Burger (1955:25)
Labial Coronal Palatal Velar
non-labial labial
Nasal m mʲ n nʲ
Plosive p pʲ b bʲ t tʲ d dʲ j[8] k kʲ ɡ ɡʲ kʷ[8]
Fricative f fʲ β βʲ s sʲ
Vibrant r rʲ
Approximant l lʲ

Palatalized consonants

Phonetics

Constraints

Morphology

Note: the spellings provided below are based on those used in Latin and not indicative of reconstructed Proto-Romance pronunciation.

Nouns

Nouns appear to have had three cases: a nominative, an accusative, and a combined genitive-dative.

Per Lausberg (1973:29, 32, 66–67)[v]
Class I II III.M III.F
Number SG PL SG PL SG PL SG PL
NOM capra capras caballus caballi pater patres~patri mater matres
ACC caballum caballos patrem patres
GEN-DAT capre capris caballo caballis patri patris matri matris
Translation goat horse father mother

Several Class III nouns had inflections that differed by syllable count or stress position.

Per Hall (1983:28)
Number SG
NOM homo pastor soror
ACC hominem pastorem sororem
GEN-DAT homini pastori sorori
Translation man pastor sister

Some nouns were pluralized with -a or -ora, having originally been neuter in Classical Latin. Their singular was treated as grammatically masculine, while their plural was treated as feminine.[25]

Per Lausberg (1973:47)
Class II III
Number SG PL SG PL
NOM brachium brachia tempus tempora
ACC
GEN-DAT brachio brachiis tempori temporis
Translation arm time

Such nouns, due to their plurals, were often reanalyzed as collective feminine nouns.

Per Alkire & Rosen (2010:193–194)
Number SG PL SG PL
Original noun folium folia lignum ligna
Fem. variant folia folias ligna lignas
Translation leaf, leaves firewood

Adjectives

Positive

Per Lausberg (1973:108–109, 119–122)
Class I/II III
Gender M F M F
Number SG PL SG PL SG PL SG PL
NOM bonus boni bona bonas viridis virides~viridi viridis virides
ACC bonum bonos viridem virides viridem
GEN-DAT bono bonis bone bonis viridi viridis viridi viridis
Translation good green

Comparative

Proto-Romance inherited the comparative suffix -ior from Latin, but only in a limited number of adjectives.[26][vi]

Per Lausberg (1973:129–131)
Number SG
Gender M+F N
NOM melior melius
ACC meliorem
Translation better

Otherwise, the typical way to form a comparative seems to have been to add either plus or magis (meaning 'more') to a positive adjective.[27]

Superlative

With the exception of a few fossilized forms, such as /ˈpɛssɪmʊs/ 'worst', superlatives were formed by adding an intensifying adverb or prefix (/mʊltu, bɛne, per-, tras-/ etc.) to a positive adjective. Comparative forms could also have been made superlative by adding a demonstrative adjective.[28]

Possessive

Feminine singular forms shown below. In certain cases there was an opposition between 'strong' (stressed) and 'weak' (unstressed) variants.[29]

Per Lausberg (1973:§§754–755)
1P 2P 3P INT
SG mea~ma tua~ta sua~sa cuia
PL nostra vostra

Pronouns

Personal

Numerous variant forms appear to have existed. For the third-person genitive-dative inflections, there appears to have been an opposition between 'strong' (stressed) and 'weak' (unstressed) variants, as also with the possessive adjectives.

Per Hall (1983:39) and De Dardel & Wüest (1993:39–43, 57)
1P 2P 3P.M 3P.F
Number SG PL SG PL SG PL SG PL
NOM ego nos tu vos ille~illi illi illa illas
ACC me~mene te~tene illum illos
GEN-DAT mi~mibi nobis ti~tibi vobis illi~illui illis~illorum illi~illaei illis~illorum

Relative

Per Elcock (1960:95–96)
Gender M+F N
NOM qui quod
ACC quem
GEN-DAT cui

The interrogative pronouns were the same, except that the neuter nominative-accusative form was quid.

Verbs

Proto-Romance verbs belonged to three main classes, each characterized by a different thematic vowel. Their conjugations were built on three stems and involved various combinations of mood, aspect, and tense.[30]

Present indicative

Per Van Den Bussche (1985:§§2.3–2.3.2)[vii]
Verb class 1P 2P 3P Translation
SG PL SG PL SG PL
I canto cantamus cantas cantatis cantat cantant sing
II.a video videmus vides videtis videt videunt~vidunt~vident see
II.b vendo vendimus vendis venditis vendit vendunt~vendent sell
III dormo~dormio dormimus dormis dormitis dormit dormunt~dorment sleep
Irregular sum sumus~semus es estis~setis~sutis est sunt be
habeo~aio habemus aes~as habetis aet~at aunt~aent~ant have
dao damus das datis dat daunt~daent~dant give
vado~vao imus[31] vais~vas itis[31] vait~vat vaunt~vaent~vant go

Participles

As in Latin, present participles had an active sense and inflected like class III adjectives, while past participles had a passive sense and inflected like class I/II adjectives. Regular forms would have been as follows (in the accusative feminine singular):

Per Hall (1983:122–3)
Type PRES.ACT Translation PERF.PASS Translation
I amantem adoring amatam adored
II habentem having habutam had
III finentem finishing finitam finished

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Following Burger 1955 and Petrovici 1956. Similarly, Pope 1934 reconstructs phonemic palatalization for both Late Latin and Early Gallo-Roman (§§258, 268). Gouvert 2015 prefers a phonetic palatalization rule for Proto-Romance, e.g. /basiˈare/ [baˈsʲaːɾe] (p. 83).
  2. ^ All palatalized consonants except /s/ show at least some sign of gemination in Romance.[11] Gouvert 2015 assumes regular (phonetic) gemination of palatalized intervocalic /n l k/ to [ɲɲ ʎʎ cc] (pp. 95, 111, 115).
  3. ^ Per the cited sources, the ultimate outcome of /ɡn/ in most of Romance is /ɲ/. Exceptions include Balkan Romance and Dalmatian, where it yielded /mn/; Sardinian, where it yielded /nn/; and certain dialects of southern Italy, where it yielded /u̯n/ or /i̯n/.
  4. ^ For further discussion on /ll/, see Zampaulo 2019:71–77 and Lausberg 1970:§§494–499.
  5. ^ De Dardel & Gaeng (1992:104) differ from Lausberg on the following points: 1) They believe that the genitive-dative case was limited to animate nouns. 2) They reconstruct a universal GEN-DAT.PL ending -orum. 3) They reconstruct, for class I nouns, a NOM.PL -ae, albeit in competition with -as per De Dardel & Wüest (1993:57). They are in agreement with Lausberg regarding the remaining inflections.
  6. ^ All comparatives inflected the same way. Further examples are peior, maior, minor, fortior, gentior; meaning 'worse, greater, lesser, stronger, nobler' Hall (1983:32, 120).
  7. ^ Nearly all of the below is per Van Den Bussche (1985), a critique of, and elaboration on, Hall (1983). Since the former does not discuss the inflections of essere 'to be', those have been taken unchanged from Hall (p. 55). Van Den Bussche leaves out the 1PL and 2PL inflections of vadere 'to go' because there was suppletion with forms of Latin ire, as indicated more explicitly by Maiden (1995:135).

References

  1. ^ Dworkin 2016:13
  2. ^ Ferguson 1976:84; Gouvert 2015:81
  3. ^ Gouvert 2015:118‒119; Loporcaro 2015; Leppänen & Alho 2018:§§5.1, 6
  4. ^ Ferguson 1976:chapter 7
  5. ^ Maiden 2016
  6. ^ Ferguson 1976:76; Gouvert 2015:78–81, 121–122
  7. ^ Lausberg 1970:§§192–196 apud Gouvert 2015:78–79
  8. ^ a b Gouvert 2015:25
  9. ^ Operstein 2010:107
  10. ^ Lausberg 1970:§§451–478
  11. ^ Repetti 2016:659
  12. ^ Barbato 2022:§1; Recasens 2020:§3.1.2
  13. ^ Gouvert 2015:86, 92
  14. ^ Lausberg 1970:§452
  15. ^ Lloyd 1987:148–150; Gouvert 2015:125–126
  16. ^ Lausberg 1970:§444; Chambon 2013 apud Gouvert 2015:95; Zampaulo 2019:80
  17. ^ Lausberg 1970:§§329, 471; Lloyd 1987:132; Gouvert 2015:83, 91; Zampaulo 2019:83‒84, 88
  18. ^ Lloyd 1987:141; Gouvert 2016:48; Barbato 2022:§1
  19. ^ Lloyd 1987:80–81; Zampaulo 2019:93
  20. ^ Gouvert 2015:15
  21. ^ Lloyd 1987:80; Gouvert 2016:28
  22. ^ Lausberg 1970:§§366, 475; Gouvert 2015:86
  23. ^ Gouvert 2015:84
  24. ^ Grandgent 1907:§§226, 254; Lausberg 1970:§§344, 486
  25. ^ Hall 1983:23–4, 29–30
  26. ^ Maltby 2016:340
  27. ^ Lausberg 1973:126–127; Maltby 2016:340–346
  28. ^ Lausberg 1973:§§686–687; Bauer 2016:340, 359
  29. ^ Lyons 1986:20–24
  30. ^ Hall 1983:47–50
  31. ^ a b Maiden 1995:135

Bibliography

Categories