Timor-Alor-Pantar

Timothy Usher, Santa Fe Institute

The Timor-Alor-Pantar family consists of perhaps twenty one languages spoken on the islands Timor, Alor and Pantar of the Lesser Sunda chain in Indonesia's East Nusa Tenggara province and in the independent state of East Timor (q.v. Schapper 2012: 194, 2014: 1, Holton, Klamer, Kratochvíl, Robinson and Schapper 2012: 87.)

The internal classification of Timor-Alor-Pantar is as follows:

Timor-Alor-Pantar

Bunaq

East Timor

Alor-Pantar

Contra Greenberg (1971: 810) and Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven (2012, 2014,) it is not obvious that Bunaq and East Timor form a subgroup against Alor-Pantar. Stokhof (1975: 23-24) presents lexicostatistical figures which show Makasae to be significantly more similar to Alor-Pantar than is Bunaq, with figures ranging from 30-42% between individual Alor-Pantar languages and Makasae against 16-30% with Bunaq.

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Proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar had perhaps 17 consonants and … vowels as follows:

In addition to the simple vowels given above, … found as follows:

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Neither lateral non-stop /*l/ nor rhotic /*r/ occur initially in native words.

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Initial consonants correspond as follows:

Medial consonants correspond as follows:

Subfinal consonants correspond as follows:

Final consonants correspond as follows:

Vowels and diphthongs correspond as follows:

These correspondences are exemplified as follows, with Bunaq attestations drawn from Bele (2009) and Schapper (2009, Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven's 2012: 234-239, 2014: 32-34, Schapper p.c.) with Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven's (2014) proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar or (2012) proto-Timor (given in brackets) forms presented for comparison.

Initial consonants …:

Initial biliabial nasal /*m/ is retained as such in all three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 218-219, 2014: 12):

Initial apical nasal /*n/ is retained as such in all three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 219-220, 2014: 12-13):

One example of East Timor initial /*n/ is irregular and unexplained. Outcomparison to both Mbahaam-Iha and South Bird's Head show this root to have descended most immediately from /*kikin/, with initial /*k/ regularly lost in Timor-Alor-Pantar; perhaps the Eest Timor form has been influenced by (e.g.) Tetun /ninik/ (Morris 1984: 154):

Initial bilabial voiceless stop /*p/ is retained as such in all three subgroups:

Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven (2012: 203-204, 2014: 3-4) give proto-Timor /*f/ rather than /*p/ due to confusion introduced by the acceptance of Austronesian loans (e.g. “mat”, “pig,” “price”) as native words, necessitating a third bilabial correspondence (below.)

Initial apical voiceless stop /*t/ is generally retained as such in three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 204-205, 2014: 4-5):

When followed by high front vowel /*i/ in multisyllabic roots, initial /*t/ is patatalized and fricated to /tʃ/ [tʃ s] in Bunaq (Schapper 2009: 44, Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 204-205, 2014: 4-5):

Initial laminal voiceless affricate /*ts/ is uncommon. It is merged with fricative /s/ in Bunaq; its reflex in Alor-Pantar is unknown:

Rounded velar voiceless stop /*kʷ/ is not found initially, West Bomberai initial /*kʷ/ having been merged with /*w/ (below.)

Initial bilabial voiced stops /*b *d *dz *g/, while common in both proto-East Timor and proto-Alor-Pantar, cannot in most instances be traced back to proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar. This is because original prenasalized stops /*mb *nd *ndz *ŋg/, from which Timor-Alor-Pantar's voiced stops derive, were merged with their voiceless counterparts in proto-West Bomberai in initial but not medial position.

Initial bilabial voiced stop /*b/ and its variants, East Timor /*b/ and Alor-Pantar /*b *ɓ/, have been found primarily in loans from Austronesian languages (q.v. Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 203-204, 2014: 3-4.) While absent from proto-West Bomberai, it is far and away the most common initial consonant in Proto-Malayo-Polynesian (Blust n.d.) resulting in a relatively large number of borrowed terms with initial /*b./ (below.)

There is one example of initial bilabial voiced stop /*b/ which might not be a loan:

Initial apical voiced stop /*d/ …:

Initial laminal voiced /*dz /is uncommon. It is realized as /z/ [z ʒ dʒ] in Bunaq and merged with apical voiced stop /*d/ in Alor-Pantar:

Initial velar voiced stop /*g/ is found in native terms only in the base of the third person pronouns (Schapper, Huber and Engelenhoven 2012: 212-214, 2014: 7):

The reason for this limited distribution is that initial velars /*k *ŋg/ were merged to /*k/ in proto-West Bomberai, which was then dropped in proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar. In this instance, a demonstrative form /*VŋgV/ dropped its initial vowel following the merger of initial velars and /*g/ is thus retained as such, remaining as /*g/ in proto-East Timor rather than being deoccluded to glottal stop [*ʔ] as is medial /*g/ (below.)

Rounded velar voiced stop /*gʷ/ is not found initially.

Initial laminal voiceless fricative /*s/ is retained as such in all three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2014: 7-8):

Initial bilabial non-stop /*w/ …:

When followed by low central vowel /*a/ or diphthong /*aⁱ/ (below,) initial /*w/ is dropped in Bunaq. Unlike Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven, we assume both Bunaq's change of /*a/ to /o/ and prosthesis of initial /h/ to be secondary rather than directly reflecting /*w/ (q.v. 2012: 215-216, 2014: 9):

…:

One example …:

Initial lateral non-stop /*l/ …:

Rhotic non-stop /*r/ does not occur initially (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2014: 9-10.)

Initial palatal non-stop /*j/ …:

… /*j/ …:

Any consonant can occur medially.

Medial biliabial nasal /*m/ is retained as such in all three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 218-219, 2014: 12):

Medial apical nasal /*n/ is retained as such in all three subgroups (Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 219-220, 2014: 12-13):

Medial bilabial voiceless stop /*p/ is deoccluded to bilabial non-stop /w/ [w u] in Bunaq:

In one example … /*p/ has become zero in Bunaq:

Medial apical voiceless stop /*t/ …:

… /*t/ …:

…:

Medial laminal voiceless fricative /*s/ is lost in Bunaq, as it is in Oirata of the East Timor subgroup:

Medial laminal voiceless affricate /*ts/ is lost in Bunaq and merged with fricative /*s/ in Alor-Pantar:

Medial velar voiceless stop /*k/ is uncommon, but its quality is confirmed by outcomparison to Mbahaam-Iha. It is lost in Bunaq:

Medial rounded velar voiceless stop /*kʷ/ …:

Medial bilabial voiced stop /*b/ is devoiced to /p/ in Bunaq. This fact, along with confusion introduced by Austronesian loans (below,) leads Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven to wrongly interpret Timor /*b/ as /*p/, although the problem is fixed at the proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar level (2012: 203-204, 2014: 3-4):

Medial apical voiced stop /*d/ is devoiced to /t/ in Bunaq. Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven wrongly interpret Timor /*d/ as /*T/, although the problem is fixed at the proto-Timor-Alor-Pantar level (2012: 204-209, 2014: 4-6):

In one example …:

…:

Medial laminal voiced affricate /*dz/ is devoiced to fricative /s/ in Bunaq and merged with the reflexes of voiced apical stop /*d/ in Alor-Pantar:

One example of Alor-Pantar /*d/ corresponds irregularly to East Timor voiceless /*ts/ (above) rather than to /*dz/. However these are distinguished in East Timor only by Fataluku /s/ where /c/ is expected, so this example might be explained as a loan immediately from neighboring Makasae or Makalero /isa/, perhaps replacing a native /ica/:

Medial velar voiced stop /*g/ is realized as glottal stop [*ʔ] in East Timor. Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven at first interpreted Timor /*g/ as /*k/ but have since revised this value to /*g/ (2012: 211-212, 2014: 6-7):

… devoiced to yield final /k/ in Bunaq:

Medial rounded velar voiced stop /*gʷ/ …:

Medial bilabial non-stop /*w/ …:

Medial lateral non-stop/*l/ is merged with the reflex of rhotic /*r/ in Alor-Pantar:

Medial rhotic non-stop /*r/ is retained as such in East Timor and Alor-Pantar and merged with the reflexes of lateral /l/ in Bunaq:

Medial palatal non-stop /*j/ …:

Final consonants …

Final bilabial nasal /*m/ …:

Final apical nasal /*n/ is lost in Bunaq along with the vowel that precedes it:

Final apical voiceless stop /*t/ …:

One example of final /*t/ when preceded by high front vowel /*i/ is reflected as /*s/ in Alor-Pantar:

The same change is found in the following loan from local Austronesian languages, which has lost its final vowel in Alor-Pantar:

Final velar voiceless stop /*k/ …:

Final apical non-stop /*l/ …

… /*l/ … dropped in East Timor:

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Final rhotic non-stop /*r/ …:

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…:

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Bunaq /h/ …:

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Bunaq loses final vowels … (q.v. Schapper, Huber and van Engelenhoven 2012: 221) … stress …:

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Vowels and diphthongs ….

High front vowel /*i/ …:

High back rounded vowel /*u/ …:

…:

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Mid front vowel /*e/ …:

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Mid back rouded vowel /*o/ …:

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Low central vowel /*a/ …:

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… loans from … likewise affected:

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… Low back rounded /*ɒ/ … /o/ in Bunaq …:

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… diphthong /*uⁱ/ …:

… diphthong /*aⁱ/ …:

… /*ɒⁱ/ …:

…:

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… free …:

… inalienable possessor and verbal undergoer …:

… alienable possessor, locative and ergative …:

… dative …:

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… with proto-Malayo-Polynesian forms drawn from Blust (n.d.) excepting those given in brackets which are local terms not found in his dataset (q.v. Capell 1944: 330-337.) As all three subgroups have a copious number of such loans, only those which appear in several or which are found also in mainland West Bomberai languages are presented here. Because the time depth and immediate sources of these loans differs, their phonological correspondences to proto-Malayo-Polynesian forms aren't always regular; correlating these differences to distinct borrowing events is a worthy topic for future investigation:

… Portuguese given in standard orthography …: