Proto-Bantu language
Proto-Bantu (also Common Bantu) is the reconstructed common ancestor of most Bantu languages.[1] It is thought to have originally been spoken in West/Central Africa in the area of what is now Cameroon.[2] Approximately 3000–4000 years ago, it split off from other Niger–Congo languages when the Bantu expansion began to the south and east.[3]
Like other proto-languages, there is no record of Proto-Bantu. Its words and pronunciation have been reconstructed by linguists.
Phonology
Proto-Bantu is generally reconstructed with a relatively small set of sounds, consisting of 11 consonants and 7 vowels.[4]
Consonants
| Labial | Coronal | Palatal | Velar | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nasal | *m | *n | *ɲ | (*ŋ) |
| Voiceless | *p | *t | *c | *k |
| Voiced | *b | *d | *j | *g |
These phonemes exhibited considerable allophony, and the exact realisation of many of the phonemes is unclear.
- The voiceless consonants *p, *t, *k were almost certainly articulated as simple plosives [p], [t], [k].
- The voiced consonants *b and *g may also have been fricatives [β] (or [v]) and [ɣ] in some environments.
- *d was a plosive [d] before a high vowel (*i, *u), and a lateral [l] before other vowels.[5]
- *c and *j may have been plosives [ɣ] and [ɟ], affricates [tʃ] and [dʒ], or even sibilants [s] and [z]. [j] is also possible for *j.
Consonants could not occur at the end of a syllable, only at the beginning, so the syllable structure was generally V or CV and all syllables were open.[4] Consonant clusters did not occur, except for the "pre-nasalised" consonants.
The so-called "pre-nasalised" consonants were sequences of a nasal and a following obstruent.[5] These could occur anywhere a single consonant was permitted, including word-initially. Pre-nasalised voiceless consonants were rare, most were voiced. The nasal's articulation adapted to the articulation of the following consonant, so the nasal can be considered a single unspecified nasal phoneme (indicated as *N) which had four possible allophones. Conventionally, the labial pre-nasal is written *m while the others are written *n.
- *mb, *mp; phonemically *Nb, *Np
- *nd, *nt; phonemically *Nd, *Nt
- *nj, *nc; phonemically *Nj, *Nc (actually pronounced as *ɲj, *ɲc)
- *ng, *nk; phonemically *Ng, *Nk (actually pronounced as *ŋg, *ŋk)
The earlier velar nasal phoneme /ŋ/, which was present in the Bantoid languages, had been lost in Proto-Bantu.[5] It still occurred phonetically in pre-nasalised consonants, but not as a phoneme.
Vowels
| Front | Back | |
|---|---|---|
| Close | *i | *u |
| Near-close | *ɪ | *ʊ |
| Open-mid | *e | *o |
| Open | *a | |
The representation of the vowels may differ in particular with respect to the two "middle" levels of closedness. Most linguists write the "less closed" set as *ɪ and *ʊ. However, some prefer to denote them as *e and *o, with the more open set represented as *ɛ and *ɔ. Regardless of the representation, the third level (*e and *o in the table) was open-mid [ɛ] and [ɔ].
Syllables always ended in a vowel, but could also begin with one. Vowels could also occasionally appear in a sequence, but did not form diphthongs; two adjacent vowels were separate syllables. If two of the same vowel occurred together, this created a long vowel, although this was rare.
Tones
Proto-Bantu distinguished two tones, low and high. Each syllable had either a low or a high tone. A high tone is conventionally indicated with an acute accent (´) while a low tone is either indicated with a grave accent (`) or not marked at all.
Grammar
Noun classes
Proto-Bantu, like its descendants, had an elaborate system of noun classes. Noun stems were prefixed with a noun prefix which specified its meaning. Other words that related or referred to that noun, such as adjectives and verbs, also received a prefix that matched the class of the noun ("agreement" or "concord").
The following table gives a reconstruction of the system of nominal classes. The spellings have been normalised to use the ɪ and ʊ notations.
| Number | Meeussen 1967 |
Welmers 1974 |
Demuth 2000 |
Odden Forthc. |
Typical meaning(s) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | Humans, animate |
| 2 | *ba- | *va- | *va- | *ba- | Plural of class 1 |
| 3 | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | Plants, inanimate |
| 4 | *mɪ- | *mɪ- | *mɪ- | *mɪ- | Plural of class 3 |
| 5 | *i- | *lɪ- | *lɪ- | *di- | Various |
| 6 | *ma- | *ma- | *ma- | *ma- | Plural of class 5, liquids (mass nouns) |
| 7 | *kɪ- | *kɪ- | *kɪ- | *kɪ- | Various, diminutives, manner/way/language |
| 8 | *bi- | *ʋi-, *li- ("8x") | *ʋi-, *di- | *bi- | Plural of class 7 |
| 9 | *n- | *nɪ- | *n- | *n- | Animals, inanimate |
| 10 | *n- | *li-nɪ- | *di-n- | *n- | Plural of class 9 and 11 |
| 11 | *dʊ- | *lʊ- | *lʊ- | *dʊ- | Abstract nouns |
| 12 | *ka- | *ka- | *ka- | *ka- | Diminutives |
| 13 | *tʊ- | *tʊ- | *tʊ- | *tʊ- | Plural of class 12 |
| 14 | *bʊ- | *ʋʊ- | *ʋʊ- | *bʊ- | Abstract nouns |
| 15 | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | Infinitives |
| 16 | *pa- | *pa- | *pa- | *pa- | Locatives (proximal, exact) |
| 17 | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | *kʊ- | Locatives (distal, approximate) |
| 18 | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | *mʊ- | Locatives (interior) |
| 19 | *pi- | *pi- | *pi- | *pi- | Diminutives |