Is Proto-Nuristani *ã justifiable on the basis of the Comparative Method?

One phoneme mentioned in Halfmann (2025) is the presence of *ã in Proto-Nuristani reconstruction. The relevant mention of this claim is found in page 94:

With this in mind, the word for ‘wool’ can be reconstructed as either PNur. *warnaka-/*warrãka- or *wərnaka-/*wərrãka-, but certainly not as *ūrnaka- as would be required for a parallel with the Indo-Aryan development.

Here, we will try to justify the existence of a distinct Proto-Nuristani vowel phoneme *ã by looking at the cognate sets below, and determine if any of the Proto-Nuristani reconstructions above agree with the application of the Comparative Method:

Sources

For practical reasons, only attested forms alongside a Proto-Indo-Iranian reconstruction will be cited below. Richard Strand's website (https://nuristan.info/lngFrameL.html) will be used alongside sources for Ashkun (Morgenstierne 1929, 1934), Katë (Halfmann 2024), Prasun (Buddruss & Degener 2017), Nuristani Kalasha (Degener 1998, Tāza 2017), and Tregami (Morgenstierne 1952, Degener 2022). Orthography may be inconsistent, so different letters may represent the same phoneme (eg. v/w and â/ā in NKal.) When orthography is uncertain, the symbols <> are used to indicate the word being written on the source (except Halfmann 2024, Buddruss & Degener 2017, and Tāza 2017). Not all Nuristani dialects are listed for the sake of simplicity.

PIIr. *Hu̯r̥HnaH- "wool" + *-ka-

> Ash. (S) <vor′oːk>

> Kt. (W/NE) vërúk, (SE) varúk

> Pr. wurˈug

> NKal. (Zh) warë́k, (N) <varak> ~ <war'ak>

Recall the correspondence set of PIIr. intervocalic *r in this post. All languages here retain the phoneme, which indicates that the Proto-Nuristani value was not single *r. A plausible suggestion would be to reconstruct a Proto-Nuristani geminate *rr, which is retained as single r in all Nuristani languages. In addition, all of the reflexes here also preserve final (< intervocalic) k, which is normally lost. Do we reconstruct geminate *kk here?

PIIr. *Hantar "between, inside, within"

> Ash. (M) <utẽi>, (S) <ota>

> Kt. (W/NE) atú, (SE) atë́

> Pr. t-

> NKal. (Wg) <atēr> ~ <atǝr-křə̃>, (Zh) <atr'e> (N) <at'er>

> Tr. (D) <atǝr>

Here, as discussed in this post, for *nt we would expect nasalization in Ash., NKal. and Tr., but in this case the reflexes here behave exactly as in Kt., with loss of nasalization but preservation of the stop. Thus, the Proto-Nuristani form could not have included the sequence *nt, but rather some other sound that conditions the preservation of the intervocalic dental stop. This would also imply a special development of Proto-Indo-Iranian initial *(H)anC- (C = any consonant) as PNur. *ãC-.

With that in mind, the same conclusion can be drawn to explain final k in the Nuristani reflexes of PIIr. *Hu̯r̥HnaH- "wool" + *-kaH-. There is therefore no need to reconstruct *kk in this word.

We can therefore justify a Proto-Nuristani phoneme *ã, which apparently behaves like *a except it conditions the preservation of the following intervocalic stop, which would be normally lost.

Thus, we can conclude the most plausible reconstructions for the above cognate sets (assuming a development of *r̥Hn > *arn > *arr˜ as discussed by Halfmann):

PIIr. *Hu̯r̥HnaH- "wool" + *-ka- > PNur. *warrã-ka-

PIIr. *Hantar > PNur. *ãtar-

References

  • Morgenstierne, Georg. (1929). The Language of the Ashkun Kafirs. Oslo, Norway: Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskap 2.
  • Morgenstierne, Georg. (1934). Additional Notes on Ashkun. Oslo, Norway: Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskap 7.
  • Morgenstierne, Georg. (1952). Linguistic Gleanings from Nuristan. Oslo, Norway: Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskap 16.
  • Morgenstierne, Georg. (1954). The Waigali Language. Oslo, Norway: Norsk Tidsskrift for Sprogvidenskap 17.
  • Strand, Richard F. (1999-2024). Richard Strand's Nuristân Site. https://nuristan.info/
  • Buddruss, G.; Degener, A. (2017). Materialien zur Prasun-Sprache des afghanischen Hindukusch. Harvard Oriental Series 80. Harvard University Press. Cambridge, MA. 
  • Tāza, Samī'ullāh. (2017). Farhang-i Zabān-i Nuristānī (Kalaṣə-alā). Kabul: Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL).
  • Degener, Almuth (2022). The Wolf and the Kids in the Devozi dialect of Tregami. International Journal of Diachronic Linguistics and Linguistic Reconstruction, vol. 19. 
  • Halfmann, Jakob (2024). A Grammatical Description of the Katë Language (Nuristani) (PhD thesis). Cologne: University of Cologne.
  • Halfmann, Jakob (2025). The Diversification of Indo-Iranian and the Position of the Nuristani Languages. Wiesbaden: Reichert.

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