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Językoznawstwo baner

No. 1/26 (2026)

Articles

Pre-glottalization of the lenis series as a possible source of aspiration in the Germanic languages

DOI: https://doi.org/10.25312/j.10244  [Google Scholar]
Published: 2026-03-25

Abstract

For Proto-Indo-European languages (PIE), three series of stops are commonly reconstructed. According to the traditional reconstruction these are voiceless, voiced, and voiced aspirated stops. The principal shortcoming of this reconstruction lies in its typological peculiarity, which has prompted the proposal of alternative models. Some of them posit a pre-glottalized series in place of the voiced one. In support of such a reconstruction, the evidence adduced thus far is presented, including the direct attestation of pre-glottalization in various branches of the Indo-European languages, among them the Germanic languages. The article also proposes the possibility that the allophonic aspiration found in the Germanic languages originated from pre-glottalization. This is argued on the basis of the convergence between the distribution of the pre-glottalized series in PIE and the aspiration in the more conservative Germanic languages, as well as by analogy with similar developments attested in Ofo and in Icelandic.

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