Middle Gujarati

Ancient form of Gujarati
Middle Gujarati
EraDeveloped around 14th century and gave rise to Modern Gujarati by the 19th century
Language family
Indo-European
  • Indo-Iranian
    • Indo-Aryan
      • Western[1]
        • Gujarati languages
          • Middle Gujarati
Early forms
Gurjar Apabhraṃśa
  • Old Gujarati
Language codes
ISO 639-3–
GlottologNone

Middle Gujarati (AD 1300–1800), split off from Rajasthani, and developed the phonemes ɛ and ɔ, the auxiliary stem ch-, and the possessive marker -n-.[2] Major phonological changes characteristic of the transition between Old and Middle Gujarati are:[3]

  • i, u develop to ə in open syllables
  • diphthongs əi, əu change to ɛ and ɔ in initial syllables and to e and o elsewhere
  • əũ develops to ɔ̃ in initial syllables and to ű in final syllables

These developments would have grammatical consequences. For example, Old Gujarati's instrumental-locative singular in -i was leveled and eliminated, having become the same as Old Gujarati's nominative/accusative singular in -ə.[3]

References

  1. ^ Ernst Kausen, 2006. Die Klassifikation der indogermanischen Sprachen (Microsoft Word, 133 KB)
  2. ^ Mistry 2003, pp. 115–116
  3. ^ a b Cardona & Suthar 2003, p. 661

Works cited

  • Cardona, George; Suthar, Babu (2003), "Gujarati", in Cardona, George; Jain, Dhanesh (eds.), The Indo-Aryan Languages, Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-77294-5
  • Mistry, P.J. (2003), "Gujarati", in Frawley, William (ed.), International Encyclopedia of Linguistics, vol. 2 (2nd ed.), Oxford: Oxford University Press


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