The Evolutionary Path of Stop Codas in Yi-Burmese
Chen Kang argues that as Tibeto-Burman evolved into Yi-Burmese, stop codas (-p, -t, -k) shifted backward in place of articulation -- bilabial/dental to velar to glottal -- with glottal closure eventually producing tone. He documents this shift with cognate sets across Written Burmese, Achang, Zaiwa, Langsu, and Written Tibetan, showing the Burmese branch retains stop codas (now converging on a glottal stop plus a short tone) while the Yi branch lost stop codas entirely, with glottalized ('tense') sounds taking over the meaning-distinguishing role and later splitting into two tense-tone categories conditioned by initial-consonant voicing. He extends the argument to Naxi, whose tense tone likewise splits by voicing into a 55 tone (voiceless initials) and a 31 tone (voiced initials) in the Lijiang dialect.
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