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Linguistic Variation: Online-First Articles

The emergence of vowel harmony in Armenian dialects

Turkic influence, endogeny, or both?

ORCID logo | University of York
ORCID logo | Cambridge University
We find vowel harmony systems in many non-standard varieties of modern Armenian. It has been speculated that these may have acquired vowel harmony due to contact with Turkic varieties (Scala 2018). On the basis of an exploration of the synchrony and typology of Armenian vowel harmony, consideration of historical changes that could have caused harmony to develop, and evaluation of new data bearing on the origins of backness and rounding harmony in Oghuz, we propose that the vowel harmony systems of the modern Armenian dialects show evidence of having been influenced by Turkish, but the numerous differences between Armenian and Turkish vowel harmony point against a straightforward copying of the Turkish phonological system. We theorize that vowel harmony in Armenian arose due to a combination of language-internal and ‑external factors: vowel shifts in some Armenian dialects, alongside universal analytic and channel biases, provided the necessary preconditions for the development of vowel harmony by the 11th century AD, prior to the arrival of Turkic speakers in the Armenian homeland. Extensive contact with Turkic vowel systems may then have encouraged the phonologization of this assimilation process, but in strikingly different ways than are found in Turkic languages.
Keywords: Armenian, Turkish, Azeri, Turkic, dialects, historical phonology, vowel harmony, historical linguistics, phonetics
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The synchrony of Armenian vowel harmony
    • 2.1A typology of Armenian vowel harmony
    • 2.2Case studies
      • 2.2.1Tigranakert/Diyarbekir
      • 2.2.2Kesab
      • 2.2.3Maragha
      • 2.2.4Zeytun
    • 2.3Comparisons with Turkic
  • 3.The diachrony of Armenian vowel harmony
    • 3.1The chronology of Armenian vowel harmony
    • 3.2The chronology of Turkic vowel harmony
      • 3.2.1Ottoman Arabic orthography
      • 3.2.2Armeno-Turkish orthography
    • 3.3Internal triggers for harmonogenesis
      • 3.3.1Omnipresent ingredients
      • 3.3.2Sound change
  • 4.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 27 August 2024
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lv.23049.hop
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