Umbrian language

Umbrisch belongs to the Italic branch of the Indo-European language family. There again, it is part of the Oscan - Umbrian group.

The Umbrian language is primarily of the Tabulae Iguvinae known ( Iguvium is today Gubbio), seven bronze plates that contain some records of religious ceremonies and statutes for the priests. The tablets were written in a variant of the old Italic alphabet.

The inscriptions found can be divided into two groups: the altumbrischen texts date from the 5th century BC, the spätumbrischen from the 1st century BC (the latter were written in Latin script). A short time later died from the Umbrian.

According to development

The following phonetic developments of the Indo-European parent language features of the Umbrian:

1 vowels

  • ă and ā are preserved; in Wortauslaut is ă to ɔ
  • ĕ is maintained or raised (see about Latin farrea with Umbrian farsio )
  • ē is raised to i
  • I will ĕ or remains: pere next piri " if "
  • ŏ remains
  • ō u or o written (compare Latin esto with Umbrian ESTU and Latin nouns Umbrian nome )
  • Ai will ɛ ː (compare Latin quaestor with Umbrian kvestur )
  • Ei is usually to e or ee (compare Latin ito with Umbrian etu next Eetu )
  • Oi is in initial position to o ː (compare Latin unum with Umbrian unu ), in final to e ː (compare Latin populo with Umbrian pople )
  • Au becomes o ː (compare Latin taurus with Umbrian toru )
  • Ou will o ː (compare Latin with Umbrian tota tuta )

2 consonants

  • R vanishes in final
  • L vanishes before t and is sometimes represented by rs (see Latin ( pater ) Familias with Umbrian fameřiās )
  • M / n before consonants and word-finally very weak ( lat. compare east ditto with Umbrian ustentu, also ustetu )
  • Dental between vowels become ř (rs).
  • As in Latin, also occurs in the Umbrian rhotacism. However, here also s is sometimes at the end of a word to r.
  • The original velar k is palatalized before e / i: to ç ¶, see
Iguvine Tablets Old Italic script Dental consonant
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