Proto-Algonquian language

Proto-Algonquian (commonly abbreviated PA) is the proto-language from which the various Algonquian languages are descended.

In the historical linguistics of North America, Proto-Algonquian is one of the best studied, most thoroughly reconstructed proto-languages.

Most Algonquian languages are similar enough that their relatedness has been recognized for centuries and was commented on by the early English and French colonists and explorers.

For example, in 1787 (over a decade before Sir William Jones' famous speech on Indo-European), the theologian and linguist Jonathan Edwards Jr. deduced that the Algonquian languages of the eastern and central United States were "radically the same" ('radically' meaning having a common 'root', since radix is Latin for 'root'), and contrasted them with the neighboring Iroquoian languages.

[4] The earliest work on reconstructing the Algonquian proto-language was undertaken by the linguists Truman Michelson and Leonard Bloomfield.

[5] Following his initial reconstructions, investigations of other languages revealed that his "Primitive Central Algonquian" was essentially equivalent to Proto-Algonquian.

[5][7] In the years since there has been an enormous amount of comparative work undertaken on the Algonquian family.

The initial theory, first put forth by Frank T. Siebert, Jr. in 1967 based on examining of the ranges of numerous species of plants and animals for which reliable Algonquian cognates existed, holds that Proto-Algonquian was spoken between Lake Huron's Georgian Bay and Lake Ontario, in Ontario, Canada, and at least as far south as Niagara Falls.

[12] There are still a handful of instances where *o can be reconstructed, usually as the result of a morphophonological process of vowel shortening.

Goddard concludes that "an independent phoneme *o is of no great antiquity in Proto-Algonquian",[12] but recommends continuing to use it in reconstructions.

Likewise, Berman states that "PA *i is probably also of recent origin", derived from earlier (pre-Proto-Algonquian) *ye sequences and morphophonological shortening.

Almost all instances where *č is reconstructed are before *i, *i·, or *y, where it does not contrast with *t (see below), or are cases of diminutive consonant symbolism.

David Pentland, for example, argued that Ojibwe oshtigwaan, claimed as the only form requiring the reconstruction of *št, is a borrowing from Cree.

This feature goes back to Proto-Algic (compare Wiyot du- + híkw = dutíkw "my louse").

Demonstrative pronouns have been more difficult to reconstruct, as many of the daughter languages have innovated a great deal.