Zu Sandhi-Erscheinungen im älteren Ägyptisch. Überlegungen zum Vorkommen in funerären Texten

Abstract

“Regarding Sandhi Phenomena in Earlier Egyptian. Considerations on the Occurrence in funerary Texts” - The term Sandhi is used in linguistics to cover sound changes which occur between two words or morphemes. Sandhi phenomena appear in many languages and are to some degree well attested in the Earlier Egyptian language, especially in funerary texts. The nature of those phenomena is explored and some already proposed Sandhis are reviewed. Especially the pronoun wi seems often to be subject of Sandhi phenomena: After suffix pronouns ending with -n it can become nwi, after n.tt it can become twi. In both cases the ending consonant of the first word, which was dropped out over time, is preserved by the Sandhi. Although both phenomena are known for more than hundred years, but only the first one was already analyzed as Sandhi. While nwi became a new form in “Égyptien de tradition”, combining the function of the dependent and the independent pronoun, twi was grammaticalized and from Late Egyptian on used as proclitic pronoun tw=i in adverbial (or durative) clauses. Thus the research on pronominal Sandhi phenomena can provide important insights not only in phonology, but in the history of the Egyptian language and grammaticalization processes too.