Wiktionary:Proto-Yeniseian entry guidelines

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Proto-Yeniseian is the reconstructed ancestor of the Yeniseian languages, analyzed in four main branches: Ketic, Kottic, Arinic and Pumpokolic.

Transcription

Currently, the transcription of phonemes in Proto-Yeniseian is taken over directly from Fortescue-Vajda (2022) and following that, Vajda (2024):

Proto-Yeniseian consonants

		Bilabial	Alveolar	Post-alveolar	Retroflex?	Palatal	Rounded velar	Plain velar	Uvular
Nasal		*m	*n				*ŋʷ	*ŋ
Plosive	voiceless	*p	*t	*č /*t͡ʃ/	*tʳ /*ʈ?/	*c	*kʷ	*k	*q
	voiced	*b	*d	*ǰ /*d͡ʒ/	*dʳ /*ɖ?/	*ɟ	*gʷ	*g	*ɢ
Fricative			*s	*š /*ʃ/	*sʳ /*ʂ?/	*ç	*xʷ	*x	*χ
Lateral			*ɬ	*tɬ /*t͡ɬ/
Approximant		*w			*r	*j

Proto-Yeniseian monophthong, diphthongoid and true diphthong vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	*i *ij *iw		*u *uj *uw
Mid	*e *ej *ew		*o *oj *ow
Open		*a *aj *aw

Other transcriptions from different authors can also be added under the "Alternative reconstructions" section for comparison sake.

Descendants

All Proto-Yeniseian reconstructions should feature at least two different branches and denote the historically attested terms with the wordlists or the dictionaries the term is taken from in abbreviated form. The current standard for listing descendants is as such, following Vajda (2024:371):

• Ketic:
  • Imbak Ket:
  • Imbak Ket:
  • Imbak Ket:
    • Ket:
  • Ostyak Yug:
    • Yug:
• Kottic:
  • Assan:
  • Kott:
  • Kott:
  • Kott:
• Arinic:
  • >? Xiongnu:
  • Arin:
• Pumpokolic:
  • >? Jie:
  • Pumpokol:

Wikicode boilerplate for descendant sections

* Ketic:
** Imbak {{desc|ket|<qq:Bahta dialect>}}
** Imbak {{desc|ket|<qq:Eed-Šeš dialect>}}
** Imbak {{desc|ket|}}
*** {{desc|ket|}}
** Ostyak {{desc|yug|}}
*** {{desc|yug|}}
* Kottic:
** {{desc|xss|}}
** {{desc|zko|<qq:Kamasin dialect>}}
** {{desc|zko|<qq:Kojbal dialect>}}
** {{desc|zko|}}
* Arinic:
** {{desc|mis-xnu|unc=1|}}
** {{desc|xrn|}}
* Pumpokolic:
** {{desc|mis-jie|unc=1|}}
** {{desc|xpm|}}

Sources

The main sources for Proto-Yeniseian reconstructions are as follows, arranged in order of preferred sources:

1. Works by E. J. Vajda & H. K. Werner:
   1. Vajda, Edward (2024), The Languages and Linguistics of Northern Asia: Language Families (The World of Linguistics [WOL]; 10.1)‎^[1], volume 1, Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton, →DOI, →ISBN
   2. Vajda, Edward; Werner, Heinrich (2022), Comparative-Historical Yeniseian Dictionary (Languages of the World/Dictionaries; 79, 80), Muenchen: LINCOM GmbH, →ISBN
   3. Fortescue, Michael; Vajda, Edward (2022), Mid-Holocene Language Connections between Asia and North America (Brill's Studies in the Indigenous Languages of the Americas; 17)‎^[2], Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN
   4. Werner, Heinrich (2002), Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der Jenissej-Sprachen, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, →ISBN
   5. Werner, Heinrich (2005), Die Jenissej-Sprachen des 18. Jahrhunderts, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, →ISBN
2. Works by the 'Cologne Group' (or 'Köln Group') collective:
   1. Fries, Simon; Bonmann, Svenja (2023), “The development of Arin kul 'water', Kott ûl, Ket ¹uˑl' Yugh ¹ur and its typological background”, in International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics, volume 5, number 2, pages 183-198
   2. Bonmann, Svenja; Fries, Simon; Korobzow, Natalie; Günther, Laura; Hill, Eugen (2023), “Towards a New Reconstruction of the Proto-Yeniseian Sound System. Part I: Word-Initial Consonants”, in International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics‎^[3], number 5, Brill, →DOI, →ISSN, pages 39-82
   3. Hill, Eugen; Fries, Simon; Korobzow, Natalie; Günther, Laura; Svenja, Bonmann (2024), “Towards a New Reconstruction of the Proto-Yeniseian Sound System. Part II: Word-Final Consonants”, in International Journal of Eurasian Linguistics‎^[4], number 6, Brill, →DOI, →ISSN, pages 216-293
   4. Bonmann, Svenja; Fries, Simon (2025), “Linguistic Evidence Suggests That Xiōng-nú and Huns Spoke the Same Paleo-Siberian Language”, in Transactions of the Philological Society‎^[5], volume 0, →DOI, pages 1-24
3. Works by S. A. Starostin (and more broadly, the 'Moscow School of Linguistics'):
   1. https://starlingdb.org/cgi-bin/query.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&basename=\data\yenisey\yenet
   2. https://starlingdb.org/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=config&basename=%2fdata%2fyenisey%2fyenet&sort=proto

Bibliography

Most works on Yeniseian languages feature abbreviations next to the historically attested but now extinct languages that denote which wordlist (or dictionaries, in some cases) the attested words are taken from, listing the authors. These are, arranged chronologically:

> 18^th century: (y. 1700-99)

• (C.): M. A. Castrén
• (M.): G. F. Müller
• (Mes.): D. G. Messerschmidt
• (P., VW., W.): P. S. Pallas
• (Str.): Ph. J. Strahlenberg

> 19^th century: (y. 1800-99)

• (Ad.): F. P. Adelung
• (F.): J. E. Fischer
• (Kl.): J. von Klaproth
• (Midd.): A. Th. Middendorff

> 20^th century: (y. 1900-99)

• (A.): E. A. Alekseenko
• (B.): K. Bouda
• (But.): V. Ja. Butanaev
• (Chis.): E. F. Chispiyakov
• (D.): A. P. Dulson
• (Don.): K. Donner
• (H.): E. A. Helimski
• (Kos.): M. M. Kostjakov
• (Kr.): E. A. Krejnovich
• (Mal.): A. M. Maloletko
• (Pot.): L. P. Potapov

Words and texts in sufficiently attested Yeniseian languages - Ket, Yugh and Kott - can be found in the following dictionaries (grammars and histories excluded), listed chronologically:

1. Werner, Heinrich (1990), Коттский Язык, Ростов-на-Дону: Издательство Ростовского университета, →ISBN
2. Werner, Heinrich (1997), Die ketische Sprache (Tunguso-Sibirica; 3), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, →ISBN
3. Werner, Heinrich (1997), Das Jugische (Sym-Ketische) (Veröffentlichungen der Societas Uralo-Altaica; 50), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, →ISBN
4. Werner, Heinrich (2002), Словарь кетско-русский и русско-кетский: Учебное пособие для учащихся начальной школы‎^[6], 2 edition, Saint-Petersburg: Drofa, →ISBN
5. Werner, Heinrich (2002), Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der Jenissej-Sprachen, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, →ISBN
6. Kotorova, Elizaveta; Nefedov, Andrey (2015), Большой словарь кетского языка, volume 1, Münich: LINCOM, →ISBN
7. Kotorova, Elizaveta; Nefedov, Andrey (2015), Большой словарь кетского языка, volume 2, Münich: LINCOM, →ISBN