Barry J. Blake

Sound changes in languages of western and central Victoria

This paper is an attempt to plot sound correspondences in languages of central and western Victoria using material recorded by Hercus (1986) and amateur notations from the nineteenth century. It is hypothesized that original intervocalic retroflex stops developed in some languages into laminal stops and in other languages into rhotics. It is also suggested that intervocalic retroflex nasals developed into laminal nasals in some languages. Recognizing correspondences and establishing a direction of change is important for reconstructing something of the relationship between Australian languages, and it seems that those Victorian languages that have intervocalic retroflexes retain important relics.