Rit (Vísindafélag Íslendinga) - 01.06.1970, Side 365
363
(> d), for instance, in imper. heyrðu, komdu (or kondu), has
taken place (1) intervocalically, e.g. eg skal siga t<er (i.e., dær),
and (2) after consonants, especially nasals (m, n), v, and liquids
(l, r), e.g. kom tœr (i.e., dœr) ikki út í sovorðið, eg kann tað (i.e.,
dað), egfari inn til tygara (i.e., dygara), tað var tað (i.e., dað).
Jorgen Rischel: It might be worth while to examine to what
extent the different pronunciations of <t) in unstressed pro-
nouns are regulated by the occurrence of the pronouns in
proclitic vs. enclitic positions, cf. in Mr. Hagström’s specimen
(prestarnir) teir dansa (last line) vs. plagar tað (íirst line). It is
not quite clear to what extent this is taken care of by Mr.
Hagström’s reference to initial or noninitial position in the
phrase.
Björn Hagström: (1) Professor Holm’s theory of an analog-
ically inserted h in ha (OSw. þœt) is very attractive, especially
as there are no parallels to a development þ>h in Swedish.
(For Faroese, see Mr. Zachariasen’s comments.)
(2) Professor Holm’s second comment should be compared
with p. 359 above and with footnote 2 of my paper, unfortun-
ately somewhat shortened in the oral version. Of course, we
must presume that the realizations of a phoneme have always
varied according to phonetic circumstances; thus the voiced
variants of the initial dental in pronouns may be old. The
reason why I speak of ‘a phonetic change in the making’
in Faroese today, in spite of the theory of early phonetic varia-
tion, is given on p. 358 above.
(3) The Faroese place-names mentioned by Mr. Zacha-
riasen show that, in exceptional cases, þ became h in a stressed
syllable. (The possibility of an analogically inserted h in these
words must be excluded; see also p. 349 above.) On the
development þ>(ð>) d, see my examples on p. 357 above,
omitted in the oral version, and Table 2, col. 5. From a
phonetic point of view, í/-pronunciation here is a case of
assimilation, of course, facilitated by the lack of stress.
(4) In my paper the term phrase is used in a purely phonetic
sense: the part of speech that lies between two pauses (p. 351