Proto-Batanic

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**Proto-Batanic** (abbreviated to **PBat**) is the reconstructed ancestor of the Batanic and Donghai languages. It contains many lexical innovations not found in other Malayo-Polynesian languages.

## History

The islands in the Luzon Strait are known to have been first settled as early as 2200 BC by Austronesian peoples emigrating from Formosa.

Malcom Ross posited in 2005 two theories on the Batanic languages: the first history is that PMP emerged during southwards settlement of Batanes from Taiwan, and PBat diverged from that; the second history is that PMP emerged in Luzon and PBat originated from settlers returning northwards. Genetic profiling of the modern Ivatan people seem to suggest the latter, but Ross's findings - mainly the conservatism of the language - suggest the former. It is likely that the original Proto-Batanic language was first spoken by Austronesians originating directly from Taiwan, and that Austronesians from Luzon returned to Batanes and adopted the language. In addition, many Proto-Batanic words in Yami got displaced by words with no obvious cognates, suggesting that Orchid Island was resettled some time after the establishment of Proto-Batanic. The Orange Islands and beyond are believed to have been settled shortly after the establishment of Proto-Batanic due to archeological findings dating not long after the earliest findings in Batanes, i.e. around 2000 BC.

Roger Blench suggested in 2015 that, due to the large number of lexical idiosyncrasies regarding nature and culture in Batanic languages, there must have been a substrate lexicon from a language spoken in the islands, though the identity of the speakers (whether they were early Austronesians or Negritos, the original inhabitants of Southeast Asia) is unknown. I suggest

## Phonology

Vowels
 Close-Mid

This reconstruction is mostly based upon that by Doris Hsiao-Fang Yang in her 2002 thesis *Subgrouping and Reconstruction of Batanic Languages* with the following changes:

* PMP \*b becomes PBat \*v word-initially and intervocalically rather than \*b according to Yang; I feel this way as Babuyan's "retention" of \*b would probably be due to influence from the nearby languages of northern Luzon.
	+ I have become slightly reluctant to posit this due to reading up on Blust (see below) and I have been tempted to rewrite this as \*b with \*v in complementary distribution in word-initial and intervocalic environments. Its inconsistent application in Proto-Batanic's daughter languages seems to support this.
* Similarly, PMP \*k becomes PBat \*c adjacent to \*i.
	+ I was initially going to also suggest PMP \*g to PBat \*j /dʒ/ adjacent to \*i, except that Yang gives only two words exhibiting this, or really \*g adjacent to \*j overall: \*ogi "stern" and \*tanigi "Spanish mackerel". The former does not have a PMP reflex (that I could find). Meanwhile, the latter appears to be a loanword from other Philippine languages as the PMP reflex is \*taŋiRi which would've been inherited in PBat as \*taŋili whereas other Philippine languages do have \*R → \*g. In other words, the \*g → \*j sound change took place after PBat.
* PMP \*d becomes PBat \*r word-initially. I have chosen not to include intervocalic PMP \*d to PBat \*r as I feel this is an areal feature rather than one developed in PBat then was subsequently lost in Yami, similar to the areal innovations of \*ŋ → \*ɲ and \*t → \*c both adjacent to \*i noted by Paul Jen-Kuei Li in 2000. (This is also my justification for the changes in the previous bullet point: a "sprachbund" of Itbayat, Ivatan, and Babuyan is more likely than a "sprachbund" of Yami, Itbayat, and Ivatan.)
* PMP \*q becomes either PBat \*h or Ø rather than \*q according to Yang. As *all* cases of her PBat \*q become \*h except for Itbayaten and (occasionally) Yami where it disappears (though it likely could have become a glottal stop that simply was not transcribed), it makes more sense to reconstruct it as \*h which then got deleted in Yami - a very common sound change - than to do the long route of \*q → \*h in all languages → Ø in Yami. In addition, it appears some cases of PMP \*q got deleted in PBat already, mainly word-initially, e.g. PMP \*qulu "head" → PBat \*ulu (c.f. Taglaog *ulo*), which ties into the glottal stop theory.
* After reading Pick's reconstruction of Proto-Batanic and reviewing Yang's work, I have decided to reject her \*l₁. Most of her examples of the phoneme appear to either be loanwords from Ilokano, e.g. \*baNlo "fragrant" which is from Ilokano *baŋló*, an allophone of \*R adjacent to \*i or \*e (which Li shows as being reflected as /l/ in Yami and Itbayat, and /d/ in Ivatan and Babuyan; see below), or simply uncorroborated.
* That being said, I interpret her l₂ as \*R /ʁ/. Pick (2018) reconstructed it as \*l but mentioned that he only did so to be consistent with PMP, and that this phoneme is now considered to *not* be an alveolar lateral. I suggest that it is a velar or uvular lateral /ʟ/ to better reflect both of its common reflexes /l/ and /ʁ/ (latter often → /h/).
* Yang's \*r and \*L are merged into my \*l, which is based upon that of Pick's \*L. Her justification for splitting them is that her \*L is reflected as /l/ in Itbayat whereas her \*r is reflected as /r/; Pick's work show them as variants of one another e.g. PBat \*LiNaw "bigeye tuna" → Itbayat *riMaw* or *liMaw*.

### Epenthesis and Metathesis

As noted by Robert Blust, in Proto-Batanic, PMP (as well as PWMP and PPh) words starting with \*CV- metathesized to \*VC- if the vowel was unstressed (this generally occurs when the vowel is a schwa, but there are a few cases involving other vowels, e.g. PMP \*kanasay → PBat \*aknasay "mullet"), and words which became monosyllabic to sound changes get prefixed with a-. This is evidenced in Itbayat as well as some of Yang's reconstructions.

### Stress

Robert Blust posited that stress in Itbayat at the time of metathesis - probably Proto-Batanic - was on the penultimate syllable, unless said syllable was a schwa, in which case it moved to the final syllable. This allowed words such as PMP \*kanasay "mullet" to become PBat \*aknasay.

## Grammar

Proto-Batanic grammar is mostly the same as that of Proto-Malayo-Polynesian. Ross noted the Batanic languages as being conservative of PMP features; for example, Itbayat maintained the PMP \*i and \*u grade distinction in articles, though it lost the \*a grade, and both Itbayat and Ivatan maintain all three in demonstratives. In addition, Itbayat maintains a partial distinction between counting numbers for humans and those for animals and objects. As such, Proto-Batanic is reconstructed with these things.

Proto-Batanic usually lists adjectives before nouns. If the adjective must go after for whatever reason (e.g. as a relative clause) it is linked with \*a. For example, "white stone" would be either \*iRak bato or \*bato a iRak.

There are two ways to negate verbs: *ava*, which follows verbs but precedes adjectives and cannot be used in subordinate clauses, and *di*, which precedes both verbs and adjectives and can be used in subordinate clauses.

### Verb Classes

In general, if a verb is conjugated with one class, it can only be conjugated with that class; conjugations with other classes are either ungrammatical, or have a different meaning. For example, \*Riman has two meanings: *to fight* (using \*may-) and *to kill* (\*using \*mang- or \*om-).

#### Actor Focus

* *may*- class: past nay-, present nay-RED, future may-RED, infinitive may-
* *mag*- class: past nag-, present nag-RED, future mag-RED, infinitive mag-
	+ Rare
* *om*- class: past omin-, present omin-RED, future RED, infinitive om-
	+ A variant of this is just *m-*: past min-, present min-RED, future RED, infinitive m-
* *maN-* class: past naN-, present naN-RED, future maN-RED, infinitive maN-
	+ The *N* here represents a nasal that assimilates to the point of articulation of the first consonant of the verb, then deletes it. If the verb begins with a vowel, *N* becomes /ŋ/.

#### Patient Focus

* *-en* suffix: patient. past -in-, present R-in-ED, future RED -en, infinitive -en

#### Locative or Dative

* *i*- prefix: goal, referent or instrumentative. past in-, present ini-, future i-RED, infinitive i-
* -*an* suffix: goal, referent or instrumentative. past -in- -an, present -ini- -an, future RED- -an, infinitive -an
* *i*- -*an* circumfix: beneficiary focus. past in- -an, present ini- -an, future i-RED -an, infinitive i- -an

#### Other Verb Affixes

* *maci*- prefix: social, implies interaction among members of a group. past naci, present naci-RED, future maci-RED, infinitive maci-
* *ca*- prefix: indirect causation. past cina-, present cinaca-, future caca-, infinitive ca-
* *pa*- prefix: direct causation. past pina-, present pinapa-, future papa-, infinitive pa-

### Prefixes

* ka-: nominalizer
* \*ka- -an: place, state, or condition nominalizer
* \*ma-: stative, adjective and adverb prefix; passive verb prefix

### Particles

* \*a: links modifiers to nouns **if the modifier does not have the ma- prefix**
* \*kano: and, than (comparative linker)
* \*maNa: plural word
* \*taga-: from

## Descendants

Proto-Batanic has three descendants: Yami-Itbayat, Ivatan-Babuyan, and Proto-Donghai. Ivatan-Babuyan is distinguished from Yami-Itbayat by PBat \*R, \*l → \*l, \*d adjacent to \*i or \*e, whereas Yami-Itbayaten has \*r and \*l as the reflexes.

## Lexicon

*Main article: List of Proto-Batanic words*
## References

1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Ross, Malcolm (January 2005). The Batanic Languages in Relation to the Early History of the Malayo-Polynesian Subgroup of Austronesian. *Journal of Austronesian Studies*. Retrieved on January 10, 2022.
2. ↑ Loo, Jun-hun (January 31, 2011). Genetic affinities between the Yami tribe people of Orchid Island and the Philippine Islanders of the Batanes archipelago. PubMed Central. Retrieved on January 11, 2022.
3. ↑ Blench, Roger (July 19, 2015). A new look at Bashiic. Academia Sinica. Retrieved on January 11, 2022.
4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Yang, Doris Hsiao-Fang (June 2002). Subgrouping and Reconstruction of Batanic Languages. *Providence University*. Retrieved on January 7, 2022.
5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Li, Paul Jen-Kuei (2000). Subgrouping of the Batanic Languages. *Academia Sinica*. Retrieved on January 7, 2022.
6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 Pick, Andrew (2018). Proto-Batanic \*L: a clue to the linguistic prehistory of the Philippines. *University of Hawai'i*. Retrieved on January 7, 2022.
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Blust, Robert (December 2017). Regular Metathesis in Batanic (Northern Philippines)?. *Oceanic Linguistics*. Retrieved on January 8, 2022.