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{{Short description|Vowel sound change}}{{for multi|I-mutation in the Germanic languages|Germanic umlaut|other uses of "umlaut"|Umlaut (disambiguation)}}{{More citations needed|date=December 2009}}{{Sound change}}{{IPA notice}}I-mutation (also known as umlaut, front mutation, i-umlaut, i/j-mutation or i/j-umlaut) is a type of sound change in which a back vowel is fronted or a front vowel is raised if the following syllable contains {{IPAslink|i}}, {{IPAslink|iː}} or {{IPAslink|j}} (a voiced palatal approximant, sometimes called yod, the sound of English {{grapheme|y}} in yes). It is a category of regressive metaphony, or vowel harmony.The term is usually used by scholars of the Germanic languages: it is particularly important in the history of the Germanic languages because inflectional suffixes with an {{IPA|/i/}} or {{IPA|/j/}} led to many vowel alternations that are still important in the morphology of the languages.

Germanic languages

I-mutation took place separately in the various Germanic languages from around 450 or 500 CE in the North Sea area and affected all the early languages,See Fausto Cercignani, Early "Umlaut" Phenomena in the Germanic Languages, in «Language», 56/1, 1980, pp. 126-136. except for Gothic.See Fausto Cercignani, Alleged Gothic Umlauts, in "Indogermanische Forschungen", 85, 1980, pp. 207-213. It seems to have taken effect earliest and most completely in Old English and Old Norse. It took place later in Old High German; by 900, its effects are consistently visible only in the spelling of Germanic {{IPA|*/a/}}.

Other languages

I-mutation exists in many other languages but is often referred to by different names. However, in the Romance languages, it is more commonly called metaphony (from Ancient Greek, meaning "process of changing sounds," which translates into German as umlaut: "about" with "sound").WEB, umlaut {{!, Etymology of umlaut by etymonline |url=https://www.etymonline.com/word/umlaut |access-date=2024-03-21 |website=www.etymonline.com |language=en}} Meanwhile, in Celtic languages, it is referred to as affection.{{citation needed|date=February 2020}} A type of i-mutation is also observed in Anatolian languages, including Hittite, Luwian, Lycian and Lydian.BOOK, Starke, Frank, Untersuchung zur Stammbildung des keilschrift-luwischen Nomens, Studien zu den Boǧazköy-Texten, 31, Harrassowitz, Wiesbaden, 1990, 3-447-02879-3, JOURNAL, Melchert, Craig H., 2012, Genitive Case and Possessive Adjective in Anatolian, Per Roberto Gusmani: Linguistica Storica e Teorica, Orioles, V., Udine, Forum, 273–286,weblink Yakubovich, Ilya (2015) "The Luwian Language". Oxford Handbooks Online.JOURNAL, 10.1163/22125892-00501002, free, The Lydian nominal paradigm of i-mutation, 2017, Sasseville, David, Indo-European Linguistics, 5, 130–146,

Korean language

In Middle Korean, I-backward-sequenced vowels () were diphthongs, i.e. {{IPA|[ɐj]}}, {{IPA|[əj]}}, {{IPA|[jɐj]}}, {{IPA|[jəj]}}, {{IPA|[oj]}}, {{IPA|[uj]}}, {{IPA|[ɯj ~ ɰi]}}. However, in early modern Korean, they are monophthongized by umlaut, i.e. {{IPA|[ɛ]}}, {{IPA|[e]}}, {{IPA|[jɛ]}}, {{IPA|[je]}}, {{IPA|[ø]}}, {{IPA|[y]}} with only one exception: .BOOK,weblink Historical Linguistics 2005, Ahn, Sang-Cheol, Iverson, Gregory K., John Benjamins, 2005, 9789027247995, Salmons, Joseph C., Madison, WI, 275–293, Structured imbalances in the emergence of the Korean vowel system, 10.1075/cilt.284.21ahn, 10.1.1.557.3316, Dubenion-Smith, Shannon, However, in late modern Korean, is diphthongized to {{IPA|[ɥi]}}.BOOK,weblink The Korean Language, Lee, Iksop, Ramsey, S. Robert, SUNY Press, 2000, 978-0791448311, Albany, NY, 66, Also, is unstable and standard Korean allows to pronounce both {{IPA|[ø]}} and {{IPA|[we]}}.BOOK,weblink The Korean Alphabet: Its History and Structure, University of Hawaiʻi Press, 1997, 9780824817237, Kim-Renaud, Young-Key, Honolulu, 169–170, en, BOOK,weblink The Handbook of Korean Linguistics, Wiley-Blackwell, 2015, 9781118370933, West Sussex, UK, Brown, Lucien, Yeon, Jaehoon, In modern Korean language, there are two types of I-mutation, or I-assimilation: I-forward-assimilation () and I-backward-assimilation (). Assimilation occurs when ㅣ is in front of (forward) or behind (backward) the syllable. In standard Korean, only a few words are allowed to assimilate, however, exceptions are often observed in some dialects and casual usage.WEB,weblink 한국어 어문 규범, 2017-03-28, Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, 2020-04-08, I-forward-assimilation adds {{IPA|[j]}} sound, but I-backward-assimilation causes vowel to umlaut.

• Forward: (to bloom) {{IPA|[pÊ°i.ÊŒ]}} → {{IPA|[pÊ°i.jÊŒ]}}, (no) {{IPA|[ɐ.ȵi.o]}} → {{IPA|[a.ȵi.jo]}}
• Backward: (Western Korean dialect) (baby) {{IPA|[ɐ.É¡i]}} → {{IPA|[É›.É¡i]}}, (mother) {{IPA|[ÊŒ.mi]}} → {{IPA|[e.mi]}}, (meat) {{IPA|[ko.É¡i]}} → {{IPA|[kø.É¡i ‐ kwe.É¡i]}}

See also

• Old English phonology

References