SIERRA POPOLUCA SPEECH—FOSTER AND FOSTER 9 
nant following the i palatalize following the usual 
palatalizing rules (4.3). 
?i7L-Sniyah they have seen it (?i- t. p. pref. + *?i'S see 
+ -ne? perf. suf. + -yah pl. suf.) 
nAkniydh they have gone (# i. p. pref. + *nak go + 
-ne? + -yah) 
°a?nA?mnita’m we have looked at it (?an- t. p. pref. + 
*?a?m look + -ne? + -ta?m pl. suf.) 
4.18. Reduction of vowel length. Since a long 
vowel cannot precede a ? (3.10), when through 
metathesis a ? is caused to follow a long vowel, 
the vowel reduces to the short form. 
?ipi?nd?y he gathered it for someone (*pi'n gather) 
ankusu?nd?ypa I keep something (*sun want) 
4.19. Vocalic syncope. Nouns and attributives 
which end in a vowel usually lose the vowel when 
followed by another morpheme. This is not in- 
variably the case, and no hard and fast rule is 
apparent from our notes. A few nouns have two 
distinct combining forms, one which maintains the 
final vowel, and the other which loses it. In the 
final analysis each noun and attributive must be 
considered as a unique form with unique charac- 
teristics. 
¢a‘;whém among the tobacco (¢X-wi tobacco + -hom loc. 
suf.) 
¢O-wihém among the mojarra (Sp.) (¢6°wi mojarra + 
-hom) 
ta?phém among the fish (tX?pa fish + -hom) 
?uksyikma up in the cloud (?iksa cloud + yakma 
loeator) 
kopkikma in the middle of the savanna 
savanna + kikma) 
ké:so knee has the following forms: 
ko-sté-n kneel (k6‘so + *ten stop) 
ko-sput sprout at the knee (k6‘so + *put come out) 
ko-soytikma on the knee (ké’so + yikma) 
ko‘sokA’ak boot (k6°so + kA?ak shoe) 
(ké‘pa 
4.20. Vocalic syncope and palatalization. When 
words or syllables with the alveolars t, s or n in 
initial position are combined after words or syl- 
lables ending in i, the alveolars palatalize and the i 
drops out, to produce the combining form. 
ké:ptak house of arrows (ka*pi arrow + tak house) 
ka‘pnd? Arrow Water (proper noun) (kdé‘pi + na? 
water) 
w6nitam girls (w6ni girl + -tam pl. suf.) 
?xkStuh hail stones (?AkS8i corn grains + tuh rain) 
4.21. The noun prefix ?ay- (10.5) and _ the 
thematic verbal prefixes ?an- (6.5), ?ak- (6.6) 
and na- (6.7), when preceded by the pronominal 
prefixes (7.2, 7.5) undergo certain changes which 
do not follow the morphophonemic rules which 
govern other apparently similar phenomena. ‘The 
phenomena involved are failure of the glottal to 
metathesize with preceding nasals, failure of 1 
to palatalize alveolars, consonantic syncope, re- 
duction of geminant clusters, and vocalic assimila- 
tion. Since these phenomena are limited to the 
morphemes in question, they are treated as aspects 
of one problem rather than separately in the sev- 
eral sections involved. 
The following chart shows the pronominal pre- 
fix, the noun or verb prefix, the resultant com- 
bined form, the form which might be expected if 
the general rules were followed, and the paragraph 
number of the general rule. The verbal prefix 
?ak- is not used in the chart, since it behaves in 
exactly the same manner as ?ay-. Also see 4.4 for 
data bearing on these phenomena. 
Resultant Expectable 
Pronominal Noun or combined combined General 
prefix verb prefix form form rule 
?a-(ta-) + ?an- > ?an- ?a?an- 4, 25 
?an-(tan- + ?an- > ?anan- ?a?nan- 4. 23 
man-) 
as ne + na- > ?ana- ?anna- PAwalal 
?in- + ?an- > ?inin- ?i?fan- 4. 23 
ss + na- > ?ini- ?inna- 2. 11, 4.5 
mi- + ?an > min- mi?an- 4, 25 
Lt + na- > mini- mifna- 4.3 
?i- + ?an- > ?in- 21? an- 4. 25 
Us + na- > ?ini- ?ina- 4.3 
4.22. Stress patterns and shifts. Loud or weak 
stress is, as has been said (1.4), an inherent feature 
of certain morphemes. Word classes are character- 
ized by stress position as well as by morphological 
considerations. Nouns, stative verbs, attributives, 
pronouns, and enumeratives of more than one 
syllable, with certain exceptions, have a loud stress 
on the penultimate syllable, while active verbs 
have a loud stress on the final syllable. Some 
conjunctions such as ?iga that, and the negative 
attributive da, except when in isolation, are given 
weak stress. 
The greatest variation in noun stress occurs in 
the case of secondary, compound nouns. In the 
case of compounds composed of noun and noun 
loud stress may occur on the penult (of disyllabic 
nouns) or final syllable (of monosyllabic nouns) of 
the final member of the compound, and a medial 
stress on the inherently stressed syllable of the 
first member, as ?i-Skuyn? tears (?i-Skuy eye + 
na? water), or aloud stress may occur on the penult 
of the compound form, e. g., ko-baktak hat (ké:bak 
