Sardinian phonology

Sardinian is conventionally divided, mainly on phonological criteria, into three main varieties: Campidanese, Logudorese, and Nuorese. The last of these has a notably conservative phonology, compared not only to the other two varieties, but also to other Romance languages as well.



Vowels
All Sardinian varieties shared an original vowel system characterized by the merger of each of Latin's short vowels with its long counterpart ( merged with, merged with , and so on) resulting in an inventory of five vowels:.

Sardinian vowels are lengthened under primary stress, especially in open syllables. Compare and.

Sardinian vowels have long been subject to a process of metaphony whereby are raised to [e o] if the following syllable contains a high vowel (either  or ). If the syllable that precedes the resulting or  itself contains another  or, that vowel is also raised, a process which may repeat across multiple syllables. , for instance, is realized as, with metaphony spreading to all three syllables preceding the final.

In the Campidanese varieties spoken in the south of the island, underwent a general raising to  in final syllables. The new produced by this change failed, however, to trigger metaphony in preceding syllables, as original  had. Since this obscured the conditions for metaphony, could now contrast with. For instance, the older 'well' and  'come' became  and  respectively, a minimal pair distinguished only by their stressed vowels. This meant that the difference between and  had achieved phonemic status, giving Campidanese a total of seven distinct vowels, as opposed to the older five-vowel system retained by other Sardinian dialects.

† Only in Campidanese.

Consonants
Sardinian possesses the following consonant phonemes: † Variable presence, depending on dialect.

‡ Mainly in Nuorese.

Plosives
The Sardinian system of plosives cannot be exhaustively characterized by either qualitative (voicing) or quantitative (duration) contrasts, but both contrasts must be specified independently on some level of grammar. All plosives participate in a system-wide and complex process of lenition that characterizes all varieties of Sardinian and operates across word boundaries.

There are three series of plosives or corresponding approximants:
 * Voiceless or fortis stops derive from their Latin counterparts in composition after another stop, from utterance-initial voiceless stops and from Latin geminates (typically voiceless).
 * As in most Romance languages, are unaspirated, with  a dental.
 * When intervocalic, voiceless stops undergo lenition by voicing. When applicable, they escape voicing by becoming long or half-long in the opposite process of fortition; when this happens, their spelling is inconsistent, with some preferring etymological (double) spelling and others phonemic (single).
 * In Nuorese, which maintains etymologically single voiceless stops, these merge with etymologically double ones as voiceless fortis. Individual words and morphemes may display independent voicing (-tàde < Lat. -tātem) and even deletion (-àu < Lat. -ātum).
 * Etymologically double and postconsonantal voiced stops do not contrast with single ones in any variety, even in Nuorese, and are typically realised as voiced geminates.
 * Voiced or lenis "stops" derive from single Latin stops (voiced or voiceless), and are commonly realised as approximants between vowels, as in Spanish ( less commonly). Latin single voiced intervocalic stops are generally reflected as zero in Logudorese and Campidanese; this can also apply across word boundaries, resulting in consonants disappearing when in combination.
 * In Cagliari and neighboring dialects, the weak allophone of surfaces as  in all positions due to rhotacism: digitus > didu~diru 'finger'.
 * occurs mainly in intervocalic position, where it is realized as the geminate, representing the regular outcome of Latin . The same sound occurs allophonically—albeit not as a geminate—in the sequence , which is realized as.
 * In some varieties, particularly in northeastern Nuorese, may assimilate to.

Fricatives

 * Apico-alveolar realizations of predominate in the centre of the island, encompassing the entire Nuorese-speaking area and extending to Sennariolo in the west and Seulo in the south. Mura describes an apico-postalveolar or retroflex realization in the eastern parts of this region.
 * voices to in intervocalic position throughout the island, except in certain parts of Barbagia. Geminate  never voices.
 * , derived from Latin or Greek, is characteristic of the Nuorese dialects. In recent times, however, it has turned to  in the towns of Nuoro and Dorgali. This may be the result of influence from Logudorese, where  is the regular outcome.
 * is generally voiced to in intervocalic position.
 * In most Nuorese varieties, word-initial, if followed by a vowel, is lost. The exceptions are:
 * Nuoro, and areas to its northwest, where it remains as-is.
 * Orotelli, where it is realized as.
 * Lodè, where it is realized as.
 * Ovodda, where it is realized as.
 * Word-initial (from Latin ) occurs in certain Nuorese varieties, such as those of Bitti and Lula, although the distinction between it and  is not always clear. Otherwise, Sardinian has merged Latin  into.
 * , written -sc(i/e)- or -sç-, is pronounced as single at the beginning of a word, and strengthened to  otherwise.
 * , written -x- and never phonetically long, is its voiced counterpart. However, its most common source is lenition of.
 * primarily exists as the lenis allophone of and is often reflected as such: Camp. fentana 'window' < Sp. ventana. Nevertheless, in some varieties it has become a phoneme that itself exhibits a fortis allophone: Camp., Log. avvesare 'to accustom'.

Affricates

 * is dentalized laminal or  written -tz-. It corresponds to Italian -z- or -ci-, the latter especially in loanwords. In contrast to  it is very advanced, tending towards the interdental  in central varieties, and then spelled th. Particularly in Nuorese, it represents the  of loanwords.
 * is the corresponding voiced or, written -z-. It mainly stems from the Latin yod  after consonants in Logudorese (fizu 'son' < fīlium, ghennarzu 'January' < iānuārium), but also corresponds to Italian -gi- or -ggi- in loanwords.
 * is written -c(i/e)- or -ç-.
 * is written -g(e/i)- or -j-. In Campidanese, it stems from the Latin yod after consonants (figiu 'son' < fīlium, gennàlgiu 'January' < iānuārium) as well as from the palatalization of Latin . In many varieties, this sound undergoes lenition to  when intervocalic.

Nasals

 * is variously but commonly realised as fortis (geminate) inside the stressed syllable, and for this reason (as well due to etymology) is often spelled double.
 * and is the only other consonant showing phonemic length contrast besides the rhotic.
 * Intervocalic commonly undergoes lenition in Campidanese, giving a glottal stop, pharyngeal fricative or disappearing, with vowel nasalization: Sarrabus  'new year'.
 * , written -gn- or -nny-/-nni- (the palatal nasal for some speakers or dialects, although for most the pronunciation is ).

Liquids and rhotics

 * Sardinian has a single-rhotic system. contrasts with  intervocalically (the only such contrast besides ), with the former surfacing as a tap  and the latter as a trill . In other positions the trill is an allophone of the tap.
 * Especially in Campidanese, intervocalic is subject to lenition both word-internally and across word boundaries, giving rise to [      ∅]. Some of these realisations are written with b or u: sobi, soui 'sun'.
 * is strengthened to geminate retroflex in order to escape lenition in those varieties where it is affected. It thus may freely alternate with the lenition outcomes, although strengthening is nowadays more common.
 * , written u, appears in Campidanese in the clusters and, as in lingua 'tongue', and elsewhere in borrowings. It can also be found as the closing element in diphthongs, when these arise phonetically: pau, pàulu 'pole, stake' < pālus.

Labiovelars

 * Latin survive unchanged in Campidanese but have merged to  in Logudorese and Nuorese.


 * Outside of the above sequences, only occurs in loanwords.

Neutralizations
Most varieties are characterised by the historic neutralization of Latin and  into the archiphoneme  within the morpheme: marralzu~marrarzu 'rock'. The Campidanese dialect does not generally allow this to end syllables except if followed by another ; as a result, underlying  sequences are synchronically and systematically repaired, either through assimilation or metathesis:
 * One strategy moves the rhotic to the leftmost available position within a phrase, sometimes jumping several syllables: >  'the bow', but  >  if none is available. The intervocalic consonant that's left is regularly fortis (geminate).
 * When is harmonically followed by the voiceless coronal, assimilation occurs: altum >  >  'tall'.
 * When followed by the voiced coronal, another type of metathesis is frequent: surdum > 'deaf'.
 * Recent Italian borrowings tend to maintain the coda as a function of register: It. forse >  ~  >.
 * In some varieties located at the north of the island, any etymological liquid in coda surfaces as a voiced lateral fricative or a palatal glide.


 * and alternate in Campidanese Sardinian, but not Nuorese.

Sandhi
Only, , , are permitted word-finally. The first three of these alternate in notable external sandhi processes. For Nuorese, and  neutralise (merge) when in sandhi in the following way:
 * before word-initial voiceless obstruents except and : tres panes  'three pieces of bread', battor panes  'four pieces of bread';
 * before other word-initial obstruents including, also , and ;
 * total assimilation before word-initial, ;
 * variable total assimilation in allegro speech before word-initial.
 * Parallel outcomes occur word-internally with the prefixes dis-, is-.

The word-final is assimilated to the following consonant within a phrase, or can be said to disappear, inducing strengthening: Log. cheret bennere '(s)he wants to come'.

Morphosyntactic gemination
Unlike Tuscan Italian, Neapolitan and Sicilian, Sardinian doesn't have a productive process of syntactic gemination since most Latin final consonants have been maintained. Nevertheless, there are a few lexical items that formerly ended in consonants, and thus prevented initial-consonant weakening (lenition); as a result, consonants occurring after these words undergo strengthening, typically by gemination. These include the conjunction e 'and' < La. et, the preposition a 'to, at' < La. ad as well as the interrogative particle a < La. aut, at or an.

Comparison with other languages
Several features distinguish Sardinian, although not necessarily all its dialects, from other Romance varieties.
 * Preservation of the plosive sounds and  before front vowels  and ; for example, centum > chentu 'hundred'; decem > dèche 'ten' and gener > ghèneru 'son-in-law' (Italian cento, dieci, genero with  and ). This is another strikingly archaic feature that was shared by African Romance.
 * and have since been introduced to Logudorese via borrowing from other dialects and external languages, but generally not Nuorese, where these are reflected as  and.
 * Absence of diphthongizations found in many other Romance languages; for example, potest > podet '(s)he can' (Italian può, Spanish puede, Romanian poate); bonus > bónu 'good' (Italian buono, Spanish bueno). This is shared by several Central-Southern Italian varieties, with many displaying various types of metaphony reminiscent of Sardinian.

Sardinian contains the following phonetic innovations:
 * Change of the Latin -ll- into a retroflex, shared with Sicilian, Southern Corsican as well as historically in Gascon; for example, corallus > coraddu 'coral' and villa > bidda 'village, town'.
 * Latin lj changed into, , , , or  rather than the palatal  of Italian: *voliam > bolla ~ bolza ~ boza 'wish, longing' (Italian voglia); fīlium > fillu ~ fizu ~ fitzu~ figiu ~ fixu 'son' (Italian figlio).
 * Various outcomes of initial pl-, fl- and cl-, commonly as, , , variously seen also in Portuguese and Galician; for example, plateam > pratza 'public square' (Portuguese praça, Galician praza; but Italian piazza), flŭxum > frúsciu 'flabby' (Portuguese and Galician frouxo) and the early Church Latin borrowing ecclēsiam > crèsia 'church' (Portuguese igreja, Galician igrexa; but Italian chiesa).
 * But also, , in both Logudorese ciae (alongside crae) and Old Galician-Portuguese chave < clāvem 'key'; contrast Italian chiave, with.
 * A small area on the Nuorese territory conserves Latin : flùmene alongside fiùmene, frùmine < flūmen for all three possible outcomes.
 * Metathesis as in abbratzare > abbaltzare 'to hug, to embrace'. In word-initial position, it can produce marked syllable onsets such as, , , , e.g. ianuarius > jrennazu (Campidanese) 'January'.
 * Vowel prothesis before an initial r in Campidanese, similar to Basque and Gascon: rēx > (g)urrèi/re 'king' (Basque errege); rota > arroda 'wheel' (Gascon arròda, Basque errota); rīvus > Sardinian and Gascon arríu 'river'.
 * Vowel prothesis in Logudorese before an initial s followed by consonant, as in the Western Romance languages: scrīptum > iscrítu 'written' (Spanish escrito, French écrit), stēlla > isteddu 'star' (Spanish estrella, French étoile)
 * Except for the Nuorese dialect, Latin single voiceless plosives, ,  became voiced approximant consonants. Single voiced plosives , ,  were lost: caritātem (acc.) > caridàde ,  (Italian carità), locus > lóːgu ,  (Italian luogo). This also applies across word boundaries: porcu 'pig', but su porcu  'the pig'; tempus 'time', but su tempus  'the time'; domu 'house', but sa 'omu 'the house'.
 * All varieties show paragogic vowels: the vowel of the final syllable ending in a consonant is copied after it to form a new open syllable, which undergoes the usual lenition (voicing) processes: Log. istranzos / Camp. strangius  'strangers'. This is only present before pause, and may be variable with some speakers.
 * After resonants, this vowel is sometimes etymological and sometimes not, leading to variation in spelling: Nuo. nùmen(e) 'name' < nōmen; fàcher(e) 'to do' < facere. Note that the vowel is non-phonemic (paragogic) in both cases: it disappears when not utterance-final, and the of the infinitive undergoes regular sandhi: fàcher(e) cùrrer(e)  'to make run'.
 * A similar epenthetic vowel has been lexicalized in most varieties in monosyllables: Camp. tui 'you' < tū.


 * Logudorese and Nuorese display vowel insertion before initial clusters, less typical of Campidanese (examples above); the latter displays it before word-initial : Camp. arrùbiu, Log. rùbiu < rubeum 'reddish'.