Reconstruction of Tolaki and Moronene Language Vocal Protophonemes

Abstract

The Tolaki language and the Moronene languages are part of the Austronesian
language group. The reconstruction is done based on the hypothesis of a genetic relationship and
regularity. Historical comparison methods were used in this study. The purpose of the
reconstruction was to obtain accurate results on the assessment of language relations. It is
deemed necessary to reconstruct the proto in order to seek the evidence of the retention and
innovation that occur in the two respective languages. From the reconstruction, several findings
and proofs were generated, which among others are TlM vocal proto-phonemes: *a, *i, *u, *e,
and *o; PTlMr *a are found at the beginning, middle and the end of the word. The proto-
phonemes are 1) *a (a-, -a-, -a)> Tl, Mr a, 2) PTlMr *i (i- -i- -i)> Tl, Mr i, 3) PTlMr *u (u -, -u-, -
u)> Tl, Mr u, 4) PTlMr *e (e-, -e-, e-)> Tl, Mr e, and 5) PTlMr *o (o-, -o-, o-)> Tl Mr o.