Armenian is geographically one of the most widespread languages of the world, with distinct dialects located as far west as Poland and as far east as India. It has a rich literary history dating from the fourth-century translation of the Bible into Classical Armenian. It is one of the most linguistically divergent of the Indo-European languages, having undergone a host of complicated phonological, morphological, and syntactic changes that continue to resist satisfactory analysis.

However, the language has yet to receive a comprehensive treatment by theoretical linguists. Bert Vaux remedies this problem, bringing Armenian into the sphere of phonological discussion by making available to Western readers the results of Armenological work published in Armenian and Russian, and by presenting theoretical analyses of many of the more striking phonological phenomena described in these sources or culled from the author's fieldwork. The topics addressed include syllabification, stress assignment, vowel harmony, feature geometry, consonantvowel interactions, and prosodic structure.

Series Information: The Phonology of the World's Languages

Series Editor: Professor Jacques Durand, Université de Toulouse-le-Mirail

Series ISBN: 0-19-961355-9

Series Description:

The phonology of most languages has until now been available only in a fragmented way, through unpublished theses, or articles scattered in more or less accessible journals. Each volume in this series will offer an extensive treatment of the phonology of one language within a modern theoretical perspective and will provide comprehensive references to recent and more classical studies of the language.