Phonetic particularities of the language of the early 17th-century Mongol chronicle Erdeni tunumal neretü sudur

This paper is the first ever study providing a detailed analytical overview of some phonetic particularities of the “History of Altan Khan” (Mo. Erdeni tunumal neretü sudur), a unique Mongolian manuscript of the early 17th century presently kept at the library of the Inner Mongolia Academy of Social Sciences (Hohhot). The author presents an analysis of the following phonetic features attested in the language of the monument: rounding harmony and its violations, vowel height assimilation, prebreaking of *i, development of contracted long vowels, elision of non-initial syllable vowels, and vowel epenthesis in non-initial syllables. The language system of the chronicle may be identified as belonging to a transitional stage between Preclassical and early Classical periods in the development of Written Mongol and is considered to be a vivid example of a mixture of linguistic archaisms and innovations typical for the documents of the transitional stage. It contains both archaic (occasional lack of rounding harmony) and clearly innovative features (development of contracted long vowels, elision of non-initial syllable vowels). Also, some vocalic developments may be considered as early Common Mongolic innovations dating back from at least the early Post-Proto-Mongolic if not the Proto-Mongolic period (development of rounding harmony, vowel height assimilation, prebreaking of *i, vowel epenthesis in non-initial syllables). The sound system of the chronicle is quite similar to the language of Sino-Mongolian glossaries of the turn of the 16th-17th centuries and Written Mongol documents of the Preclassical and early Classical periods.