A revised reconstruction of the Proto-Tupian vowel system

Abstract This contribution is concerned with the reconstruction of the vowel qualities of Proto-Tupian, the ancestral language of the Tupian language family. The study is grounded in a bottom-up application of the comparative method and seeks to offer a more balanced reconstruction that avoids an overreliance on the Tupí-Guaraní branch. It is first shown that the height opposition traditionally reconstructed for the rounded vowel series (*o vs. *u) is best interpreted as an opposition between an unrounded vowel and a rounded one (*ə vs. *o). It is also argued that multiple instances of *e in the traditional reconstruction should be rather attributed to *ə. Finally, it is shown that two vowels (symbolized as *ɨ and *ɯ) must be reconstructed in lieu of the traditional *ɨ. The resulting proposal has consequences for the subgrouping of the Tupian family.