{"word_count": 346, "character_count": 2287}
This marker is reflected in three kinds of contexts: In northern Amis, before common nouns, inflected for case as k-u (nominative) t-u (oblique), n-u (genitive) without any number distinction (Bril, in press); prefixed to numerals of the non-human series in the southern Tsouic languages: Kanakanabu, Saaroa; and in Kavalan. Modern Rukai dialects do not show it but Ino's recording of Karei Rukai&#160; (Ino 1898:25-33) gives an almost complete series: isa, urisiri, utool, usipat, urima, ulumu, upitoo, uvaŋat, (puruk '10' is a loan from Paiwan). The missing u-prefixed word for '1' in Rukai is u-tsani, discussed here. Vestiges of u-prefixation also exist in Tsou numerals: usupat 'four' in one variety of Tsou, here. sporadically reinterpreted as an onset consonant w- or v-&#160; with PAN nouns beginning in vowels, as noticed by Bril (p.c, April 20, 2020) for Natauran:*asu, ‘dog’, *u-asu id. &#62; Natauran Amis wacu, Pazeh wazu, Kavalan wasu, Paiwan vatu;*aNak, ‘child’, *u-aNak id. &#62; Proto-Rukai vanakə (Li 1977);*amaH2 'father', *u-amaH2 &#62; Natauran Amis&#160; wama.In Fey's dictionary of Amis one finds pairs like idaŋ/widaŋ 'friend', ina/wina 'mother'.In order to explain sporadic cases of initial w- or similar in&#160; words for 'dog', 'fire', 'child', Dyen (1962) reconstructed a new Austronesian phoneme *W; the random appearance of a noun prefix is a better interpretation.Under my model of AN phylogeny, *u- 'common noun marker' reconstructs to PAN, being present in the Pazeh word for 'dog'; Pazeh is regarded as a primary branch of PAN.ReferencesBril, I. in press. Northern Amis. Handbook on Formosan languages, ed. by P. Jen-kuei Li, E. Zeitoun, R. De Busser.&#160; Leiden: BrillDyen, I. (1962) Some New Proto-Malayopolynesian Initial Phonemes. Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 82, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1962), pp. 214-215Fey, V. (1986) Amis dictionary. The Bible Society in the Republic of China.Ino, Yoshinori 伊能嘉矩. 1998. 巡臺日程 Xún Tái Rì Chéng [A Formosan itinerary]. In 伊能嘉矩番語調查手冊 Ino Yoshinori fānyǔ diàochá shǒucè [Ino Yoshinori’s field records], ed. by : T. Moriguchi, pp. 13-201. Taipei: Southern Materials Center.Li, Paul Jen-Kuei. 1977. The internal relationships of Rukai. Bulletin of the Institute of History and Philology 48:1-92.[cite]