Mari

Last Updated: 2020-06-10

COMPROMISED: conflation between /n/ and /ɲ/ and between /l/ and /ʎ/; skepticism related to the orthographic reliability of the reduced vowels /ə/ and /æ/ (i.e. is it exhaustive)

Background

Language Family: Uralic / Finno-Ugric / Finno-Permic / Finno-Cheremisic / Cheremisic

• Mari is spoken in Russia.
• Crúbadán appears to represent Hill (western) Mari rather than Meadow Mari, with the inclusion of graphemes ⟨ӓ⟩ (/æ/) and ⟨ӹ⟩ (/ə/), so where dialects diverge, I will favor Hill Mari.

Phonology

Consonants

	Place of Articulation
Manner of Articulation	Bilabial	Labiodental	Alveolar	Postalveolar	Alveopalatal	Palatal	Velar
Stops	p b		t d				k ɡ
Affricates			ts		tɕ
Fricatives	β	f	s z	ʃ ʒ	ɕ		x
Nasals	m		n			ɲ	ŋ
Trills			r
Approximants			l			j ʎ
Note: For phonemes that share a cell, those on the left are voiceless and those on the right are voiced. Both palatal approximants are voiced, but the one on the right is lateral.

Vowels

• Although, I have chosen to stick with the analysis of /ə/, given that other sources attest its reduced nature without contradiction (Kangasmaa-Minn 1998, 223; Campbell 2012, 1082), I have veered away from the analysis of /ə̂/. Alhoniemi (1993; as cited in Bradley 2017, 371) highlights the classification of this reduced mid-central vowel in Mari; however, there is some skepticism related to this. Estill (2012) and Bradley (2017) point out that this interpretation is suspect given that the description of the phoneme warrants a place more back than that of schwa (p. 229; p. 371). I have chosen to use /ɤ/ just as Bradley (2017) does (p. 371).

	Front	Central	Back
High	i y		u
Mid	e ø	ə	ɤ o
Low	æ		ɑ
Note: For vowels that share a cell, those on the left are unrounded and those on the right are rounded.

Alphabet

• The palatalization of ⟨н⟩ and ⟨л⟩ is not indicated orthographically preceding vowels /e/ and /i/, which somewhat compromises the language (Riese et al. 2012, 32).
• Kangasmaa-Minn (1998) states that the reduced vowels /ə/ and /æ/ are not always marked orthographically (p. 223).
• Recent Russian loanwords may be realized according to their Russian pronunciation rather than adapted to Mari phonology (Bradley 2017, 377).

Grapheme	Phoneme	Comment
а	/ɑ/
ӓ	/æ/
б	/b/
в	/β/
г	/ɡ/
д	/d/
е	/e/; /je/	/je/: word-initially, following vowels, and following both the hard and soft sign
ё	/jo/	primarily appears in Russian loanwords
ж	/ʒ/
з	/z/
и	/i/
й	/j/
к	/k/
л	/l/
м	/m/
н	/n/
ҥ	/ŋ/
о	/o/
ӧ	/ø/
п	/p/
р	/r/
с	/s/
т	/t/
у	/u/
ӱ	/y/
ф	/f/	primarily appears in Russian loanwords
х	/x/	primarily appears in Russian loanwords
ц	/ts/	primarily appears in Russian loanwords
ч	/tɕ/
ш	/ʃ/
щ	/ɕ/	primarily appears in Russian loanwords
ъ		referred to as a hard sign: indicates palatalization at word boundaries and when preceding specific vowels
ы	/ɤ/
ӹ	/ə/
ь		referred to as a soft sign: indicates palatalization of specific consonants and when preceding specific vowels
э	/e/
ю	/ju/; /u/	/ju/: word-initially, following vowels, and following both the hard and soft sign
я	/jɑ/; /ɑ/	/jɑ/: word-initially, following vowels, and following both the hard and soft sign
Digraph
нь	/ɲ/	phoneme occurs if ⟨н⟩ is also followed by ⟨ю⟩ or ⟨я⟩
ль	/ʎ/	phoneme occurs if ⟨л⟩ is also followed by ⟨ю⟩ or ⟨я⟩

Misc. Rules

• /d/ devoices when followed by a consonant (Riese et al. 2012, 38).
• Voiced stops and /β/ devoice syllable-finally (ibid.).
• Mari has vowel harmony. Suffixes match the stressed vowel in terms of frontness and roundedness (Riese et al. 2012, 39–40).
• /β/ may be realized as [v], especially among younger generations (Riese et al. 2012, 21–22)

References

Alhoniemi, Alho. 1993. Grammatik Des Tscheremissischen (Mari). Hamburg: Buske.

Bradley, Jeremy. 2017. “Transcribe.mari-Language.com: Automatic Transcriptions and Transliterations for Ten Languages of Russia.” Acta Linguistica Academica 64 (3): 369–82. www.jstor.org/stable/26453100.

Campbell, George L. 2012. Compendium of the World’s Languages. Routledge. https://www.ebook.de/de/product/18929231/george_l_campbell_compendium_of_the_world_s_languages.html.

Estill, Dennis. 2012. “Revisiting the Meadow Mari Vocalic System.” Linguistica Uralica 48 (3). http://www.kirj.ee/public/Linguistica_Uralica/2012/issue_3/ling-2012-3-228-237.pdf.

Kangasmaa-Minn, Eeva. 1998. “The Uralic Languages (Routledge Language Family Series).” In, edited by Daniel Abondolo, 219–48. Routledge. https://www.amazon.com/Uralic-Languages-Routledge-Language-Family/dp/041508198X?SubscriptionId=AKIAIOBINVZYXZQZ2U3A&tag=chimbori05-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=041508198X.

Riese, Timothy, Jeremy Bradley, Emma Yakimova, and Galina Krylova. 2012. Оҥай марий йылме: A Comprehensive Introduction to the Mari Language. University of Vienna. https://www.univie.ac.at/maridict/book/book_en.html.