Lionnet (2025): Tonal Languages Without Tone #
@cite{lionnet-2025}
Tonal languages without tone: downstep in Drubea and Numèè (Oceanic, New Caledonia). Phonology 42, e23, 1–43.
Key claims formalized #
The word-prosodic system of Drubea and Numèè consists entirely of register features — underlying downstep (
l) and postlexical upstep (h) — with no tone features.The register-bearing unit (RBU) is the mora, not the syllable, evidenced by the CV⁺V three-way contrast.
Culminativity: each native stem contains at most one downstep.
Drubea/Numèè downstep satisfies the core definitional properties of downstep cross-linguistically (@cite{leben-2018}).
Tonal systems split into tone-based (paradigmatic) and register-based (syntagmatic), enriching @cite{hyman-2006}'s word-prosodic typology.
The register analysis is more parsimonious than the tonal alternative: 1 underlying primitive + 1 postlexical process vs. 3 + 2 (@cite{lionnet-2025} §5).
Every monosyllabic minimal pair shares the same segmental form.
The contrast is purely prosodic — the register feature l is
the only difference between the two members of each pair
(@cite{lionnet-2025}).
The contrast in each minimal pair IS the register specification: one member is registerless, the other is σ1-downstepped.
Every stem in the Drubea fragment satisfies culminativity:
at most one l feature per stem (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.10).
Culminativity holds structurally for all three patterns at any
mora count: each pattern places at most one l.
The three register patterns produce distinct mora-level specifications on bimoraic stems, confirming the mora as the RBU (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.7, §4.2).
CVV registerless: both morae unspecified [∅, ∅].
⁺CVV: downstep on first mora [l, ∅].
CV⁺V: downstep on second mora [∅, l].
With only 1 mora (monomoraic CV), only two patterns are distinct:
registerless and σ1-downstepped. The σ2 pattern collapses to
registerless (no second mora to host the l).
Four consecutive downstepped monosyllables produce terracing: each is realized one step lower than the preceding (cf. ex. 11: /⁺ɲi ⁺mwa ⁺ŋii ⁺me/ 'They said that…'; ex. 12: /⁺mwa ⁺ŋii ⁺yoo ⁺ne/ in Figure 7).
The theory-primary content is the delta sequence [-1, -2, -3, -4]:
each downstep adds another step of cumulative descent. The offset-4
realization below is just an arbitrary anchoring of those deltas.
Registerless syllables following a downstep maintain the lowered register — they are realized at the same pitch as the downstepped syllable.
A mixed sequence of downstepped and registerless syllables: each downstep creates a new lower plateau, registerless RBUs inherit the current register.
Abrupt h-epenthesis: insert h on the registerless RBU immediately
preceding a downstep (cf. ex. 13b; @cite{lionnet-2025} §3.2, §4.4).
Spreading h-epenthesis: raising extends over the entire sequence of registerless syllables before a downstep (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.2).
Utterance-initial downstep is not phonetically realized: there is no preceding register to contrast with (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.5, §4.5). The realized pitch sequence is indistinguishable from a registerless initial.
The contrast between registerless and downstepped IS maintained
when a downstepped syllable follows: the initial registerless
syllable undergoes pre-downstep raising, the initial downstepped
one does not (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.5, §4.5). The minimal pair
/goo ⁺mie/ 'wet Hibbertia' (registerless initial → h-epenthesis)
vs /⁺goo ⁺mie/ 'wet tree' (downstepped initial → no h-epenthesis)
is the diagnostic.
The reason the contrast survives utterance-initial neutralization:
realizePitchUtterance only suppresses the phonetic drop, leaving
the underlying l in place to block h-epenthesis on itself. The
underlying form is still culminative-sensitive
(@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.5).
Drubea utterance-final raising: h% docks onto the final
registerless syllable (@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.3, §4.8). The
Numèè utterance-final downstep ⁺% is formalized separately
in §13 because its eligibility conditions (light CV + registerless
penult) require explicit syllable structure.
Drubea/Numèè downstep satisfies all three core definitional properties of downstep (@cite{leben-2018}: 2; @cite{lionnet-2025} §6.1):
(a) affects the entire prosodic domain (not just one tone) (b) changes the register for what follows (c) cumulative: multiple downsteps stack
Equations
- One or more equations did not get rendered due to their size.
Instances For
The functionsContrastively annotation on drubeaDownstep is not a
free stipulation: it is witnessed by monoMinimalPairs. A pair of
segmentally identical stems differing only in register (the form
equality of minimal_pairs_same_segments plus the register
contrast of minimal_pairs_register_contrast) is exactly what
functionsContrastively claims for the lexical case
(@cite{lionnet-2025} §3.10).
The register analysis of Drubea/Numèè (@cite{lionnet-2025} §4):
1 underlying primitive (the l feature) and
1 postlexical process (h-epenthesis).
Equations
- Lionnet2025.registerAnalysis = { underlyingPrimitives := 1, postlexicalProcesses := 1 }
Instances For
The competing tonal analysis (@cite{lionnet-2025} §5): 3 representational primitives (underlying L + epenthetic H + epenthetic downstep ⁺) and 2 postlexical processes (OCP-driven downstep insertion + H-spreading for pre-downstep raising).
Additionally, the tonal analysis suffers from a duplication problem (both L and downstep encode the same pitch drop) and a conspiracy problem (raising of H before L and of L before ⁺L are analysed as unrelated despite the same phonetic effect).
Equations
- Lionnet2025.tonalAnalysis = { underlyingPrimitives := 3, postlexicalProcesses := 2 }
Instances For
The register analysis is strictly more parsimonious.
Drubea is the first attested register-only word-prosodic system: tonal contrasts defined entirely syntagmatically, with no paradigmatic tone features (@cite{lionnet-2025} §6.2, Conclusion).
Drubea is +tone under @cite{hyman-2006}'s definition (3): pitch (via register features) enters into the lexical realization of morphemes. The minimal pairs in §1 demonstrate this directly.
Drubea enriches Hyman's typology: it is a tonal system (by def. 3) that is register-based rather than tone-based — a sub-distinction within Hyman's tone prototype that he did not draw.
Drubea is +T, −SA under @cite{hyman-2006}'s 2×2 typology (same quadrant as Yoruba).
Drubea satisfies register culminativity: every stem in the fragment
has at most one l feature. This is IsCulminative from
RegisterTier, applied to all stems in §2.
This is NOT @cite{hyman-2006}'s stress culminativity (def. 5b),
which concerns primary stress per word. Drubea has no stress
accent system — OBLHEAD does not apply. The two uses of
"culminativity" are formally parallel but phonologically distinct
(see Hyman2006.CulminativityDomain).
Numèè shares Drubea's underlying register inventory (registerless vs
downstepped morae, no tone features) but diverges at the
utterance-final boundary. The phenomenon, formalized in
Fragments/Numee/Prosody.lean, has three properties worth pinning
down here: it applies only to light CV finals, only when the
preceding syllable is registerless, and produces a stacked
double downstep when the final is itself underlyingly downstepped
— preserving the registerless/downstepped contrast utterance-finally.
Boundary ⁺% downsteps a registerless light CV final preceded by
a registerless syllable (@cite{lionnet-2025} ex. 24).
An already-downstepped light CV final receives a second downstep
at the boundary — the stacked ⁺⁺ that preserves the underlying
contrast in final position (@cite{lionnet-2025} ex. 25). The minimal
pair nĩ 'coconut' (registerless) vs ⁺nĩ 'breast' (downstepped)
is realised utterance-finally as a one-step vs two-step pitch drop
on the same surface segments.
The boundary distinguishes the minimal pair: niCoconut triggers
single, niBreast triggers double. This is the empirical
signature that the underlying registerless/downstepped contrast
survives the boundary process.
A heavy CVV final blocks the boundary downstep — eligibility requires a light (monomoraic) final (@cite{lionnet-2025} ex. 26).
A downstepped preceding syllable blocks the boundary, even
when the final is light CV and registerless
(@cite{lionnet-2025} ex. 28: ⁺tĩĩ ku 'three yams').
Same blocking pattern with a different downstepped penult and
different light CV final (@cite{lionnet-2025} ex. 29: ⁺paa kwɛ̃
'down sand').
A bare light CV final with no preceding syllable does not trigger the boundary — the rule's structural description requires two syllables.
Numèè syllables inherit the same register inventory as Drubea
morphemes — the per-mora TRN list niBreast carries is
IsCulminative, just like Drubea stems. The boundary process is
postlexical and does not feed culminativity, which is a property
of underlying lexical specifications.