A Grammar of Tamashek (Tuareg of Mali)

4.1 Noun morphology 215

Here, all Sg stems have a short V in the first stem syllable. (188.a-d) have
a full V in the second stem syllable, while (188.e-k) have a short V in the
second stem syllable. In the masculine Sg forms, and in both masculine and
feminine plurals, we observe lexical penultimate accent. The bulk of stems
with this unsuffixed <o α» PI have a medial CC cluster (188.a-c, e-i), though a
handful have just a single C in this position (188.d, j -k). The stem may also
have an initial CC cluster (188.C, i-j). Clusters have no effect on accent or
ablaut vocalism. Several Sg stems (188.g, i) end in i, which behaves like hyL
so the ablaut PI ends in ...ay.

The cases in (188.k) are exceptions to Syncope. 'Direction' is not really
exceptional, since the only unsyncopated forms are from A-grm, which
generally fails to syncopate. However, 'finger' is an authentic exception in R,
K, and Τ dialects, but the Im dialect variant s-ssakad with geminate ss
suggests a possible historical reason why Syncope does not apply to this stem,
since Syncope is incompatible with a CC cluster on either side of the targeted
schwa, as seen in s-zzami 'strip of hide' (188.j). Foucauld (DTF 4.1813)
likewise gives "esseked" (presumably assakad) for the Adrar (i.e. K-f) dialect,
though Tuareg varieties of Algeria and Niger have a distinct word for 'finger'
(root Vdd)
We now turn to cases where the Sg is V-final as in (187) but has a short V
in the first stem syllable (189).

(189) Unsuffixed Plural Ablaut (V-Final Bisyllabic noun, <o α» Sequence)

singular plural gloss

a. V-final, first Sg stem vowel short. :, masculine, unaccented

α-fesko l-faska

ά-s-aevmo "i-s-arma

ά-s-aekto Vs-akta

ά-s-aelso l-s-alsa

a-s-aenso l-s-ansa

ά-saerko l-s-arka

a-s-askso Ί-s-aksa

ά-saenjo l-sanja

e-sseyhe l-sayha

'early hot season'

'dye'

'remembrance'

'garment'

'tomb'

'Bozo man'

'fodder'

'enemy'

'fonio

b. V-final, first Sg stem vowel short, masculine, Sg with no prefix

s-aento Vs-anta 'beginning'

[also s-Eento-taen]

c. like (b) but Sg with final accent

zaerto l-zsrta 'ladle'