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ESSAY IV
337
314. In the languages of the Philippine type some WB's accentuate the penultimate and others the final, without there being any rules on the subject. We can form no idea why Bontok says piló, “seven”, but wálo, “eight”, the more so as there is no certain etymological explanation of these words.
315. Unusual modes of accentuation: accentuation of the antepenultimate results from the addition of a supporting vowel in all languages that add it. Hence Hova ánaka, “child” < Original IN anak, Makassar nipisiq, “thin” < Original IN nipis.
Equal accentuation of both syllables of the WB is found in some languages in onomatopoeic formations, as in Toba búmbám, “to beat”.
Accentuation of Derivatives from the Word-Base.
316. When a disyllabic — or polysyllabic — WB is extended by means of prefixes, the accentuation is not affected thereby; Bugis pésĕq, “to feel”, and papésĕq, “feeling”, are accentuated alike.
317. When suffixes are added, we observe the following phenomena :
I. In languages of the penultimate type the accent is shifted, so that it always falls again upon the penultimate. From the Bugis tiwiq, “to bring” < Primitive Bug. tiwir, are derived: tiwiri, “to bring to somebody” , and patiwiriyaṅ, “to give something to somebody to take with him and bring it”. Only a few languages of the penultimate type fail to shift the accent, e.g. Gayo, which accordingly accentuates kĕbáyakan, “riches” < bdyak, “rich”.
II. The other types also shift the accent, hence Toba isian, “vessel” < isi, “contents”. But alongside of this they also possess suffixes which attract the accent to themselves. In Toba the suffix -an of the comparative takes the accent, thus: biroṅán, “blacker”, from biroṅ, “black”, as. against the above-cited isian.
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