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ESSAY IV
341
the same loudness but the penultimate one sounds somewhat longer or more extended and thus has the accent” (Van der Toorn). — “When pronounced alone, in fact simply mentioned, all Achinese words are sounded so that both syllables have an equal stress, but the second syllable is pronounced in the higher tone” (Snouck Hurgronje).
The Unaccentuated Syllables.
329. It appears from § 328, that so far as the loudness of the tone is concerned the unaccentuated syllables do not differ very considerably from the accentuated. At the same time the syllable preceding the accentuated one is somewhat weaker than the one following the accentuated syllable. On this fact are based all sorts of phenomena that we have noticed in the preceding parts of this monograph, e.g. that the syllable after the accentuated one is pronounced long in several languages, and that it is capable of becoming a diphthong. On the other hand, length is of very rare occurrence in syllables preceding the accentuated one, and diphthongization is still rarer. Ampana sounds the syllables before the accentuated one so softly, “that it is only when a person speaks slowly, that one can hear what vowel they have” (Adriani). In several languages a syllable preceding the accentuated one may lose its vowel: in Dayak they say blaku as well as balaku, “to ask”. Loss of a vowel following after the accentuated syllable is very rare; it is found in Makianese, which has lim, “five” < Original IN lima.
Original Indonesian Accentuation.
330. In former monographs I assumed that the determinate system of accentuation, and in particular the penultimate type, was the modern representative of the Original IN law of accentuation. Since then, doubts have arisen in my mind. In IE there are languages with determinate, and others with free, accentuation, and Original IE is credited with the free system, the IE languages with the determinate accent
