Proto-Tibetic *mbras ‘1grain; 2rice’
Abstract
Abstract This article proposes a new historical subgrouping of Old Tibetan dialects. It demonstrates that Tibetan dialects started to differentiate in late pre-historical times, shortly before the script introduction. The emergence of the first dialects is shown to have resulted from the military expansion of the Tibetan Empire. The reconstruction of the dialect formation supplements earlier insights by studying modern equivalents of Old Literary Tibetan ɣbras , the Proto-Tibetic form of which has been reconstructed as *mbras. In addition, comparing its cognates in other presumably closely related languages permitted the reconstruction of *mras to Proto-Bodic and, tentatively, *mrats to Proto-Trans-Himalayan.
Fields of Study & Subjects
Linguistics and language evolution
Indian and Buddhist Studies
Turkic and Altaic Linguistics
Publication details
- Journal / source
- Language and Linguistics 語言暨語言學
- Volume
- 27
- Issue
- 2
- Pages
- 175–227
- Publication date
- 26 February 2026
- Language
- EN