ABSTRACT
All Kiranti languages have a stop series p, t, k and the affricate ts (written < c >, if it cannot be split up into t + s). NW languages have a regular voiced vs voiceless opposition. Eastern languages have at most a handful of lexemes with initial voiced stops, but in intervocalic and
postnasal position voicing takes place: Athpare yep-yuk ‘he will stand up’, yeb-e ‘he stood up’. All languages have an opposition between aspirated and nonaspirated stops. Some have breathy voiced stops, with breathiness sometimes optional: Thulung jham ‘possible’, jam ‘cooked rice’, but joomu ~ jhoomu ‘plough’. Camling seems to be the only language in the documented set that has phonemic breathy voice with nasals and laterals, e.g. lhamma ‘catch’, lamma ‘look for’, lammha ‘dump’. The only fricative is s. Some northern languages have a tonal contrast, which could be related to (loss of) voiceless finals, cf. Thulung loaana ‘you see it’ vs lóaana (< *loak-/t/-na see-PT-2s) ‘you saw it’.
