ABSTRACT
The Indo-European consonant clusters bt, gt, gs, dt occur in Proto-Germanic not-as to be expected from the Germanic sound shift ( Grimm’s law)—as pt, kt, ks, tt, but rather as [ft, χt, χs, s(s)]. Therefore, it may be assumed that in Indo-European the stemfinal voiced stops assimilated ( assimilation) to the voiceless stops of the following syllable, cf. e.g. Lat. scrībere: scrīptum; regere: rēctus. In the Germanic sound shift these voiceless stops regularly turned into their corresponding voiceless fricatives, cf. IE *skabt-, *reĝ-tos: Proto-Gmc *skaft *reχt; in the case of dt and tt there was an additional assimilatory fricativization of the stops, cf. IE *sedtos>Lat. (ob)sessus: Proto-Gmc *sedstos>*sestos>*sessos.
