Middle High German [rs] [r] as height dissimilation

Abstract The contrast between Middle High German (MHG) [s] and [] was consistently neutralized to the latter sound after [r] in many modern German dialects, e.g., MHG kirse > New High German Kirsche ‘cherry’. It will be argued that this sound change was a dissimilation of the distinctive feature [high] and that this dissimilation was triggered by an independently motivated OCP constraint banning adjacent consonants with the same value of [high]. Alternative analyses in which the shift from [rs] to [r] is analyzed as a dissimilation of some other feature or as the assimilation of some proper... Mehr ...