Gonda [1940: 20If], in analyzing Malay/Indonesian onomatopoeic and sound-symbolic words with the iterative infixes — er- and — el-, proposes comparison of the latter with English and Dutch formations in, respectively, — er, — le and — eren, — elen.

Ever cautious with regard to the idea of onomatopoeia and sound symbolism, Gonda nevertheless arrives at the conclusion that the Malay/Indonesian — er-, -el- infixes are not grammatical morphemes — they are concomitant to imitating sound or movement, and their source (or at least one of their sources) may be a significant number of iconic words [ibid.].

In Sundanese, RL-formatives are an expression of the category of plurality — for verbs, adjectives, and sometimes nouns: dink «to sit (sg.)» — dariuk «to sit (pi.)», bodo «foolish (sg.)» — barodo «foolish (pi.)», budak «child» — barudak «children».

As I showed earlier, mostly for English, r in the onomotapoeic root is always (no exceptions) iconic, fulfilling onomatopoeic function of rendering «pure dissonance» — vibrating, intermittent sound, i. e. a series of rapid pulses Voronin [1969:1, 394]. A special series of studies on Indonesian onomatopes [Voronin, Bratoes 1976; Bratoes 1976; Bratoes, Voronin 1980] demonstrated i. a. that the same is true for r in the Indonesian root: see the CandPhil by Bratoes [1976: 5] written under my supervision. Data Voronin [1982: 115–118] based i. a. on RL-verb semantics as given in Bratoes [1976], point to the fact that in more than one third of the instances the R-formative fulfils only the above-mentioned one function. E. g. ker(e)tap «report (of a gun), explosion»: one complex sound («vibrant pulse») — the infixal r's function is onomatopoeic, the same function of rendering pure dissonance as that of the root r in e. g. ar «creak; trampling».

In a great number of cases we have the infixal r fulfilling the sound-symbolic function of simple repetition:

Broadening the perspective, it was expedient to gauge the RL situation in some language typologically different from English and Indonesian. Closely linked to a series of typological studies (e. g. [Voronin, Lapkina 1977; Lapkina, Voronin 1979; cf. Voronin, Lapkina 1989]), was the CandPhil by Lapkina [1979], a postgraduate of mine, discussing onomatopoes in Bashkir (as compared to English). As in other Turkic languages, R-formations are a significant part of Bashkir onomatopoeic vocabulary. Usually the R-formative is seen in Turkology as conveying plurality, iteration, intensity (e. g. [Asmarin 1928; Xaritonov 1954; Sevortian 1962; Xudajkuliev 1962; Ismuxametov 1970; Serebrennikov 1977]), thus imparting to the onomatope only a subsidiary, quantitative characteristic (not unlike the formative in English). Phonosemantic analysis, however, shows that, at least for Bashkir, this sound-symbolic function of r in the formative largely makes way for the qualitative onomatopoeic function of rendering pure dissonance. Consider thus supyr «(dial.) to bubble» denoting essentially an iteration of the instant sound of a stone going plop into the water, the latter rendered by the onomatope sup: the r's function is sound-symbolic; as opposed to this consider typyr in the sense «the rattling sound of machine-gun fire»: the r's function is onomatopoeic (like in tur «vibrant sound», with r part of the root).

Studies in a number of Germanic (English, German, Dutch), Turkic (Bashkir, Kirghiz, Chuvash) languages, as well as Malay/Indonesian, and Samoyed (Selkup) languages demonstrate that these formatives comprise a phonosemantically valid part of iconic word.

The evolution of RL is related to the process of denaturalization (the erosion of iconisity) in RL-formatives. This is best seen in r (the phonosemantically more powerful of the two sonants), discussed in the present paper. In root onomatopoeia, r is an important qualitative feature of the referent; it comes forth as the constituting element of an entire class of onomatopes («frequentatives»), first elicited in Voronin [1969]. It is the qualitative idiosyncrasy/exclusiveness of r that encompasses the very possibility of its development towards an element of nothing more than a quantitative characteristic of the referent: «dissonance, vibration, roughness, staccato nature, intermittence' — „iteration, plurality, prolongation, intensity“. And this possibility is widely used by the most diverse languages. The quantitativeness of the iterative R-affix germinates from the qualitativeness of the r-element in the phonetic structure of the onomatopoeic root word. What happens is the transformation of r from concrete qualitative characteristic of the referent, its „downgrading“ to an abstract quantitative characteristic (a de-qualification of r» s semantics, together with its quantification).

Thus, studies in a typological multeityoflanguages — i.a. Indo-European (notably English, also Tajik), Uralic (Selkup), Turkic (notably Turkish, Chuvash, Bashkir, Yakut), Mongolian (Buryat), Tun-gus-Manchu (Nanaian), Malay/Indonesian (discussed at some length in this paper) — warrant the conclusionthat RL-formatives, in origin part of a simple disyllabic iconoc root word, comprise a potent iconic frequentaliain the sphere of expressing verbal plurality(multiplicativity). A detailed phonosemantic typologyof RL-formativesis on the agenda.

I now conclude. Typologists have an impressive record of penetrating research in phonetic, semantic, functional-semantic, functional-grammatical typology. I suggest that they no longer turn a blind eye to cross-linguistic grammatical iconicity and phonosemantic typology. Mainstream linguistics will then — I warrant this — encounter a world hitherto unseen — a vast and mysterious world waiting to be unravelled.

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