On the origin and development of the Albanian demonstratives

Albanian has a two-term demonstrative system, with proximal masculine ky and feminine kjo ‘this’ contrasting with distal masculine ai and feminine ajo ‘that’. The distal pronouns double as personal pronouns of the third person. Both demonstratives arose from the composition of two deictic elements. The second element (with nominative singular masculine - i / -y , feminine - jo , and neuter -ta ) is the same for both pronouns and probably continues the PIE demonstrative * se/o -, * te/o -, although some etymological details are not clear yet. The origin of the first elements k(ë) - resp. a - is also disputed. In this article I will first briefly sketch the morphology of the two demonstrative pronouns in Old Albanian and then proceed to a re-evaluation of the etymological scenarios that may explain the rise and grammaticalization of ky and ai .