affricates

If it were vowel height/closedness that caused the affrication, then the affricates would be the same.

Concern trolls and the Etruscan bilabial 'f' 2009

Then you'll be hard-pressed to explain the source of Japanese affricates, ts and z then.

Linear A treatment of consonant clusters 2009

As for the presence of affricates, the rare eteocretan texts indeed suggest their presence as well.

A new value for Minoan 'd' 2009

If related to Etrusco-Lemnian languages, I'd expect Minoan would have a possible, hidden aspiration contrast in stops as well as some affricates if the Linear A d-series is related to common Etrusco-Lemnian affricate *z.

A new value for Minoan 'd' 2009

Then you'll be hard-pressed to explain the source of Japanese affricates, ts and z then.

Linear A treatment of consonant clusters 2009

Try imagining a situation where a para-IE dialect *beside* Mid IE the direct ancestor of PIE c.5500 BCE, let's say diverges already before PIE proper develops and it has become influenced by northerly Proto-Uralic to form palatal affricates.

The PIE and Pre-PIE pronominal system from the perspective of a wave model 2009

A sensible compromise is obvious: TO and TU might be automatically lenited in similar fashion to the development of Japanese dental affricates from their respective plosives neighbouring a +back vowel.

Linear A treatment of consonant clusters 2009

However, palatal velar stops are unstable and quickly turn to affricates, so it wouldn't have been long before *ć and *k were heard throughout Satem IE as became the norm in later Indo-Iranian.

Archive 2007-10-01 2007

I say “modern” because both “Peking” and “Nanking” reflect an earlier state of Mandarin in which velar stops before front vowels had not yet merged with affricates; this sound change happened around the 16th century.

Beijing vs Peking | Linguism 2007

However, palatal velar stops are unstable and quickly turn to affricates, so it wouldn't have been long before *ć and *k were heard throughout Satem IE as became the norm in later Indo-Iranian.

Reinterpreting the Proto-Indo-European velar series 2007