Re: A SinoTibetan-Vasconic Comparison: A very, very, very, very len

From: Guillaume JACQUES
Message: 1381
Date: 2000-02-04

Merry chinese New Year to everybody.

Because I have to spend some time outside Paris, you have till Monday
to answer the poll.

> Yes, understood. However, I'm wondering, was there aspiration
contrast at
> all either? The correspondance *pingu > *bnga is nagging me. It makes
me
> feel that even */p[h]/- and */p/- were the same in ST.

Well, I don't have yet any precise idea of the consonnantal system of
proto-tibetan, let alone TB or ST...
>

> Ah yes, and *cir(tLi)k?u & *r-tLik?u "squirrel/weasel/mouse" (Basque
sagu
> "mouse", Burushaski c^arge "squirrel", NEC:Ingush surtq?a "weasel",
> Nostr:Kartvel:Georgian cirq?wi) which according to my not-so-perfect
notes
> is to be found in ST with a tentative reconstruction of *k-r-Lei
"squirrel"
> from a book I have no reference for...sigh.

The only word I can think of is syoX < b/lha? I think, which is used in
the modern mandarin compound song4shu3 "squirrel". This lh- is
reconstruted by some people (like Starostin) as sl-, but it is wrong
for several good reasons. This word means "rodent" in general, not
especially squirrel.
In tibetan, the word for "weasel" is sre-mo. It should be unrelated to
the chinese word according to my reconstruction, although I suspect the
form that you cite to be an unconsistent mix of unrelated word in
different languages as "tibeto-birmanists", especially in USA, are used
to do.
>
> Ah good, there it is. Maybe *-r is becoming -X, hmm. Don't have many
> examples of *-r final roots in DC yet. Perhaps I was somewhat right
in my
> guess of *nla, but more like *nlyax perhaps?

No, -r becomes -n. Want the demonstration ?
>
> Does Kachin have a prefix /ma-/ in its word for "eye"? Both *m-hutL
and
> *m-lir are under the *m-class and both are disyllabic words
contracted to a
> monosyllabic word in ST. They should undergo the same treatment in
Kachin.
> If one has a "prefix", the other should too.

Kachin has myi, which can come from mli or myi.
Oh, by the way, Ngari dialect has Xnyi < gmyi for eye. Don't know what
that means.
>
> Tibetan because I know of Cantonese /meng/. At any rate, it would
seem more
Cant. is logically predictibe from MC.


> But AC tet or tsyet? If tet, I would say that this is a problem.
It is indeed.