Re: [tied] Lemnian New Yorkers and Tyrrhenian *p->*f

On Fri, 12 Jan 2001 07:14:27 , "Glen Gordon"
<glengordon01@...> wrote:

>Joy of joys! I hadn't come across this until I specifically checked some
>things out but apparently there is a Lemnian /nafoth/ "nephew" equivalent to
>Etruscan /nefts'/! You see, if both Lemnian and Etruscan BOTH have the
>"nephew/grandson" word, it becomes harder to dismiss Etruscan as just a
>Latin borrowing. Afterall, Latin /nepo:s/ isn't even phonetically
>reconcilable with /nefts'/ anyway! How joyous to my theory that PIE *p =
>PTyr *f (bilabial fricative)! Happy, happy, joy, joy. Tralalalalei!

I'm sorry, but the Lemnian word is <naphoth>. The sign for <f> does
not occur on the Lemnian stele, so we have no evidence if /f/ was in
Lemnian or not (it's relatively rare in Etruscan as well).

As long as the stele hasn't been deciphered, relating <naphoth> to
Etr. <nefts'> or PIE *nepot- is nothing more than a conjecture, even
if a plausible one.

>So, I'll reconstruct with pride Tyrrhenian *nefotta (the expected, perfectly
>regular reflex of IE *nepo:t as of late). Of course, Tyrrhenian *nefotta and
>MidIE *nepat:a (IE *nepo:t) should derive from IndoTyrrhenian *nep-at:a,
>another compound showing the bizarre reverse order ("child-father" ->
>father's child)

Naah, PIE *nepot- is *ne-pot- (cf. Lat. infans, Grk. ne:pios, OIr.
no:idiu).


=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...