Re: [tied] Perfect of verb starting with vowel

The problem is that Attic reduplication is only found in Greek. If any pattern recurs in more than one branches, it's the long-vowelled perfect *e:d- (Lat. e:di:, OE ae:t). Perhaps the long vocalism arose first in plural forms like *h1e-h1d-mé > *e:dmé and spread into the mechanically expected singular *h1e-h1ód-, where normal contraction would probably have yielded (unattested) *o:d- < *e-ód-. We also have "comparative IE" *a:g^- for predicted sg. *h2e-h2óg^-, pl. *h2e-h2g^-' (which should have developed into *a-óg^- : *a:g^-). It seems that perfect formation for such roots was a messy affair from very early on.

Piotr

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Sent: Thursday, April 19, 2001 3:43 PM

Subject: [tied] Re: wolf and lamb :: perfect of verb starting with vowel

Greek perfects such as ele:lutha (I have gone) from e:luthon (I went), elthei^n (to go (momentary)), give me the impression that: - If a PIE word seems to start with a vowel, it actually started with H1 (= glottal stop), as in German and Arabic. - Perfect reduplication was by duplicating the first consonant and e. - Past tense augment was by prefixing {!e-} - But if the verb started with H1, reduplication and augment were the same, so in that case to distinguish they reduplicated the next consonant also: root !ludh, perfect !le!ludh2e = "I have gone". (Greek later extended this process by analogy to verbs which started with a vowel where the original initial consonant was H2 or H3.) For {!ed-} = "eat", I would guess {!ede!ed-} or similar, changing to {ede:d-}. I seem to remember Greek {ede:edoka} = "I have eaten".