Ed states:
>/up-/ is glossed by Stoltenberg as "offering". It can also
>be found as /uph-/ and /uf-/, and maybe, /vap-/. I don't
>relate it immediately to /alpan/, although there may
>ultimately be a connection which I explore below.
There is also /ulpaia/, a type of jug, which might be the missing
link.
>The /-ku/ may be some sort of deverbal related to the Etr. factitive affix
>/-xu-/ rather than the past tense /-ce/, which usually appears in Raetic as
>/-ke/.
I'll ponder on that.
>My supposition is that the word is an adjective */(a)paniun(a)/ qualifying
>/upiku/.
I thought you were assocating /upiku/ with a verb "to give". You
mean an _adverb_? This isn't making sense. What's your suggested
translation of this phrase then?
>BTW I think your suggestion: [...]is really interesting. I've been
>wondering about this strange aphaeretic/prothetic /a-/ (and /e-/ too?) that
>keeps coming and going. This feature may be of relevance relating to /pan-/
>etc.
And /e-/ too? As in what terms? In Etruscan?
>Most of my suggested glosses for the words in these two
>inscriptions have been made before in some form by
>somebody or other. But there's no truly knowing about it
>whoever says it.
Alright, I'll accept that.
>>However, I do admit that there may have been an
>>"agentive" usage of the genitive case
>
>At last!!! You're on a slippery slope to ergative now.
There's a difference between these two statements:
a) the genitive had an agentive usage
b) the genitive was once an ergative case
I'm stating a) *only*. I do not, and will not, claim b). In
Mandarin, /bei/ is used as an ergative marker as in /ta bei wo da/
"He was hit by me" or literally "He give me hit". This hardly means,
however, that /bei/ was once an ergative marker or that Chinese
once had an ergative case. The word /bei/ is the verb "to
give" and only secondarily used here for the purpose of marking the
agent.
This is the same with IndoTyrrhenian languages. The genitive may
have been used as an agentive but the *main* function of the ending
was clearly for conveying "of" or "from". It does not derive from
an earlier ergative case. The accusative *-m is more likely to be
derived from an early ergative case and the lack of the ending in
inanimate noun stems relates to the probability that once upon a
time an inanimate noun could never be the agent of an action. But
then, that rule just makes logical sense, doesn't it?
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