I'm afraid this will lead to misunderstandings. Richard asked about the
nom.sg., not the acc.pl..
Nom.sg. -ìs, -ùs are limited to mobile paradigms and must be
analogical: All nom.sg. forms are end-stressed in mobile paradigms, except
those of o-stems; and if -as lost it accent by a late "Nieminen's Law"
they may even all have final accent at one point. There are no non-acute
immobile i-stems, but the u-type has tur~gus in accent class 2.
Acc.pl. -ìs, -ùs with non-acutes do indeed act like they were acute
themselves, since they attract the accent. This can hardly be phonetically
regular from IE *-ins, *-uns, but it may well be analogical on the endings
-ùs (-úos-ius) and -às (-áNs-ias) of o/a:-stems. Of the latter two, the
masc. is inherited from IE *-o:ns which had a long vowel (Sanskrit -a:n),
while the fem. has been restored as "*-a:ns" to replace something like
*-a:s (Skt. -a:s, Goth. -os). The analogical forms may well have had the
shape *-i:ns, *-u:ns at one time.
The working of Saussure's Law is quite shallow, but not absolutely
automatic on the surface, cf. esp. the plural cases dat. ran~koms, ins.
ran~komis, loc. ran~kose. These must have been formed in opposition to the
endstressed forms of the mobile type, z^iemóms (older -omùs), z^iemomìs,
z^iemosè. The same goes for the duals you quote: D&I ran~kom as
opposed to D z^iemóm, I z^iemo~m. The ultimate basis of the tonal
difference between the last two is the pattern set by the same cases of
the o-stem plural, D vaikáms, I vaikai~s (cf. also dual D vaikám, I
vaikam~, copying the tones of the plural).
Jens
On Mon, 7 Oct 2002, Sergejus Tarasovas wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Richard Wordingham [mailto:richard.wordingham@...]
> Sent: 2002 m. spalio 7 d. 11:04
> To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: [tied] Re: Lith. Acc.pl.
>
>
> >> How do you deduce that the nominative singular (-ìs, -ùs) is
> acute? My understanding is that acute and circumflex are only
> distinguished in stressed long vowels and diphthongs, and so in
> themselves these forms reveal nothing. Moreover, PIE -is, -us should
> have yielded circumflex, not acute.
>
> These -ìs, -ùs are historical *-í:s and *-ó:s, contracted by Leskien
> rule.
>
> >>I have notes that say that Saussure's law applies synchronically. Is
> this wrong? I certainly can't reconcile it with the dative dual and
> plural endings (o-stems -ám, áms and a:-stems óm, óms) where rãtas
> forms rãtam, rãtams, not *ratám, *ratáms, and similarly
> rankà forms ran~kom, ran~koms.
>
> I'm not sure about dual (dual forms has disappeared from Lithuanian
> toward the middle of this century except some pronouns, so didn't bother
> to find out :), but I'll do that in some hours if nobody outruns me),
> but -áms and -óms are historical -ãmus and -õmus (the forms are
> registered in Old LIthuanian texts), with normal contractional metatony.
>
> Sergei
>
>
>