Re: [tied] Austronesian d/l/n/r

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 16114
Date: 2002-10-09

 
----- Original Message -----
From: Richard Wordingham
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, October 09, 2002 6:13 PM
Subject: [tied] Austronesian d/l/n/r

> The reflexes of 'telu' often suggest an ancestral form like *tetelu, but that is the
greatest of the irregularities...
 
Not even an irregularity:
 
"This pattern [Ca-reduplication] was first recognized with the numbers, where *esa 'one', *duSa 'two', *telu 'three', *Sepat 'four', *lima 'five', and the like are matched by a corresponding set of numbers *a-esa, *da-duSa, *ta-telu, *Sa-Sepat, *la-lima. The unreduplicated set was used in serial counting or in counting nonhuman objects, and the reduplicated set in counting human beings. In some daughter languages (such as Tagalog) elements from both sets have survived and have been combined into a single set." [R. Blust]
 
Piotr