Re: [tied] Demonstratives

I've understood your main idea on the origin of the pronominal *e/*i alternation. Further, this point attracted my attention:

The same rule (deletion of *i before *á-) also explains the feminine forms: > nom. *-á-ih2 > *-á-h2 > acc. *-á-ih2-m > *-á-h2-m > voc. *'-a-ih2 > gen. *-a-íh2-as > dat. *-a-ih2-ái > dat. *-a-íh2-ai > ins. *-a-ih1-át > pl. > nom. *-á-ih2 + átW > *-á-h2-àtW > obl. *-á-ih2- > *-á-h2- + oblique pl. endings,

So, I see, you reconstruct the original marker of feminine gender as *-ih2. I like it very much, because it seems just excellent for external comparison. But why not *-h2 ?

> Yes. And Proto-Altaic *m corresponds to Proto-Nostratic *m, > Proto-Altaic *b corresponds to Proto-Nostratic *b.

> This is what led Sasha Vovin ("Nostratic and Altaic", in: > Salmons/Joseph "Nostratic: Sifting the evidence") to state > that "... the inescapable conclusion is that PA personal > pronouns are unrelated to Indo-European and Uralic personal > pronouns".

PA *b- ~ PU / PFU *w-:

*bo:lo- ~ *wole- "to be"

*biujlu ~ *wire "blood"

*ba3a ~ *wa(n)c'V "early"

*bior'u ~ *wa"De "a young domestic animal (calf, colt)"

*bojl'o ~ *welV- "to learn"

(Note that the correspondences PU *-l- ~ PA *-r-/*-l- and

PU *-D- ~ PA *-r- are regular. So the connection of these

words is quite clear, and they are not incidental similarities

only in the initial sound.)

PA *b- ~ PIE *w-:

*bi:re "wolf" ~ wlkWo- "wolf"

*beta "sea; ford" ~ *wet- "water"

*beje "man, self" ~ *wiHr- "man"

*bedu "thick, large" ~ *weto- "old"

> Vovin is of course right: if the Nostratic pronouns were *mi > and *ti, Altaic *bi and *si must be unrelated.

PA *bi = PIE *we; PA *si = PIE *se > Hitt. zi-k, verbal 2 pp. -s. > However, the pronouns as we must reconstruct them for PIE > are not *mi and *ti, but *mu and *tu. If we derive the > Altaic pronouns from the same base, the problem of the > Altaic 1/2 personal pronouns disappears. The etyma now > become *mu- and *tu- (extended in the sg. with a vowel, > probably *i: *mu-i, *tu-i). We can now state a soundlaw to > the effect that the clusters *mw, *tw (or the labialized > consonants *mW, *tW) give *b and *s in Altaic (*b and *t in > Mongol), except when a nasal (at least *n) follows, when the > result of *mW is *m.

All these soundlaws can be acceptable not earlier then additional examples of their application are found. > The same development *mW > *b can be seen in the > demonstrative (Turk. bu) and the accusative *-ba [both from > (oblique) *mu-a]. It would of course be nice to also have > some additional lexical items with the correspondence > PIE/Ural *m ~ Alt. *b[W], or with Turkic/Tunguz *s ~ Mongol > *t (PA *tW), but it's not essential.

Really, this is essential. There seems to exist no correspondence PIE/PU *m ~ PA *b, and only one possible example of Tur. *s ~ Mong. *t (so"Nu"k "bone" ~ c^imu"gen < *timo"ge "marrow"), and even for the latter Starostin finds alternative etymological connections.

> I have no doubt that the correspondences as

demonstrated

> by the personal pronouns are correct.

It seems to me that this point of the reconstruction is surely incorrect. ============ Vadim Ponaryadov