Re: [tied] Bader's article on *-os(y)o

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, enlil@... wrote:

> Jens:
> > Of corse they are different: the nom.pl. ending *-es is that of
> > athematic paradigms, so why would that contain the thematic

vowel?

>
> Ironic considering that you argue for a thematic vowel *i in an
> athematic feminine, eh? Oh, perhaps that was another wrong tree
> to bark up :P

The tree is fine, but *-iH2 is also thematic (in deví: and quite
generally in vrddhi derivatives where it is PIE according to
Wackernagel-Debrunner). The use of *-iH2 in the feminine of
athematics looks most of all like a desambiguation of collective *-
H2 and feminine sg., based on such forms.

That cannot be assumed for nom.pl. *-es which is never used with
thematic stems.

>
> > We were talking about the *-e-s of the 2sg of verbs which is

*only*

> > found with thematic stems and therefore must contain the thematic
> > vowel. That makes nom.sg. *-os and 2sg *-es a minimal pair,
>
> No it doesn't.

It does synchronically - still that could perhaps be doubted in a
further diachronic perspective, if that is brought up now.

> But granted the solution is subtle so I wouldn't
> blame you for not seeing it. The fact is that *-es alternates with
> *-esi with non-final *s. Analogy preserved *e by keeping voiceless
> *s throughout the 2ps. The same devoicing must have occurred in the
> 3ps since *-et again alternates with *-eti and since inanimate *-d
> lacks a medial counterpart, thereby keeping its voicing.

That is only possible if it is *assumed* that the ending of the
neuter sg. nom.-acc. was not *-d already, but only became *-d by
change of an older *-t. At best, nothing is known about that; if
some of the evidence is pertinent it was //d//, cf. Ved. idám, Lat.
idem, Goth. ita. If 2sg *-s and 2pl *-te are related in a way
parallel to 1sg *-m and 1pl *-me, the 2sg *-s specifically reflects
a word-final development. That would now be expected to lead to *-z
and take a thematic form *-o-z, primary *-e-t-i, which could be
levelled to *-o-s, *-o-s-i or *-e-t, *-e-t-i according to your
principle of a ban on different vowel or different consonant in the
primary and secondary forms of otherwise identical forms. None of
this happened, so *-e-s, *-e-s-i never had a voiced consonant.

Think about it yourself for once: If original *-V-t became *-e-t
before the change of *-t to *-s, and the presumed voicing of the
resulting *-e-s to *-e-z was later still (and the devoicing back to
*-e-s even later), then the presumed voicing in *tV-t could not lead
to *to-d, but would become *te-s (> *te-z > *te-s). Alternatively,
if the "t" of the ending did not assibilate (because there were two
different t's and that option is better liked than the asumption of
two different s's), the form *tV-t would give *te-t, then *te-d,
whence *te-t. What we find looks quite a bit more like *tod. So that
is also wrong.

There remains: 2sg *-e-s : *-e-s-i; nom.sg. *-o-z > *-o-s; ntr.sg.
*to-d; 3sg *-e-t : *-e-t-i. On a more abstract level, i.e. in an
earlier stage, the 2sg *-s has arisen out of a word-final *-t, while
the 3sg *-t has arisen out of something else, apparently something
containing a nasal feature (a prenasalized /Nd/?).

> Just to nail
> the point, the *m in the 1ps is always voiced no matter what and is
> therefore the place where we happen to find our expected *o.

That doesn't nail anything.

> So, you're wrong. The 2ps derives from *-&s/*-&si [-&z/-&si], the
> plural from *-es [-ez] and the genitive athematic singular from *-

as

> [-az]. All can be explained with a single phoneme *s with a z-

allophone.

Sure, but they can all also be explained with a single phoneme *s
*without* any assumption of final voicing. Therefore, they do not
point to any such thing. What happened to the quest for simplicity
here? This is getting funnier all the time.

> > Even under that theory, a putative dose of length imparted on the
> > vowel of nom.sg. *-o-s, but not on the vowel of 2sg *-e-s must

reflect

> > a difference between two different sources of the *-s.
>
> Nope. Look above. Think it over. Come back to me.
>
>
> >> You continue to insist to us that it is necessary. Yet, the
> >> unanswered question persists: "Why?" Why must **z be anything

other

> >> than an allophone of *s.
> >
> > Why? Because the subject is the one we're talking about. In two
> > thematic inflections, both alternating -e-/-o- in dependency of

+/-

> > voice in the following segment, we have both *-o-s and *-e-s.

That

> > is not compromised by reference to an athematic nominative which

has

> > only *-es.
>
> As per above, this is an inadequate reason. So again, why?

Ditto, ditto adequate ditto. That's why.

Jens