Re: [tied] Alternance a-u in Romanian [...]

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Sergejus Tarasovas" wrote:

>>>>> as I know the
>>>>> alternace a-a a-u is present also in Lithuanian, but I haven't
>>>>> enough knoledge on this
>
>>> "I don't follow. Could you elaborate on that or give an example?"
>>
>> I can give you some examples:
>>
>> I. From Pokorny root a:p-2 we have:
>> Rom. apa 'water'
>> Lit. ùpė, Lett. upe `water, river, river stream'

[...]

>> So Rom. apa - Lit. ùpė
>
> Thank you. I cannot comment on the other examples -- asking for
> examples I meant Lithuanian only.
> East Baltic *upe: (Lith. ùpe:, Latv. upe) indeed looks aberrant
> (if one wants to derive it from PIE *h2ap- 'water'), but whatever
> be its origin, it's not what one would readily call "alternace
> a-a a-u in Lithuanian", wouldn't he? Just an isolated word of
> unknown history.

Well, actually that's not an alternation in any language one would
like to consider. At least according to usual definition of what an
alternation is in linguistics: "The variation of the phonetic form
of a morpheme such that each of the alternants appears under certain
conditions" (of course, in a given language).
BTW, all Romanian examples given are fallacious (etymologically).

Cheers,
Marius Iacomi