Re: [tied] PIE suffix *-ro - 'similar-with'

On 2006-01-06 13:16, Jens Elmegård Rasmussen wrote:

>>Actually, stems
>>like *wed-r/n-, *pet-r/n-, etc., may themselves be substantivised old
>>neuter participles (like **pet-nt 'flying, that which flies' -->
>>'feather, wing')
>
>
> That is really ingenious.

Thanks. As you see, I'm trying to make sense of adjective-forming *-ro-
by incorporating it into Olsen's analysis of *-nt- formations less
hesitantly than she does herself. I can't see how else this could be
achieved if not by accepting *-r as a very old allomorph of *-nt also in
participles. If so, some fossilised remnants of such a formation should
be lurking somewhere in the IE lexicon, and the *-r-/*-n- heteroclita
seem to be the most obvious candidates.

> Functionally, one may wonder if the
> connection is even deeper: If re:x and regens mean pretty much the
> same, it is perhaps rather the "individualizing" function of the n(t)-
> suffix that may here be extended to include also the r-allomorph. From
> collectives, the suffix denotes a single particular manifestation,
> sometimes directly a singulative; and from animates it denotes the
> particular one which the speaker has in mind. It seems to come close
> to a definite article.

Well, I can only agree; cf. the use of weak adjectives with
demonstrative pronouns (and in other "definite" contexts) in Germanic.

Piotr