[tied] Re: Convergence in the formatin of IE subgroups

>
> I wrote this in Nostratic-L. Perhaps it bears repeating here:
>
> Words for "dog" of the type *kWVn/r- etc are found all over the
> place, in the most diverse language families. According to recent
> research, dogs were domesticated 14,000 years ago. If we assume

that

> the word travelled with the article, we have an example of a
> recoverable root which is 14,000 years old, which is much older

that

> the usually assumed age of recoverability, approx. 4-5000 years

(PIE)

> or 6-10,000 years (Nostratic).
>
>
>
> cf

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2498669.stm<http://news.bbc.co.uk/
1/hi/sci/tech/2498669.stm>

>
> Now if 14,000 year old roots are recoverable that easy, it means

that

> roots that are more difficult than that to recover are 14,000+

years

> old. That means ice age, and hunter-gatherer bands. Now if it is
> true, as it seems, that (almost) all the major language families

of

> the world have become major because their ur-ancestor community
> adopted farming, the prospect is bleak that something like

Nostratic

> should be recoverable; the possible time depth is too great, and

I

> can't see a common technology for them that would have made them
> multiply, as happened with agriculture. Which means 'Nostratic'

might

> be a mirage, created in our minds by post-farming loanwords (of

which

> the "dog" word is one).
>
> This is rather loose; any objections?
>
>
>
> Torsten
>
> ***
> Patrick:
>
> What possible connection do dogs have with farming???

What possible connection between them do you believe I have
postulated?

But you're right of course, that the set of roots reconstructible as
Nostratic in principle would be technical terms of the first
agricultural revolution. One such root that I'm trying to get the
energy to look into is *kW-r- (> *k-r-, *g-r-, *b-l-, *w-r-
etc) "(pair of) horns" > "enclosure, round, wheel". The "dog" word
must be an earlier loan, as you point out.

> What my work suggests to me is that "dogs" were an important part
>of our _earliest_ ancestors' lives. And built into the earliest
>language is a clear distinction between "wolves" (FHA; Nostratic
>*wa:-), and "predators" in general; and "dogs" (KHE; Nostratic *k^A-

).

>
> The word Torsten cites for "dog" is _obviously_ not very early!

That's not obvious to me.

>"*kWVn/r-" (where in Heaven's name does the -*/r come from???;

Finnish koira, Estonian koer.

> and why *W rather than *w???).

Latin canis. I'd rather believe *kW- > *k- than *kw- > *k-.
Pulleyblank reconstructs Old Chinese *kÜ- in his attempt to link
Chinese and IE (but also *kÜw- I think it was).

>The root on which it is based is obviously **k^eH- (Nostratic **k^A?-

), 'to be a dog" + *-w, 'to wag the tail like a dog' (PIE *k^eHw-) +
*n(A), 'a (tail-)wagger' >(*k^won-).

That's not obvious to me.
I was wondering by what kind of principle you have joined the two
roots?




Torsten