----- Original Message -----From: tgpedersenSent: Monday, September 11, 2006 9:57 AMSubject: [tied] -s- and verbs<snip>
Back to linguistics:
This means that a suffix that changes a stative or durative
verb to make it denote something punctual, will by that same
act make it denote something punctual in the past *or* in the
future.
Which means that the -s- of the s-aorist might be identical to
the Baltic future in -s-, if we define the primary function of
that suffix as that of making the verb denote something punctual
(we might have to give up the link to the desiderative, though).
What do you guys think?
Torsten
***I wrote some months ago that I believed the earliest function of -*s as it occurs in what later were interpreted as -*s-aorists was to impart singularity.
This has been my position for some 15+ years: http://www.geocities.com/proto-language/ProtoLanguage-Monosyllables.htm#SE
With -*s, a _lexical_ durative is made into a new _lexical_ punctual verb.
Tense was not a characteristic of earliest PIE.
Patrick
***