From: tgpedersen
Message: 46544
Date: 2006-11-05
>If the Hittites chose /da/ over /ta/ purely for writing convenience,
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@> wrote:
>
> > > I believe the received wisdom is that PIE *dh, *d, *t > Hittite
> t.
> > > This doesn't look like that at all.
>
> The received wisdom is indeed that, in initial position. Internally,
> we have *d/dh > -t-, and *t > -tt- by Sturtevant's law. There are of
> course also the special rules that *ti > zi, while *dhi > ti, and
> apparently *di > si (Sius < *diews), which must have been separated
> before the merger.
>
> When we find a statistic preponderance of ti-/te- and da- (as in
> tehhi, daitti, da:i), it is at least in part a matter of pure
> graphics. The signs TA and DA are homophonous in Hittite, but DA and
> TI are each one wedge simpler than TA and TI, and TE is very much
> simpler than DÉ (DE is not used by the Hittites). Therefore,
> the "default" way of writing /ta/, /te/ and /ti/ in Hittite is by
> the signs DA, TE and TI (but see below).