--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "jouppe" <jouppe@...> wrote:
>
> > --- mkelkar2003 <swatimkelkar@> wrote:
> >
> > > "Wilk suggest that one of the Finno-Ugric substratum
> > > features in
> > > Indo-European is the generalized initial stress in
> > > Germanic (as well
> > > as in Latvian (see section 2.3) and in the
> > > north-western Russian
> > > dialects, known for a number of Finnic-substratum
> > > phenomena). This
> > > `main event in the split of Proto-Indo-European into
> > > Prot-Germanic and
> > > the other IE languages' had dramatical consequences
> > > within Germanic,
> > > known as Verner'law, which was later introduced into
> > > Finnic in the
> > > form of consonant gradation.
>
> - - - - - - - -
> The proposed sequence of events makes no sense. Initial stress could
> not have had Verner's law as its "dramatical consequence", because
> Verner's law was effective before the stress shifted to the first
> syllable. Is it me or mr.Kelkar who is misunderstanding Wilk here? Or
> is Wilk misunderstanding the events?
>
> Jouppe
It must be Wilk. I simply quoted the passage. This reminds me of
another quote from Thundy (1991).
""For instance the Gothic strong verb where we find the voiceless
variant in the root-final stage militates against Verner's law. If
Sanskrit does not necessarily retain the archaic feature of PIE
stressthere is no evidence that it doesVerner's application of
shifting stress to Germanic raises problems. Stress is not
characteristic of spoken Sanskrit and modern Indic languages; the
uddatta ("raised" and svarita (a combination of udatta and anudatta )
discussed by Panini in his Grammar are musical tones, and not a matter
of stress. Verner's comparison of shifting Sanskrit syllabic
lengthening to shifting Germanic stress is highly questionable simply
because no voicing or unvoicing takes place in the Sanskrit verbs,
such as pat, cit, vrt and vep, unlike in some Germanic verbs (Thundy
1991, p. 1180)."
Thundy, Zacharias P. (1991), The Future of Grimm's Law. PMIA, Vol. 106(5)
If Vener's law is contact induced then it cannot be relevant to the
reconstruction of PIE. Therefore Grimm's law which it is supposed to
explain cannot be relevant to the reconstruction of PIE. And therefore
Germanic langauges also cannot be relevant to the reconstruction of PIE.
M. Kelkar
[Excess quoted matter removed. -Brian]