Substrates in Latin and Germanic [was: The reason for Caesar's obtai

Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

> Your interpretation of what I said as meaning that I think the French phrase
> 'mot populaire' translates to English 'loan' would make sense only if you
> think I don't know basic French. I could choose to interpret that as an
> insult, I chose not to. You are of course free to leave the discussion any
> time you please.

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I don't think You don't know Basic French. We agree that 'mot
populaire' doesn't translate English 'loan'. You wrote that You think
that Latin mot populaires were loans. OK, everything is clear on this
point

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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>> > I will now explain what I meant above: I think the 'mots
>> > populaires', ie those covered by that term as used by
>> > Ernout-Meillet, are loans in the Latin language.
>> >
>
>> You have now explained what You meant. On that I had no doubt.
>
> Yes? Then why did you claim that I thought 'mot populaire' translated as
> 'loan'?

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Because You have not been explicit (not enough for me, at least).
Now You are. OK
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
>> What I lack is a proof that such words were taken from a language
>> other than Latin (because I don't know of any other language where
>> those words are attested) into Latin (i.e. a further proof that the
>> direction of the loan was precisely from non-Latin into Latin)
>
> We don't have proof in linguistics, as you should know, only disproof.

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OK, I'm waiting for disproofs that a Latin word, attested only in
Latin and with IE etymology, isn't hereditary. Please don't answer
'because they are loans', since You haven't disproven the a priori
alternative that they are hereditary.
Note that I'm not excluding that they are loans, I'm just claiming
that the hereditary hypothesis is at least at the same level of
probability and morevoer doesn't have to postulate a substrate
presence in Rome (not otherwise documented except for these
controversial words).
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
>> >> >
>> >> >> On one side You are so tough that You want all semantic
>> >> >> groups to show *exactly* the same phonemic distribution,
>> >> >> although one can always group words with one phoneme and then
>> >> >> affirm that such phoneme characterizes their prevailing
>> >> >> meaning ('populaire' is very vague for the complex of Latin
>> >> >> words with /a/ of non-laryngeal origin: cacumen calamitas
>> >> >> calare calidus callis calx cancer candere cardo carina
>> >> >> carinare caro carpere carpinus carrere caterua scabere
>> >> >> scalpere scamnum scandere scatere; auillus caudex cauere
>> >> >> cauilla cauos fauere fauila fauis(s)ae Fauonius Faui fauos
>> >> >> fraus laus lauere pauere rauos; malleus malus manere manus
>> >> >> marcere mare margo maritus mateola; canis fax quaerere
>> >> >> qualum/s quatere squalus suasum uacca uagus ualgus ualuae uas
>> >> >> uastus; flagrare frangere gradior labra lac magnus nassa
>> >> >> trabs; fraces lapis latus patere sacena aries gramen gramiae
>> >> >> trahere faba; castrare farcire farnus fastigium ianitrices
>> >> >> mala nancire pando panus passer quattuor sarcire sarire
>> >> >> spargere uannus);
>> >
>> > They have have also been characterised as words belonging to the
>> > lower class *and* religious sphere.
>> >
>
>> All that is so lovely vague that everybody can build every
>> theory on such a basis.
>
> The important fact is that these words are concentrated in a few semantic
> spheres, which indicates (not 'proves') that they derived from a particular
> sociolect of Latin, correponding to one of the component people of the
> ethnogenesis of the Roman people.

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Alas the very existence of such component people is product of a
linguistic hypothesis and therefore cannot be the base for further
arguments: it's simply one and the same argument - a good hypothesis,
but not better than the hypothesis of the absence of the /a/-substrate
of Latin
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>> Latin /a/ is different from, say, /p/ in Q-Celtic languages
>
> In what way?

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Q-Celtic languages have no hereditary words with /p/ of IE origin
(except perhaps where /pp/ is from IE */pn/ + accented vowel, e.g.
*ruppos < *rup-'no-s.
Do You think that EVERY /a/ in Latin isn't of direct IE origin?
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>> Do You feel that explanations through *h2 are 'contrived'?
>
> Yes.
>
>
>> If no, I beg Your pardon; if yes, You apply a criterion which is
>> quite tough in comparison with the optimism with which You accept as
>> true a substrate hypothesis
>
> Do you feel that is the case?

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All these are hypotheses. I know Kuhn's hypotheses, Vennemann's
ones and so on. I like them.
Laryngeal are hypotheses as well.
You refuse completeley certain hypothese and subscribe
unconditionally other ones. I simply ask: "Why?"
I rather work on probability levels. Certain hypothese are nice,
but intrinsically less more expensive than other ones. Maybe they are
nevertheless true, but till now we don't know. So why certain ones -
absolutely yes and certain others - absolutely no?
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
>
>> A people called Veneti were there. Venetic
>> language was spoken, as far as we know, in the Upper Adriatic Basin.
>> It CAN be that it was spoken in Southern Poland as well, but this is
>> just a simple hypothesis. We don't have a single piece of evidence
>> in favour of such hypothesis
>
> Not true.
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/4443

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Oh please, these are Old European river names, not Venetic
inscriptions! Come on! Don't play with definitions!
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>> As for Thracian, this is simply wrong. Thracian was spoken in
>> Thrace; there is a couple of names in Regnum Bosporanicum that can
>> be of Thracian etymology. That's all. There area in between is
>> rather Dacian.
>
> Okay, so that's what you think.
> Strabo and Pliny the Elder disagree
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dacians
> 'Strabo and Pliny the Elder state they spoke the same language'

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Do You think that Thracian had a Lautverschiebung?
Do You think that Daco-Misian had a Lautverschiebung?
If You answer 'yes!' or 'no!' to both questions, You agree with
Strabo and Pliny's historical-linguistic evaluation; otherwise not. In
this particular case I have doubts that Daco-Misian had a
Lautverschiebung, while I find quite convincing that Thracian had one
(Georgiev, Duridanov).
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
>> As for Dacian, it's quite sure that it was spoken West and East
>> of the Carpathian Range. More to the North, there were Slavs; the
>> hydronimic evidence (Udolph) is too strong
>
> Here's a -dava within the range of Germanic (Sciri) settlements at the time
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Setidava

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OK, very good. This is a good argument. Until we don't know
something more about alternative etymologies and explanations of the
name (I could propose some of them, but now it's really irrelevant, so
I omit to do it), a simple ending -daua is a weak piece of evidence,
but still it IS a piece of evidence.
So, for the sake of the argument, let's state that (I'm quoting)
"a Dacian outpost in North Central Europe" was in linguistic contact
with Proto-Germans and that words could flow from there up to
Scandinavia (not just into Scirian). This is a further, but possible,
hypothesis.
This doesn't imply that every other (hereditary) possibility is
automatically excluded. Stop. That is what I was already underlining:
hereditary hypotheses cannot be disproven by the mere existence of
possible substrate alternatives. That's all
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
> See above, plus the name. According to Kuhn Germanic had early contact with
> an Italic language. Venetic is Italic.

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All of Kuhn's etymologies (which I like, by the way) are less than
a single inscription. In order to be sure that a language has been
spoken in a region, one needs inscriptions. If there's no inscription,
one has to emit hypotheses, but they are bound to remain such -
hypothese. Very good, very nice, I like hypotheses very much. But You
can't refuse an etymology just because it isn't compatible with a
different *hypothesis*; less so You can refuse an etymology just
because an alternative hypothesis is there
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Torsten <tgpedersen@...>:

>
>> >> Wouldn't it be better if we used one and the same criterion for
>> >> all etymologies?
>> >
>> > Which one would that be?
>> Diachronic phonological precision and areal linguistic
>> philological care
>
> You didn't answer the question. Which criterion is it you recommend?

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Holzer's criteria (Entlehnungen aus einer bisher unbekannten
indogermanischen Sprache im Urslavischen und Urbaltischen, Wien: ÖAW,
1989): respective length of alternative compared words, respective
possibility of phonological confusion, respective semantic
neighbourhood to the compared word, respective semantic vagueness,
degree of reconstructability of the alternative compared words