Re: Vocabulary distribution (was: On Greek anthro:pos 'man')

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Bhrihskwobhloukstroy wrote:

> iv - but Indo-Europeanists often hate PIE and try in every way to
> demolish as much as possible the reconstruction of PIE. They want a
> small, shortly lived, and territorially restricted PIE, possibly
> made of just those words that are continued by all IE languages (=
> no word) or at least of roots that are attested in every IE
> language (= just one, *bherg'h-, provided it's in fact present in
> Latin and Greek)

This is an interesting claim. Only one IE root is found across every IE language?

I assume this actually refers to main branches (checking every single modern IE language from Icelandic to Bengali would be too much work for anyone), and furthermore also that scanty material is an issue with several branches - but I'd still expect more than just a single root to be found in all of Hittite, Tocharian, Armenian, Albanian etc.

Or is the issue in including even fragmentarily attested languages like Macedonian in the count?

_j.