Re: Ruki Rule

cybalist message #142cybalist: Odp: Cowboys on Horseback

Thanks a lot, Piotr. Is it so exceptionel? not present in other IE languages? perhaps a consequence of specific ways of pronunciation perhaps partly inherited from PIE? has it something to do with the satem/centum distinction? (sorry if this question sounds silly - I don't know anything on Slavic or Indo-Iranian or...)

Marc

It would take some explaining, but it is quite obvious to me that the nature of Balto-Slavic/Aryan similarities guarantees their genetic character (e.g. common phonological developments like the so-called RUKI rule), while the similarities between Germanic and Balto-Slavic (mostly lexical, in a few cases morphological) are more likely to be due to areal convergence. Germanic is not CLOSELY related to Italo-Celtic. Under my scenario, the two groups would have had about 4000 years of independent development behind them at the time of their first historical attestation.

MV: what is the RUKI rule?

It is the pronunciation of inherited *s as a postalveolar fricative [š] after the sounds [r], [u/w], [k] and [i/y] (hence the acronymic name given to it by the ancient Sanskrit grammarians). In Slavic the postalveolar sound changed to [x] (except when palatalised). The RUKI environment is more or less the same in Baltic, Slavic and Aryan; it so unusual that it can hardly have resulted from parallel environment.