Re: [tied] IE > Slavic

----- Original Message -----

From: Piotr Gasiorowski

To: cybalist@egroups.com

Sent: Sunday, November 12, 2000 1:23 PM

Subject: Re: [tied] IE > Slavic

The development of word-initial *V- and *jV- in Slavic (and in Baltic) is a good topic for a long lecture. I'll focus on *(j)e-, *(j)o- and *(j)a- only, but it's going to be a rather complex affair anyway. Here are the most basic changes:

 

*e-, *je-, *jo-, *ja- > PSl *(j)e- (> East Slavic o- ~ je-)

*a-, *o- > PSl *o-

 

Apparently in a few words *e < *a-/*o-, e.g. *(j)esetrU 'sturgeon' < ak^etro- or *(j)elU-kU 'gone bitter' : *olU 'beer' < North IE *alu-, cf. English ale. This is probably due to a dialectal merger of *a- and *e- in Proto-B-Sl.

 

When lengthened e.g. before plain voiced stops ("Winter's Law"), the vowels ultimately merge:

 

*(j)e:-, *(j)a:-, *(j)o:- > PSl *(j)a- [~ *(j)E-]

 

Examples:

 

*eg^om > *e:zU > *(j)azU- (OCS azU, P./R./Cz. etc. ja)

*abl- 'apple' > *a:bl- > *(j)ablUko

 

The preconsonantal sequence VR- (R = {l, r}) developed as follows:

 

*orC, *arC- > B-Sl *arC > PSl *orC- > roC- (Northern), raC- (Czech/Slovak and South Slavic)

 

There are very few convincing examples of *eRC-, *jeRC or *jorC- (all could be expected to have developed into PSl *(j)erC-); it seems that these combinations either underwent the same treatment as *orC-/*arC- or yielded *roC-/*raC- (distributed as above) in free (originally dialectal?) variation with *reC-.

 

If there was originally a syllable-final laryngeal after the sonorant, or if C was a plain voiced stop, the vowel was lengthened:

 

*(j)orHC, *arHC, *(j)erHC- > *a:rC- > PSl *arC- > raC- (in all subbranches)

 

In the literature you will often find the contrast *orC- : *arC- transcribed as ôrC- : órC- (circumflex : acute) -- the two transcriptions may be regarded as roughly equivalent, referring to different historical stages. The contrast between the short and long vowel is well visible in Polish (dots signify syllable divisions where these are relevant):

 

*orbH- > PSl *orb- > Polish rob- (e.g. robota 'work, job')

 

*elk^- > PSl *els- > Polish los' 'elk'

 

*xarh- 'plough'

*xarh-je-ti > *ar.hje.ti > *o.rje.ti > Polish orze 'he ploughs'

*xarh-dHlo- > *arh.dHla- > *a:r.dla- > *ardlo > Polish radło 'ard, plough'

 

*elho:n, *elhen- 'red deer'

*elhen-(jo-) > *elenjI > Polish jelen' 'stag'

*elhn-ix- > *e:lni: > *a:lni: > *alni > Polish l/ania 'hind'

 

Piotr

 

 

 

 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: João Simões Lopes Filho

To: cybalist@egroups.com

Sent: Sunday, November 12, 2000 2:20 AM

Subject: [tied] IE > Slavic

What's the evolution of IE initial syllabes *YER- and YOR-/YAR- in Church Slavic?

 

*yer- > *jre- ? jire- ?

yor-/yar- > *jra- ? *jira- ?