--- In
cybalist@egroups.com, Miguel Carrasquer Vidal <mcv@...> wrote:
> On Tue, 23 Jan 2001 20:08:20 +0100, "Piotr Gasiorowski"
> <gpiotr@...> wrote:
>
> >The fact is that if one relaxes the standard constraints on
regularity even a little (by ignoring vowels, allowing "doublets" and
other n-tuplets, permitting ad hoc consonantal permutations, etc.)
the likelihood of finding spurious cognates increases dramatically,
since a *vast* number of new sound combinations can be treated
as "equivalent".
>
> But that's not what I was talking about. Both Illich-Svitych and
> Bomhard (don't know about Møller, as I haven't really studied his
> proposals) stick rigourously to their regularities, most of the
time,
> and obtain results which, not always, but in a number of cases, seem
> rather convincing, or at least suggestive of a real genetic
connection
> between the "Nostratic" languages. The "doublets", which, even if
we
> don't "allow" them, are still there [look under the carpet!],
explain
> the curious fact that sometimes both proposals overlap semantically,
> but not, strictly, phonetically. What the significance, if any, is
of
> this, I couldn't say. The only thing that seems obvious is that if
> Nostratic exists, the exact sound correspondences (as yet unknown)
> will hardly be as simple as, say, Bomhard's PIE ~ PAA *t ~ *t, *d ~
> *t', *dh ~ *d. That just may be correct as a Grimmian first
> approximation, but there's a whole lot of Verner still required.
>
>
> =======================
> Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
> mcv@...
Thank you, Miguel, for the quotes. Actually I was worried we had the
only copies of Møller's original books here. I've read him a lot, and
all I can say is I have never caught him in any glaring
inconsistencies. The problem is, I know nothing about AA except what
I can read in Orel & Stolbova, so I can't pass judgement how well he
has constructed his system of phonetic rules. Cuny (and perhaps
Møller? I don't have the books here) came up with the idea that the
PIE e/o alternation was actually a schwa/a alternation, an idea
Bomhard ascribes to Pulleyblank (much later). I think he and Cuny
got a bad rap, probably because he wrote in German, and at that time
the Germans were not quite ripe for the idea of a connection IE-AA.
But, to counter an objection, Piotr raised: Even if these
alternations are not part of a regular system within PIE, once you
allow for loans from a third (non-PIE, non-AA) source, these
alternations could be explained as loan words loaned at different
times.
Fictitious conversation:
TP (rushing into the room, out of breath):
I have just discovered that in the ancient language Latin there is
a root "camp-". This may perhaps explain the words "campaign" and
"champagne" in English!
NN (weary of such unscientific talk):
Nonono! Everyone knows that *camp- and *champ- are separate roots in
Middle English!
TP: ??!
Also, once you allow for "Austronesian" alternations (d/l/r/n) you
can find things in Bomhard too, eg. (and I still don't have the book
here) approx p-l-/b-r- "town". Note that these alternations are found
in pre-IE Mediterranean stuff too.
Also, interestingly, Bomhard et al. do not allow for loans (except in
very specific cases). This is of course part of their method, but,
sooner or later, they will have to relax that (implicit) rule (as
Nostraticists get more self-confidence).
Torsten