Re: [tied] Re: ab o:uo:

One reason to distrust a reconstruction like *h2o:wi-o- is that the *o-grade does not occur in the base from which it is supposedly derived; and that in adjectival vrddhi (inasmuch as it dates back to PIE) the lengthened grade is normally *e:.

I agree that Sieversian syllabifications are tricky, but still it would be nice to have a reconstruction that does not violate the general principles of PIE syllabification (and *-o:ujo- looks very clumsy indeed)

Old Indic vi-/ve- is declined like a typical *i-stem (vim, veH, vayaH, vibHiH, etc.) but is somewhat anomalous in being monosyllabic. If we reconstruct is as *h2awi-/*h2w(e)i- (with Old Indic generalising the latter set of allomorphs), the anomaly is gone. I have seen it claimed that Vedic ve- causes positional lengthening in the preceding syllable (a trace of *h2), though I don't remember any concrete examples.

The *Ho- (*h2o-?) business is controversial; there are just a few supposed compounds that might involve such an "adprep", e.g. *h2osd-o- 'branch (perch?)' (cf. *ni-sd-o- 'nest').

Piotr

----- Original Message -----
From: Sergejus Tarasovas

To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Sunday, September 30, 2001 11:21 PM

Subject: [tied] Re: ab o:uo:

--- In cybalist@......, "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@......> wrote: > The vrddhi theory is difficult to accept: first, the long *o: is odd > (one would expect *h2e:w- [h2a:w] + *-jo-); Odd if we don't suppose prolongated o-grade here: *h2owi- > *h2o:ujom. Of course such an ad hoc reconstruction (which just have come into my mind) is not very reliable, but are there any formal reasons to reject it? > secondly, after an > originally heavy syllable *-jo- should be realised phonetically as *-i > [j]o-. But Sievers' law has many unexplainable exceptions and can be more or less reliably ascribed to Germanic only while the latter doesn't point to a heavy syllable in its *ajja-. > But perhaps the word is an old compound with > adverbial *Ho- 'near, by', namely *Ho-h2ewi-o-m [*Hoh2aujom] > > *oaujom > *o:ujom. Very interesting. Would you comment on this *Ho-pattern in PIE? What was the typical usage, how often has it been used? Do *h1o-ti 'over' or (rather xor) *h3e-bHi 'towards' belong here? >Greek o: > (w)eon remains puzzling, perhaps reflecting an alternative form like > *Ho-h2wei-o-m > *o:wejom (the "bird" word was *h2awi-s/*h2wei-). > Do you mean our local Lithuanian chicken and their Indo-Iranian cognates by *h2wei-? But what is _direct_ evidence for this form (especially its *h2-)? It looks like put into existance merely by systemic reasons. Sergei