Knut:
>Of course, it is neccessary to establish rules based om several
>examples. But- I think we must be contented with rules thet are not
>as exact as the rules you can establish inside indoeuropean for the
>time being, when working at the "nostratic" level. And then refine
>them later, if possible. [...]
Nostratic sound rules have been lax for a good century now. It's
time to get real and be more serious. There are people who
have already proposed sound correspondances. Illich-Svitych,
Dolgopolsky and Bomhard are some of the names to look for. Let's
stop reinventing the wheel.
>An example of such a rule could be IE s/t - Ur s/t.
I've already mentioned an *s/*t alternation in IE. For instance,
the IE plural *-es, I feel was from ProtoSteppe *-it. This is my
view concerning ProtoSteppe sound correspondances of dental stops:
ProtoSteppe => Uralic IndoEuropean Altaic
*t- *t- *t- *s-
*t:- *t- *d- *t-
*d- *t- *dh- *d-
*-t- *-t- *-t- *-s-
*-t:- *-tt- *-d- *-t-
*-d- *-t- *-dh- *-d-
*-t *-t *-s *-r
*-t: *-t *-s *-t
(*-d *-t *-s *-d)
So... in IndoTyrrhenian, the immediate precursor to IndoEuropean
and Tyrrhenian (comprised of Etruscan, Lemnian, Camunic & Rhaetic)
changed final *-t to *-c (an affricate *[ts]). Due to this change,
there came to be an alternation between *-c (in final position)
and *-t- (in medial position, when followed by suffixes). Hence,
weird things like a *-t- plural fossil in the IE "twenty" stem
*-kntix, derived from IndoTyrrhenian *kamec "tens" (stem *kamet-),
further derived from ProtoSteppe *kumit. Another example is
the IE *-s- modal affix that pairs with the stative *-t suffix
< IndoTyrrhenian *-c/*-t- < ProtoSteppe *-it:
Since the alternation only occurs when original ProtoSteppe *-t is
in final position, we need not stress ourselves out in wondering
whether medial Uralic *-s- corresponds with IndoEuropean *-s-
or whether it corresponds with *-t-. In such a case, Uralic *s
always corresponds with IndoEuropean *s.
Maybe that'll help.
- love gLeN
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