Oritur quaestio: where does the long vowel
of <a:cer> come from? The other Latin derivatives of *h2ak^- are
short-vowelled (<acus, aculeus, acuere, acu:men, acie:s, acerbus,
acescere>, etc.), except of course those derived via <a:cer> itself
(e.g. <a:criter, a:crimo:nia>). <a:cer/a:cris> is historically an
i-stem (*h2a:k^-r-i-), so the length apperently has to do with the word being an
adjective. Nouns analysable as *h2ak^r-i-s occur here and there (Gk. akris
'summit', Skt. as'riH 'sharp edge, corner') and show a short vowel, as does the
"minimally derived" thematic adjective *ak^ros (Slavic *ostrU 'sharp', Gk. akros
'extreme'). I wish we had a clearer picture of the conditions leading to
adjectival vrddhi.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, November 02, 2001 5:52 PM
Subject: [tied] Re: Slavic hawk-word
> *o:k^ro-/*a:k^ro- is itself rather speculative; at any rate I'm
not aware of such forms with the meaning 'fast'.
I agree, the only
-r-form that can be involved (more or less) is Latin a:cer
'sharp'.