Re: [tied] Centum in Vedic?

--- In cybalist@..., "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> The source of <s.> is IE *s in the "ruki" context, not a velar
> stop, so it's quite clear that <kH> is secondary. Quite likely,
> the spelling was employed to represent a velar fricative
> pronunciation [x] in the dialects. The development of "ruki"
> *s^ to *x is attested in Slavic. A similar development has
> taken place in Spanish (the old pronunciation of <j/x> was [s^]).
>
> Piotr

I don't understand. Would this hypothetical dialect have
developed 'x' directly out of a palatal (RUKI) 's' and so
have avoided the acquisition of retroflexes altogether, or
did it develop out of a retroflex 's.' after the creation
of an independent retroflex row? Is 'kht' or 'kht.' ever
found where 's.t.' would be expected?

David