Re: [tied] PIE *ts ?

----- Original Message -----
From: "Miguel Carrasquer" <mcv@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, February 23, 2003 6:27 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] PIE *ts ?



>> Why not? /kt/ ~ /ks/ ~ /sk/ ~ /k/ from reduced or metathesised clusters vary dialectally in some Greek roots, and so do /pHtH/ and /ps/ (pHtHisis ~ psisis , pHtHino: ~ psino:).

> Any examples *not* before /i/? ti > si is a well-known Greek soundlaw, which may have been sporadically applied to *tHi > si as well (not *dhi, I don't think).

/kt/ ~ /k/ in <arktos> ~ <arkos>
/kt/ ~ /sk/ in <-kte:te:s> ~ <-ske:te:s>, <kteino:> ~ <kataskene:{i}>
(here I take <sk> to reflect unmetathesised *tsk)
/pHtH/ ~ /ps/ in <pHtHeirei> ~ <pseirei>

> It's straightforward to explain khth- out of of ghdh-, and in view of Toch tkam. and Hitt. tekan, taknas I see no reason to push the affrication underlying Skt. ks.- all the way back to PIE.

I just wanted to point out that the Greek form can be explained _either_ way (<kHtHes> shows that affrication would have given the right form too), and that there is some positive evidence for *tk > *tsk > sk as a variant development in Greek (not much of it, but then the combination is rare).

The Hittite example is not really damaging to the affricate solution, since Hittite */tk-/ lurking behind the spelling <tak-> or <tek> is only a possibility. Which said, let me borrow the gun from you and shoot myself in the foot: Hitt. hartagga- points to *h2r.tkos rather than *h2r.tskos, and _this_ constitutes strong evidence that affrication in *-tt- is older than that in *tk, and that whereas the former is unquestionably PIE, the latter postdates the separation of Anatolian (and perhaps also of Tocharian).

However, there is something to gain if we push the "thorny" affrication as far back as possible: a uniform explanation of a variety of effects in several branches with recourse to a phoneme already reconstructed on other grounds. PIE *þ and *ð have always been an embarrassment, and I find *ts (*[dz]) preferable by far. Though not strictly PIE in this particular context, it would be old enough to explain correspondences like Lat. s : Av. xs^, s^, Gz^ : Skt. ks. : Gk. kt, pHtH, etc. as due to a _single_ common innovation (affrication plus metathesis).

Piotr