[tied] Re: Pronouns again

From: tgpedersen
Message: 19550
Date: 2003-03-03

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen <jer@...>
wrote:
> > Jens: [...]
> >>The ending -nga is undoubtedly related to the 1sg possessive
marker
> >> *-ka. The nucleus must be the /k/ which, by general rule, would
be
> >> nasalized in word-final position (its Aleut counterpart is in
fact
> >> -ng). I have had grave trouble making out why there is
nasalization
> >> also in the
> >>intransitive ending -nga.
>
> > I would have guessed that the Aleut ending shows the original
state of
> > affairs and that -a has been secondarily added to Inuktitut -nga.
>
> Sure, that's one of the two possibilities I spelt out in the mail
you're
> replying to. It's the only one I have published. Nice to know it's
the
> better one.
>
> >>It begins fine: [...] But can *-g^ mean 'I'?
> >
> > No. The interpretation of *-g- as an already existant emphatic
particle
> > is logically sufficient, as opposed to an idle connection with
PEskimo
> > *-ka.
>
> Well, many things are logically sufficient without being true.
There are
> often *many* posibilities. Even so, I fail to see the idleness of
> highlighting the similarity between Eskimo {'there' + -k} and PIE
{'there'
> + -g^} both meaning 'I'. Most true cognates look less similar.
>
> >>The PIE morpheme corresponding to Esk. -nga (or *-k) is *-H2,
> >
> > While I agree with this connection, there are approximately some
6000 to
> > 8000 years of prehistoric development to explain for both language
> > families. It would seem to me that Proto-Boreal, ancestral to
EskimoA,
> > CKam, Yukaghir and Uralic, would have had two distinct 1ps endings
> > marking subjective and objective: *-m and *-N.
>
> Was there not a *-K also? I find it much harder to find an *-N.
>
> >>Could the front vowel have palatalized the old velar?
> >
> > The *g^ in PIE is not palatalized. It's a plain velar. It is only
> > palatalized in later satem dialects.
>
> The three PIE velar series which are not in complementary
distribution in
> any arrangement. There is no way they can have been created
secondarily
> after the dissolution of the protolanguage.
>
> > Plus, I feel that *eg- was in fact a _verb_ signifying "to be
here",
> > which is the reason for the enclitic *ge which served merely as a
filler
> > consonant to go between the stem and the pronominal ending *-o:.
>
> The *-o: is only found in Italic and Greek; a number of other
languages
> point to a shorter form, in fact to exactly what remains if we
leave out
> the *-o: of ego:. That makes it unattractive to locate the
message "first
> person pronoun" in this part. Alas, I am not endowed with a sense
to make
> me feel which part of a word means what. There may be others of my
kind;
> could you teach us your tricks?
>
> >>Inflected forms of 'I' begin with *m- in IE. Curiously, also the
forms
> >> of the dual and plural reflect /m/ (in part changed to /w/ by
rule, and
> >> in part apparently dissimilated to /n/ which looks more like a
> >> spontaneous event). In none of these cases is the consonant in
> >> word-final position.
> >
> > Was there not an athematic, non-indicative 1ps *-m? How did that
get
> > waved away?
>
> It did not, I explicitly conceded that this item does not fit the
picture.
> It all boils down to the question whether what looks like three
series (1)
> *-k/*-m-, (2) *-k/*-m-, (3) *-m/*-m- can be assumed to reflect a
single
> series *-k/*-m-, with paradigmatic levelling being responsible for
the *-m
> of (3).
>
>
> >>It may be noted that PIE has other cases of an interchange of /m/
and
> >> /H2/. One could cite the roots *gWem- and *gWeH2- 'come, go'
[...]
> >> there are also *drem-/*dreH2- 'run' and another *drem-/*dreH2-
'sleep'.
>
> > Given that there are many other verbs with an optional *-H2-, I
think
> > not.
>
> I see no basis for this statement. What exactly is it that you do
not think?
>
> Jens

As far as I can tell, this attempt at analyzing 'ego' end up with an
unexplained -g'- which also means "I". Next question (same question):
where did -g'- come from?

Torsten