--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Jens Elmegård Rasmussen <jer@...>
wrote:
> You must mean cases of circumflex -y- and -u:- based on -i-/-u-
> since other vocalisms would be fully capable of harbouring a
> circumflex.
Not only. I also meant cases like <skanùs> 'tasty' ~ <skõnis> 'taste'
or *gèras (later Standard Lithuanian <ge~ras>, but not at the time of
the derivation) 'good (adj.)' ~ <ge:~ris> 'good (n.)'.
The point sometimes missed by generic Indo-Europeanists is that the
way Standard Lithuanian reflexes older (short stressed) *è and *à (>
e~, a~) has little or no support in dialects, even those (West
Auks^taitian kaunis^kian) traditionally held the basis of the
standard literary language. Indeed, nearly all the Auks^taitian (sub)
dialects reflect older *è and *à not with circumflexed vowels, but
with vowels whose length is between that of (standard) è, à and
(standard) e~, a~ and which bear _no_ pitch accent: they have
_expiratory_ stress (marked with vertical tilde over the vowel in
Lithuanian dialectological notation). West Z^memaitian dialects
retained old shortness, most other Z^memaitian dialects retained old
short è and à before a long syllable; in other positions the
development is basically the same as in Auks^taitian ones.
Actually, Standard Lithuanian a~ and e~ look like an
artificial "innovation", simplifying the prosodic structure of the
literary language (eliminating half-long expiratory stressed vowels
and replacing it with circumflexed long vowels modelled after
the "genuine" circumflexed vowels like e:~ and o:~).
From all this one can conclude that at the time the metatony in
question operated, *a and *e would _not_ be fully capable of
harbouring a circumflex -- in the same way as i and u aren't capable
up to now.
Sergei