PIE & Sanskrit Vowel Counts (was: Nominative: A hybrid view)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen <jer@...>
wrote:

>
> The relevance for IE is that, in the discussion of IE, it is the

sheer

> possibility of reducing the sounds [e, a, o, e:, a:, o:] to a

single vowel

> phoneme /e/ that is rejected on typological grounds. And for these
> elements Sanskrit does in fact make do with /a/ and /aa/ only.

As /a/ and /aa/ are [&] and [a:], Sanskrit provides a parallel to
both Miguel's 2-vowel PIE system (length contrast) and to Glen's
(height contrast).

Richard.