Re: [tied] IE vowels

Peter:

>One of its oddities is the places where the vowels are typically found:
> /i/ & /u/ almost entirely as vocalic versions of /y/ & /w/,

But not completely entirely. While *i can be analysed as the vocalic
expression of consonant *y, just as we may analyse Sanskrit /e/ as
the expression of /a/ + /y/, the fact is that *i _is_ found as a bonified
_vowel_. There's nothing wrong with these vowels.

>/a/ outside the ablaut system, never with the ablauting vowels, not a
>vocalic version of anything. (secondary *a from eH2)

This all depends on whether we're talking about allophonic *[a]
(arising from the lowering of *e in the presence of uvulars) or
whether we're talking about phonemic *a (the "true", unconditioned *a).

I think that *a, both allophonic and phonemic, _does_ occur in the
ablaut system.

>Is this entirely normal???

Yes!!!

>Even if we accept typologically normal vowel patterns /a i u/
>and /a i u o e/ for PIE, is there any other known language
>where this sort of restriction occurs?

That's a kind of unfair question. There is no language like IE anymore
than there is another language just like Urdu.


= gLeN

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