Re: [tied] phonetic nature of PIE occlusives

----- Original Message -----
From: "harper110338" <harper110338@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Monday, July 14, 2003 7:26 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] phonetic nature of PIE occlusives


> My point of departure is looking at a table which e.g. , lists
> p (plain) p' (glottalized) ph (aspirated) phonetically but writes
> them *p *b *bh, respectively when setting up correspondences. So,
> when PIE *b ([p']) becomes b in Skt., Av., OCS, etc., is one to
> understand that it deglottalizes and voices. From your post I
> guess some dispute the glottalized value and such a representation
> merely tries to put forth two phonetic interpretations simultaneously,
> i.e,, that *b is either [b] or [p'].

The [ph] surprises me; I would have expected to see [b]. Writing *p, *b,
*bh minimises confusion. [?b] > [b] occurred in most of the Tai languages,
apparently in the past 700 years. In Thai, the [?b] and [?d] are written
<p> and <t>, i.e. using the unmodified letters used for Sanskrit /p/ and
/t/, so they may have been fairly close to [?p] and [?t].

Now here's an interesting thought - there are exceptions! [?b] > [m], [?d]
> [l] in Shan. What if the PIE development were [?p] > m (similar to Shan)
but [?t] > d (usual Tai pattern)?

(Proto-Tai lacked a preglottalised affricate *[?dZ] and velar *[?g]. I
suspect, by internal reconstruction and very sketchy comparative data
respectively, that they were eliminated by pre-Proto-Tai [?dZ] > [?j] and
[?g] > [g] respectively. The comparative datum is Yangfeng Mak /?dz'im 12/
'tongs' compared to Proto-Tai *gi:m tone A 'tongs' e.g. Siamese khi:m 33.
Mak has ethnologue code MKG. In my source, the phonological description
scanned in from 'Comparative Kadai' for the Rosetta Project, /ts'/ is
described as 'close to the Mandarin alveoloplatal affricate', but is written
as t + diacritic rather than t + c+ diacritic.

For those in the real world, my source is probably 'Comparative Kadai:
Linguistic Studies beyond Tai' by Edmondson & Solnit.)

If anyone wants to take me up on this suggestion, do consider whether Phonet
(devoted to length discussion of sound changes and phonetic issues) or
Nostratic-L (devoted to Nostratic) might be more appropriate.

Richard.