Re: [tied] Germanic nominal declensions

Miguel,

Just a few points. I may return to other things later on, time permitting.

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15-07-03 15:47, Miguel Carrasquer wrote:

> Acc. *-om *-aN
> n. *-om *-aN
> Runic -a, ENWGmc. -0. P. Ramat suggests that the famous inscription "ek
> hlewagastiz holtijaz horna tawido" is perhaps better translated as "I
> Hlewagastiz [son] of Holt made [these] two horns", but I don't know if that
> is meant as a suggestion that *-aN had perhaps already been reduced to -0
> in Runic, or as a suggestion that perhaps the dual was still alive in
> Germanic at that early stage. In any case, he reconstructs PGmc. *-aN.

There are no facts known to me that would speak against a Proto-Germanic
date of the loss of *-n (< *-m, *-n). I take the development to be *-om

> *-an > *-a (already in PGmc.), without nasalisation on short vowels.

Nasalisation has to be posited for long vowels to account for things
like OE nom.sg. -u vs. acc.sg. -e (< PGmc. *-a:/-a:m) in strong feminines.

> pl.
>
> The nominative in *-oi is unattested in Germanic. PIE *-o:s would have
> given PGmc. *-o:z, which explains Goth -o:s and ON -ar, but not OE -as, OS
> -os. The reconstruction is thus:
>
> PIE *-ó:ses *-o:siz
> *'-o:ses *-o:ziz
>
> which explains all the forms (Goth. -o:ss > -o:s, ON *-o:ziz > -arr > -ar,
> OE/OS *-o:siz > *-as). OHG -a is the acc. form.

The OE and OSax. forms are certainly strange and seem to require some
kind of "extension" to prevent the *s from word-final voicing (already
in PGmc.!). *-iz would do the trick, but I suspect the whole affair is
internal to Germanic and there's no need to drag in anything as risky as
"PIE" *-o:ses. I'd sooner consider a more conservative solution: *-o-es

> *-o:s ~ *-o:s-es > *-o:z ~ *-o:siz with a doubly marked variant of

the plural that arose within Germanic.

> It's a reasonably well-established fact that PIE *i/*e and *u gave
> PGmc. *i and *u when a high vowel (*i or *u) followed in the next
> syllable, whereas when *a followed they gave *e and *o.

This height harmony is frequent in OHG and OSax., but not in OE or
OFris. Cf. OE medu vs. OHG mitu ~ metu. But the harmony of *e, *eu > *i,
*iu before *i/*j is found in all the Germanic languages.

> Before I go on with the C-stems, I'm almost sure Piotr posted something
> about Germanic n-stems some time ago, but I can't find it...

I can't find it either, but I vaguely recall that I wrote something
about the n-stems when we were discussing the Gothic genitive plural.
What's remarkable about the nasal stems is the relatively archaic
bahaviour of the weak masculines (with the preservation of ablaut and
even traces of the contrast between *-o:n and *-e:n), and the Germanic
innovations leading to the development of secondary gender contrasts.

Piotr