Re: [tied] Germanic nominal declensions (take 2)

24-07-03 23:17, Miguel Carrasquer wrote:

> While I'm sympathetic to Piotr's attempt to explain the Gothic masc. N. sg.
> -a by regular sound change instead of analogy, I don't think the proposed
> solution is viable. The N/WGmc forms (ON/OE -a, OS/OHG -o) show a
> development exactly similar to that of the fossilized remains of the o-stem
> ablative (Goth. -o:, ON/OE -a, OS/OHG -o), and given the unlikelihood of
> something like *-oon in the n-stem nom. sg., I see no other alternative
> than to invoke the Schleifton, by way of the PIE variant forms *-o:n
> (acute) ~ *-o:~ (circumflex). Gothic has -a, not -o:, so it must derive
> from something else, and it's not *-o:n (that gives Gothic -o:). Analogy
> after the acc. *-an(u) is always a possibility, but my money is on a form
> parallel with ON -e, from PIE *-e:n or *-e~. In the 3sg of the weak
> preterite, Gothic -da/-ta does derive from someting like *-dhe:t (ON
> -de/-te), so I don't see any immediate phonetic obstacles.

That sounds reasonable to me. *-e:n would have been inherited in a few
items (especially the 'ox' word). I only wonder why this _rare_ variant
was generalised in Gothic and Old Norse. Paradigmatic levelling can be
ruled out, so the only thing I can think of is the "exaptation" of *-e:n
as a gender marker, so that feminines in *-o:n were contrasted with
masculines in *-e:n.

I still have doubts concerning the PIE variant (sandhi?) forms as the
source of the apparent Schleifton in the West Germanic weak masculines.
I'd much prefer a Germanic solution of some sort. In all the other cases
known to me (including the fossilised thematic ablative) Schleifton is
the result of contraction in final syllables, so I'd bet on something
like *-aa at least in West Germanic (not that I'm sure where it comes from).

Piotr