On Thu, 18 Sep 2003 16:14:18 -0400, Robert Wilson <
han_solo55@...>
wrote:
>couldn't *e and *i be more frequent than *o and *u, thus making *k^ more
>frequent than *kW?
Could be of course, but it's not very likely. *k^ is _much_ more frequent
than *kW.
The way I see it, before the "vowel collapse", (pre-)PIE can be
reconstructed with 3x2 vowels (**a, **i, **u, short and long, **a being, by
some considerable margin, the most frequent one). One might also have had
*e, *o, or even *ä, *ö, *ü, but since they were largely to collapse anyway,
I see no reason or way to distinguish beyond potentially palatalizing
**i(:), labializing **u(:) and "plain" **a.
There were also velar and uvular stops (**k, **g, **gh and **q, **G, **Gh,
the velars being considerably more frequent). The velars became "classic
PIE" *k^, *g^ etc. (except when labialized to *kW etc.), while the uvulars
became "classic" *k, *g, etc. (except, again, when labialized).
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...