--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Mate Kapovic" <mkapovic@...> wrote:
> So you do find it possible that at a period there was only one
> phonemic vowel in PIE?
Some words seem to have an original *i or *u (e.g. *mus). At the very
least we'd need a system of /i u a/ probably with length contrasts.
One could then try to derive *e and *o from them. Perhaps *a, which
we'd expect to be the most common and the one partaking in ablaut,
was raised to *e or *o in certain environments (e.g. apophonic *o
appears to occur primarily before nasals).