On Sat, 27 Sep 2003, Miguel Carrasquer wrote:
> >How did the -i- part get into the picture?
> It looks like a root extension.
>>[...]
> Not in this case. *stah2- "to stand" does not alternate with
> *stah2i-, AFAIK. *stah2i- (or *stah2y-) is an altogether different
> root (although based on *stah2-).
Well, since we do not know what root extensions are (the term is often
used simply to keep questions away), it seems impossible to exclude that
we have one here. Only, in that case it weakens the argument quite
severely, since then the different cognates are not all cognate sensu
stricto.
> Wouldn't a form *sta:inV- also give circumflex?
>
With lengthened-grade PIE /a:/? No, that yields acute (Lith. íes^kau). I
am not sure whether it is relevant here (have lost your point a bit),
but long-diphthong roots form o-infix derivatives with acute in BSl.,
i.e. a root *steH2y- should form **stóyH2-no-, not *stóy-no-; the latter
can apparently only come from *stVyH-.
>
> I don't accept unmotivated /a/.
I accept anything I find. I am in no position to tell God what kind of
world to give us to analyze. I do try and reach for the simplest
understanding possible, but when things prove impossible I accept the
verdict of the material. Sometimes, however, a nice solution has only
been impossible *to me* because I got something wrong. The matter at
hand is particularly tenacious.
> >
> >If this is from 'stand',
>
> It isn't.
Well, you did write this (Sept. 24): "The connection with *steh2-, as
suggested in EIEC, seems appropriate for the semantics of the cognate
group." But okay, fine, it does not have to be that way.
>
> >[...]
> The fact is that we have *sti(:)a:, from which the verb *stya:-ye- is
> derived.
I do not understand the legend "*sti:a:". If you have /H2/ preceding the
/y/ in the underlying form as you plainly do, the zero-grade *stH2i-
should have aspirated /th/.
>
> >None of this of course *proves* that my analysis of the verbal
> >stem stya:ya- as *stiH3-oye- is correct. It could also be a stative
> *stiH3-e-H1-yé- (via *-o-H1-yé-?) from an adjective *stiH3-o- if that
> exists. What we need is of course an example that *does* reflect a
> structure *-H3-éye- (root-final laryngeal three + suffix *-éye-), so
> that we can see what *does* come out of pre-PIE *-H3-e- in Sanskrit.
> Both anas- and apas- can have syllables closed by laryngeals, and avi-
> is apparently an example of the wrong type.
> >
> >Then I see no valid positive evidence for a distinction between /H3e/
> and /o/ in the way Brugmann's law works in Indo-Iranian.
>
> You would't.
I would if you had adduced any, and that goes for the future also. I
still do not exclude that there may be such a difference, only I have
seen no valid evidence for it.
Of course for a claim as strong as "different treatment of *H3e and *o"
we need evidence of exceptional strength. I have not seen that. To go
against it is not so strong a claim, for it entails only that things are
as we have always believed. Still even for that I would like to have
more than the mere possibility that stya:yate may represent
*stiH3-óye-tor.
Now, on closer inspection I believe one must accept that the accentuation
of the form "styá:yate" given by Pokorny and Monier-Williams from where I
have quoted it, is not based on nothing, even if textual attestations are
limited to unaccented stya:yata:m. The classification of the verb as
belonging to "present-class I" is made by Pa:n.ini himself. Since the old
accent was obviously living in Panini's time, there is little point in
toying with the possibility that the stem /stya:ya-/ was accented on
/-yá-/ and not on the root. If that is credible - and I don't see how it
couldn't be - all analyses of the present stem as either a denominative, a
factitive or a stative are out of the question, leaving only /styá:ya-/.
If the root is /stya:-/ it cannot be combined with the supposed cognates
that have an i-diphthong. Therefore, I say, id will have to be a
zero-grade form of a root *stVyH-, i.e. *stiH- + a suffix appearing as
/-á:ya-/. Such a suffix does not exist in its own right, but if it can be
an allomorph of /-áya-/, the formation can be a normal iterative (like
*g^huH2-áye- 'call' which may also have asyllabic root form in hváyati,
Av. zbaiieiti). That, however, can only be achieved if the root-final
laryngeal changes the first vowel of the suffix /-áya-/ from
non-alternating /a/ into something that surfaces as a long vowel under the
circumstances obtaining here. That can hardly be anything other than a
change of /e/ to /o/, a change that makes sense only if the laryngeal is
/H3/. It may be questioned that this can be independently substantiated,
but it may also be asserted that such substantiation is not really
necessary since there appear to be no other theoretical possibilities.
Still, I would have liked a decision on such a relatively important (if
intrinsically unlikely) matter to be decided by more than a single
etymology, and I accept that others may be disinclined to follow me in my
analysis of this one word.
Jens