On Fri, 05 Dec 2003 04:08:53 +0000, Glen Gordon <
glengordon01@...>
wrote:
>>Szemerényi's treatment can be summarized as follows [...]
>
>>2pl. *yus is pronominal *y- + 2pl. *wes. ".. it seems clear that *wes is
>>itself simplified from *twes,
>
>Hyperbole. We find *-te(s), not **-ye(s), so this doesn't
>support the claim of **twes > *yus in the slightest. An
>arguement that goes nowhere.
You have misunderstood. Szemerényi doesn't claim *twes > *yus at all.
Szemerényi argues that the original shape of the 2pl. pronoun was *wes
(*wos), ultimately from *twes. I obviously don't agree with Szemerényi,
but he *has* submitted the data to a proper analysis, which means that he
has realized that the *y- in the nominative form is secondary, as is shown
by the oblique forms *usmé and *wos. His explanation of the *y- as a (3rd.
person) pronominal element is taken from Brugmann (*yu = *i "he" + *u
"you").
>>Martinet's theory
>
>Even worse. Again, highly speculative. It never can be good
>when someone starts off with "On pourrait penser que". Non,
>il ne faut pas "penser que", Miguel,
André.
>At any rate this has no bearing on *yus. Your quotes merely
>serve to discredit the logic behind your much-loved sources.
Which much-loved sources? I gave an account of three competing theories.
I already gave my own account, so it should be clear that I agree with none
of them, although my own theory was certainly inspired by Jens' attempt
(which is far superior to those of Szemerényi and Martinet).
The fact is that all three of them (four, counting my own), in some form or
other, argue for loss of t- in the second person plural. That is not
because I picked these three theories on purpose because of that, but
merely because they were the only three attempts at internal reconstruction
of the PIE personal pronouns that I found in my library.
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...