13-12-03 16:54, Abdullah Konushevci wrote:
> I guess that its origin can't be devided from PIE *ksun-, basic form
> *su(n)- (cf. Greek syn-, Slavic so-, s-.
The origin of some Albanian prefixes will probably remain debatable
forever, since they are too strongly reduced to preserve sufficient
information about their earlier form. Some are certainly of Latin
origin, e.g. ç- (~ sh- ~ zh-) < *ds^- < dis-. The partly homophonous
prefix sh- (~ zh-) may also reflect Lat. ex-. This of course doesn't
exclude the possibility that some instances of <sh-> reflect a prefix of
native origin (perhaps even the same *h1eg^s- that appears in Latin).
I'm not sure where z- (~ s-) comes from (I have no access to Çabej's
classic study of Albanian prefixes; Cimochowski gives the earlier form
as *dz- ~ *ds- but doesn't explain it further). At any rate, *(k)sun- is
a most unlikely source -- the initial would not have developed into
Albanian /s-/ or /z-/.
PSl. *sU(n)- (*so~- in old compound nouns) is most likely the same thing
(modulo apophony) as Skt. sa(m)-, Germanic *sam- and Gk. (h)a-, namely
PIE *som- 'together, with'. There are some perfectly parallel forms like
PSl. *so~logU (< *som-logHo-): Gk. alokHos (< *sm.-logHo-) 'bedmate,
spouse' or PSl. *so~dU 'trial, judgement' < *som-dHh1-o- 'putting
together, confrontation', as in Skt. sandHi-, sandHa-.
In some Slavic languages, including Polish, the prepositions and
preverbs *sU 'with' and *iz 'out (of)' have merged phonetically as s- ~
z- ~ zV-, and the original contrast of meaning has consequently become
blurred. They have to all intents and purposes fallen together as one
preposition/preverb with several different meanings.
Piotr