--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski
<piotr.gasiorowski@...> wrote:
[On Olsen's thesis: VH1/2t > PIE Vth, often dubbed "IE
preaspiration"]
> I'd like to discuss it, actually. It's ingenious, but I have my
doubts.
> One uneasy aspect of this explanation, as far as I'm concerned, is
that
> it depends so heavily on the testimony of Latin (<po:culum> vs.
> <pa:bulum>), but doesn't work consistently even there.
It does not work consistently anywhere, nor do most other laws. The
preaspiration event is nowhere productive, but is only retained as
an archaism. It may have much the same status as the Narten ablaut
which is completely recessive. There are archaic forms
reflecting /th/ in all languages that can show the difference, and
everywhere is unaspirated /t/ the productive form. Even the form
with /th/ comes in two flavours, actually, for the preceding vowel
may be left short by the absorption of the laryngeal in the process,
or it may surface long because the laryngeal has been restored. Even
the variant with absorbed laryngeal may restore unaspirated /t/, so
that we get forms like *bhuto- and restored *bhuH-to- instead of
**bhuH-tho- which does not seem to exist.
> Apart from the
> *-tlom- suffix and the suggested interpretation of <ple:b-> (and
Gk.
> ple:tHu-) as *pleh1-tw- (I have to say I particularly like this
one), is
> there any independent reason for thinking that *tH developed into
a
> voiced sound in Latin?
The showpiece is the suffix -idus of the participle of stative
verbs, e.g. albidus from something in underlying *-e-H1-to- which
apparently developed through *-etho-, whence *-e{th}o- > *-e{dh}o- >
*-edo- > -ido-. The objection that an "archaic form" like
ace:tum 'vinegar' does not show the "productive form" of
acidus 'sour' misses its point because the participles in -e:tus all
belong to verbs in -e:scere, not -e:re, the two types having
standardized their participles in different manners.
If rota is a Celtic loanword, radius is free to reflect *-th-. With
the rounding of -brum/-bulum note verbum which may be *wr.thó- from
pre-PIE *wrH1-to- 'said', the root of Gk. eíro:, rhé:to:r.
> One has to resort to analogy to explain away
> quite a lot of counterevidence. OK, let's admit that *mah2te:r and
> *bHrah2te:r may owe their unaspirated *t to the analogy of
*p&2te:r and
> *dHug&2te:r (already in PIE).
My personal hunch (not perhaps Birgit's) is that 'mother'
and 'brother' are hereby seen not to contain laryngeals. What does
it matter? The words are not analyzable anyway. On the other hand,
if 'mother' and 'brother' had had aspiration we would have used it -
but then the rule would have been known and accepted already.
> But why don't we ever find *-to:r or
> *-tr-ih2- with reflexes of *tH, in Latin or any other language
where
> they could be seen (Greek, Sanskrit)?
There are three possible answers: (1) The allomorphy has been
obliterated by generalization of the productive form with /t/; (2)
there are restrictions to the rule so that some word-types, yet to
be defined, fail to develop aspiration; (3) the rule is completely
wrong. Given the residual status of the aspirated tenues I see no
reason not to opt for (1), but I keep an open mind for (2); on
balance, (3) is in my eyes hardly a serious option anymore.
> Lat. terebra apparently shows
> vocalised *&1 (if what we see in the second syllable is a
laryngeal at
> all). What is it analogous to? *tr.h1-tro-, unattested in Latin?
The aspiration is inherited from Indo-European so it does not matter
one bit whether or not an alternant survives in Latin itself. The
form of terebra is actually relatively consistent, for the
collective must have had regularly zero-grade, so the "a-stem"
variant should actually have aspirated stop, i.e. PIE *tr.(H1)-thrá-
H2, with sg. *tér&1-tro-m.
> What
> about <stabulum>, where vocalised *&2- must be assumed?
That would be quite regular as *stá-thlo-m from pre-PIE *stéH2-tlo-
m.
> Slavic has generalised *-dlo-. Since it's hard to believe that
Slavic *d
> should have developed out of *tH, you seem to be suggesting that *-
dlo-
> is a reflex of *-tlo- (with assimilatory voicing?).
There *are* potential indications of *H1t > (Balto-)Slavic /d/, but
it is hard to assess their value for sure: *tvIrdU 'hard' from
*twr.H-tó- 'fenced in', *re^dUkU 'rare' from *reH1-tu-. Another
candidate is OPr. wirda- 'word'.
> However, apart from
> this morpheme, old *tl survives unchanged in Slavic, and even in
the
> instrumental suffix we have occasional traces of *-tlo- in words
with
> obscured morphological divisions: *veslo 'oar' (which I'd suggest
comes
> from *vez-tlo < *weg^H-tlom), *c^islo 'number' < *c^it-tlo, *teslo
> 'adze' *tes-tlo < *tek^T-tlom (there are only isolated traces of
> *-tro-).
These are not examples of *-tl- between vowel or between laryngeal
and vowel. I don't think much can be based on l-participles with -d-
lU, -t-lU (except if an expected -tl- surfaces as -dl- which I have
not seen).
> Isn't it more realistic to assume that Balto-Slavic had both
> *-tla- and *-d(H)la-, and that either the one or the other was
> generalised in the descendant groups? Which of course would mean
PIE
> *-tlo-/*-dHlo-.
We are trying to decode reality, not prescribing it. We have many
cases of unrealistic reality in linguistics. To me, this does not
look like a setting with room for *-dh-. And, to turn the table,
what would be the environment in which *-dh- belonged? There just
seem to be *no* examples of voiced-aspirate-final roots forming
instrument nouns in Latin -bulum/-bula or -brum/-bra. That is quite
a bit weaker than the position of the thesis stipulating aspiration
after consonantal aspirating laryngeals which can really point to
positive examples.
Let me add that Birgit is very pleased that her rule has received
some open-minded attention. Before now she had only met colleagues
looking the other way unwilling to enter into any kind of debate. I
convey her thanks, adding my own "im Interesse der Wissenschaft".
Jens