From: Mate Kapovic
Message: 30110
Date: 2004-01-27
----- Original Message -----
From: "Glen Gordon" <glengordon01@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2004 4:51 AM
Subject: Re: The palatal sham :) (Re: [tied] Re: Albanian (1))
> It is far more difficult to theorize that there were multiple events of
> satemization than a single event. That's just good ol' fashioned
statistics.
> A typical isogloss map seems to show that it was a small area while
> centum languages are typically outliers, no?
I am not so sure. Please explain that. And I see no problem in multiple
satemization. There was a tendency to break the unstabile *k - *k' - *kw
system and some lgs did it by changing *k' to somekind of sibilant and some
by getting rid of palatalization. See for instance how Luwian and Hittite
which are in other things very close treated these differently.
> Only because they throw normal phonology right out the window and
> have little understanding of linguistics. Name a language that has no
> low vowel and I promise to cough of blood. Again, so rare that it's not
> considerable. Yes, Mate, it's possible just like a hydrogen bomb under
> the table... just not at all likely. So knock it off with the "but some
> quacks say such and such" derailment. Many people say a lot of things
> but the important thing is that it has to make sense given the evidence.
> ALL evidence, including important linguistic tendencies.
But you have to admit that the evidence for PIE *a is very slim. You may
theoreticize as much as you want but there is no real solid ground for PIE
*a. It is to say at least speculative and to use for proving the uvularity
of *k is even more speculative.
> Yes, you're right. I misplaced the Luwian palatalization evidence in my
> swiss-cheese head. However, it has no bearing on the validity of the
> uvular arguement.
Yes, as you and Miguel keep on saying... :-) But I think it does.
Mate