[tied] More prefixes. Was Re: Eggs from birds and swift horses

From: Exu Yangi
Message: 30988
Date: 2004-02-12

>From: "Brent J. Ermlick" <brent3@...>
>
>In article <02eb01c3f091$02d5dc40$3866fe96@...> Piotr
>Gasiorowski <piotr.gasiorowski@...> wrote:
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "elmeras2000" <jer@...>
> . . .
> >> do not matter. A derivative from that source with the "funny o" should
>have
> >> this element prefixed, thus forming *o-H3w-i-o-m 'something from a
>bird'.
> . . .
> > It seems a plausible solution was already available, only I failed to
>make a
> > possible connection between your *o prefix/infix and this funny long
>*o:.
>
>I'm slightly bothered by the paucity of prefixes in PIE. The only other
>prefix
>that I know of offhand is the negative *n-.

How about s-, the s-called "s mobile".

Just to throw up a bit of mud, I wonder sometimes if, perhaps at an older
stage of the language, the grammar was more infixonial. That is, like
Hittite -ni(n)- so we get roots CVC- becoming CVni(n)C-. Because of their
early split, the Anatolian languages often preserve what the rest have lost,
although the only ACTIVE infix in Hittite that I know of is -ni(n)-

Prime candidates might be the "misterious" volwel lengthening (currently
attributed to stress or surd/sonant consonants or the dark of the moon)
which could be (HERETIC WARNING: DO NOT REAL THE FOLLOWING TWO WORDS IF YOU
ARE NOT ABLE TO THINK HERETICAL THOUGHTS) infixed laryngeals. There is a lot
of evidence to think they were not, but that has been wrong before.
Anomalies usually conceal things of great historical importance, and that
particular one just begs to be explained. By the time of the anatolian
break-off, the only active infix was -ni(n)-, but I have never heard of
another infix-using language which had only one infix. Possible, but
unlikely.

A good, solid examination of the corpus looking for detritus of this type
might be interesting.

Phil Wayne
exuyangi@...

>--
>Brent J. Ermlick Veritas liberabit uos
>brent3@...

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