Re: [tied] Re: Eggs from birds and swift horses

> the surprising thing to
> me about the Latin imperfect subjunctive is not the /e:/,
> which is after all a Latin subjunctive morpheme in its own
> right.

Not as simple as that. In Latin it functions in one class of verbs verbs
as a subjunctive, and in two others as a future. It all these forms it
probably derives from the use of the thematic vowel as a marker of the
subjunctive, on a root which already has the thematic vowel.

We find it on an athematic vowel only in the verb to be: *es-e-s, *es-e-t
etc, which goes by regular processes to eris, erit etc, and functions as
the future of "to be".

In the 3rd and 4th conjugations we see the marker of the subjunctive (*-ye-)
followed by the thematic vowel. This gives the usual long vowel
subjunctives of Greek, and the long vowel futures of Latin.

The strange thing is the /s/. For the e:-form we would expect

> *es-e:-m, *es-e:-s > *erem, *ere:s, but we find in fact
> essem, esse:s.

Latin has exactly the simple thematic subjunctive that we see in Sanskrit:
PIE *es-e-s, *es-e-t etc
Skt asas, asat etc
Latin eris erit etc

So we can guess that if this simple thematic subjunctive is found, the long
form will not be.

>the forms of the Latin perfectum are all
> based on the perfect stem + corresponding forms of the verb
> "to be" (pf.subj. ama:v&- + sim, si:s > ama:verim, -eri(:)s;

An intersting theory, which goes a long way to explaining the anomolous -is-
in the perfect forms. But what is this form ama:v&? Where does the
laryngeal at the end come from? Do you mean it is extracted from the
ending of the 1 sg -Ha and generalised to all other forms? Another
explanation is that we have amav-is-yeH-m etc., based on old optatives.

> but it wouldn't be very
> surprising in itself if the impf.subj. were also based on
> verbal root + past subjunctive of *es-.

It would be very surpising. As I have said, there is no "past subjunctive".
There is only a subjunctive. You have to change the stem to get a time
reference.

>If the e:-form had
> reguralized the zero-grade of the root, the forms would have
> been *se:m, *se:s, *se:t, *se:mus, *se:tis, *se:nt, which is
> exactly what we find as the endings of the impf.subj. in the
> infectum. The verb esse itself secondarily added *e(s)- to
> that (as in the 2pl.pres. *stes > estis) for its independent
> forms (essem, esse:s), and those forms were then added to
> the perfectum stem to create the pqpf.subj.

Neat. I don't want to believe it (yet), but I admit it's neat!

Peter