Re: Accusative was allative

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, mcv@... wrote:

> tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
> > pre-PIE was an OV-language. Therefore a subordinate clause came
> > before the main clause and had this structure (eg. as this one
> > serving as NP in the following main clause):
> >
> > <noun>erg.-suffix <noun>abs.-suffix <finite verb><nominalising
> > relative suffix> <main clause> (= O V)
>
> Well, my interpretation is completely different...
>
> I think accusative *-m comes from, as you write above, a <relative

suffix>, in fact from a relative pronoun in the oblique case.

>
> The available constructions would have initially been something

like the following:

>
> A. <unmarked> [man I-see] "I see (a) man"
> B. <marked> [man whom I-see] "The man that I see"
>
> (B) was then reinterpreted as [man-whom I-see], i.e. [man-ACC I-

see], denoting a definite object: "I see the man". This is still the
function of the *m-accusative in Uralic and Altaic. In PIE, the
construction with *-m completely replaced the unmarked construction
(A), at least for animates.

>

I don't get it. A must be a sentence and B a noun phrase. Are you
saying that a noun phrase was reinterpreted as a sentence? That
sounds rather mysterious to me.

> Note that this implies a phase with zero marking of acc. (and nom.)

singular in a pre-stage of IE, Uralic and Altaic.

>
> From the formal point of view, the suffix appears as *-m in Uralic

and *-b in Altaic, i.e. the same variation that we find in the 1st.
person singular pronoun. In Indo-European, besides nominal *-m, the
suffix appears as *-mé ~ *-wé after the personal pronoun roots (sg.
*m-é ~ **mé-me [> *méne], *t-wé ~ *té-we, *s-wé ~ *sé-we, du. *n.h3-
wé, *uh3-wé, *sphé [< *s(w)h3-wé], pl. *n.s-mé, *us-mé, *s-mé). In
view of this, we can reconstruct the suffix as IE/Alt. *mu-á, Ural.
*m-á (cf. 1st. person pronoun IE/Alt. *mu-, Ural *mi), an oblique (*-
a) form of the relative/interrogative pronoun *mV "what, which" (in
PIE, this pronoun has been replaced by the pronoun *ku- > *kW-is ~
*kW-os).

>
> In Georgian, this same pronoun *mV is the basis of the ergative

case (OGeo. -man > -ma), i.e *ma- + ergative suffix *-n.

>
> The Eskimo-Aleut genitive/ergative in *-m may also be based on *ma.

I can't say the idea doesn't sound appealing to me, since I can hitch
it up with the idea of a Wanderwort *m-n- "man; thought; mound; what
remains" spreading with some type a religion believing in an
afterlife spreading with an agricultural revolution.

Torsten