[tied] Re: Syncope

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

> Richard:
> > You don't get it because you've dropped the 'which'.
> > The analysis being considered is *tesyo = *tes + *yo. with
> > *tes meaning 'with him' and *yo meaning 'which'. The
> > question then becomes, 'Why is the relative not inflected?',
>
> Because it would be in IE itself, but not in earlier layers
> of IE when the modifier and modified did not agree in
> case. So *-yo is in the endingless locative, which it needs
> to have been declined in to have originally conveyed "_WITH_
> him" in the first place. In mLIE, it's *tasya (*ta-s + *ya).
> Later, confusion with the thematic paradigm caused the *e/*o
> alternation. Hence in IE itself, *tesyo is simply the new
> _genitive_ form and the locative nuance has been lost.
>
>
> > By the time of PIE *yo would have agreed with *pode in
> > gender and number.
>
> Yes, but not in mLIE and previous layers.

[I thought I had posted this, but I don't see it appearing.
Therefore I repeat it now.]

You don't know any of this, you are only issuing a decree without
any basis for it. Incidentally, you are dismissing the obvious for
no apparent reason other than fear of joining the enemy. The obvious
analysis is that the *-yo was indeed relative, and was originally
inflected, but gave up the inflection; that's what univerbated
concatenations tend to do over time. The form generalized may have
been the nominative singular masculine. In that case *wl.kWos-yo
*H1donts "the wolf's tooth" has originally meant "the tooth which
(is) the wolf's". The nom.sg.masc. of *yo- is of course not *yo, but
*yo-s, so we need to assume loss of the *-s. I suggest dissimilatory
loss in *te-syo-s > *te-s-yo just as in *so-s > *so 'that'.

Jens