-osyo 4 (was: Nominative Loss. A strengthened theory?)

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

> >>Why can't *-(e/o)syo-d have been simplified by loss of /d/?
>
> Miguel:
> > Because I can't think of a (phonetic) mechanism that would
> > get rid of *-d.
>
> Hopefully, we will finally exhaust all possibilities of 'getting
> rid of some phoneme X' and return to our common sense (if there
> is any) that *-syo doesn't need to be anything other than with
> vowel final... ever! Hence *-syo < *-sya as always.

Common sense says that the *-yo has to be nominative. The only hope
for a version of Glen's analysis is that our common sense is warped
by the rarity, as opposed to non-existence of, of relative clauses
expressing genitive relationships in which the possessum, not the
possessor, is marked. Someone please remind me why Latin gentive
singular -ius in prononimal and similar stems isn't a dissimilated
form of *-syos in which the first /s/ is dropped.

> And perhaps now that Piotr has also stated that double-long vowels
> are exceedingly rare, we might all finally realize what I already
> know -- that Jens' use of double-long vowels in both IE and now
> Proto-Slavic shows how bizarre his tactic for problem solving

really

> is and grossly unbalances the actual statistics if he were correct.
> I've stated this rarity of double-long vowels for some time but
> because I'm the 'crazy' member of the Forum who is far too

delighted

> with such a glorious title to develop a more productive self-image
> for myself, no one has heeded my offerings of common sense. Oh

well.

Are double long vowels in Estonian a local development? My English
idiolect seems to have three vowel lengths - the vowels in _beat_
and _bid_ seem to be the same length! (These words are also
distinguished by vowel quality and voicing of the final consonant.)
Rare, but not impossible.