On Sun, 16 May 2004 16:43:29 +0000, elmeras2000
<
jer@...> wrote:
>--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Miguel Carrasquer <mcv@...> wrote:
>
>> In the pronouns, the oblique *-ey/*-oy often became a
>> nominative (as is normal in pronouns), replacing the old
>> nominative, which was *-esW/*-osW (the former still in *mesW
>> "we", *yusW "you"; the latter perhaps in Ved. -a:sas <
>> *-osW+esW).
>
>Do you really mean to equate the desinential part of nominatives
>like Vedic ay-ám and OLat. qoi, Celtic *kWei, Germ. *hwai (OE
>hwa: 'who') with the *-oy of the plural cases of pronouns and
>thematic nouns?
No. I equate the -e: in Vedic nom.pl. imé: with it.
The nom.sg. ay-(ám) has a different origin, although both
happen to have converged on the shape *ey.
The pronoun *is is peculiar in having a stem *i- in the
singular strong cases, *e- in the weak ones. My hypothesis
is that the root was *i (giving *i-z, *i-m, *i-d) with
oblique *i-a. The G, D/L, Ab/I were built on *iá- +
endings, with accent shift as expected, and absorption of *i
by a stressed thematic vowel, as elsewhere, giving *esyo,
*e(sm)i, *e(sm)ot etc. The unextended oblique *ía (> *íya)
regularly gave *éy (this is completely parallel to the
i-stem vocative *-ey), and this is seen in Vedic *ay-ám,
etc.
The plural forms were *i-átu > *és(W) and oblique *i-áti >
*éy.
So singular *ey (*ía > *íya > *íy > *éy) and plural *ey
(*iáti > *áti > *ác^ > *é3^ > *éy) are in origin very
different.
The unextended oblique (I like to call it "absolutive")
leads a rather marginal existence in PIE. We find it in
these rare nom.sg. pronouns in *-ey, and as the vocative in
nominal stems. It also functions as the basis of the
nominative plural, as is best seen in the i- and u-stems
(nom.pl. -ey-es, -ew-es).
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...