Re: [tied] Genitive/Thematioc confusion: The Rise of Feminines

Jens:

>> So you are positing thematic accusative singular *-o-m, athematic
>> genitive plural *-om.

Me:

>> No, you're being a jackass. Reread the posts.

Richard clarifying the source of the disagreement:

> I've reread them, and I don't think Jens has misunderstood this
> point. You wrote, in message 32625:
>
> 'In athematic declension, the accusative is *-m and the genitive
> plural is *-om. The thematic then is simply the product of thematic
> vowel plus the athematic endings. If you do the math, merely
> grafting the same endings *-m and *-om to thematic stems would
> otherwise produce a homophonous *-o-m.'
>
> I for one do not understood the side claim of -o- + -om = -om
> (thematic genitive plural) - it looks like an irrelevant mistake.

No, no, dammit no, you people! I was saying that that form DOESN'T
exist. It _WOULD HAVE BEEN_ homophonous if athematic *-m and *-om
were simply grafted to a thematic stem because the vowel of *-om
should disappear before the vowel of the stem. (For example we
see *-o-syo, not **-o-osyo and yet we can all agree that the
*s is from the athematic genitive *-os). It doesn't obviously, which
was my point. The fact that it DOESN'T means that they NEVER WERE
homophonous. That *-om is NOT the thematic genitive. For crying out
loud!

So to avoid the theoretical homophony, the genitive plural did the
same thing that the nominative plural did to avoid what would be
(BUT WASN'T) its merger with nominative singular. It acted like a
postclitic suffix. It kept its vowel. Ergo, *-o- + *-es > *-o:s
instead of expected (BUT NONEXISTENT) **-os.

I hope now that the capitalization will spoonfeed you to now read the
quote above PROPERLY this time as it was intended.

> You do seem to be claiming thematic accusative singular *-o-m,
> athematic genitive plural *-om. Perhaps you could clarify by an
> example, e.g. *owyom 'egg'.

Yes but please don't mix thematic and athematic together for no
reason. This, after other more real contortions of what I said, is
why I got bitchy in the first place. Why should 'egg' prove anything?


Richard:

> And you have a problem too if we don't understand you. Do you re-
> read your misinterpreted posts?

I promise to re-read from now on. [gLeN bows head in shame]


= gLeN