Jens:
> I have added the rule that a long vowel in nominatives (and
> collectives) was shortened if the stem ended in two consonants (or
> perhaps before a cluster of three word-final consonants).
This is logical considering that stems ending in -CC- didn't occur
until after both Syncope and Szemerenyi Lengthening.
> The same shortening rule will also process the nom.pl. of 'foot'
> and 'night': 1. *pé:d-z-s > *pé::dzs > *pó:(:)dzs > *pódzs > *pódezs
> > IE *pódes, Gk. pódes, Ved. pá:das, Arm. otk'. 2. *né:kWt-z-s >
> *né::kWtzs > *nó:(:)kWtzs > *nókWtzs > *nókWtezs > IE *nókWtes, Gk.
> núktes, Lith. na~ktes, ON nættr.
This is of course completely nuts, unnecessary and overcomplicated.
MIE *-es (inheirited from Proto-Steppe *-it as attested in Uralic,
Altaic, EskimoAleut and Tyrrhenian) is simply expected to be **-&s
in eLIE after Syncope but there's a reason why it didn't.
The schwa however never materialized in the nominative plural because if
it had, it would subsequently merge with the singular nominative of
thematic stems with *-&-s. So *-es for good reason remained as it was.
It's origin is simple and straightforward in one sentence. If Rob is
going to believe any madness, let it be yours, Jens.
> The word *do(:)m-/*dem- is not easy. One would like to regard it as
> a root noun of *demH2- 'build' (Gk. démo., dédme:mai, neó-dme:tos,
> Doric -a:-). That provokes the question, where did laryngeal go in
> the gen. *dém-s?
The laryngeal is a transitivizing suffix as seen in *i-ex- "to go
somewhere". The verb root is ancient and appears to also exist in
Tyrrhenian as *tem-. The IE transitive suffix *-(e)x- is from ITyr
transitive *-h- yielding the Tyrrhenian passive *-he (Etr -cHe).
I observe a similar laryngeal correspondance in the collective suffix
(ITyr *-hWa; hence MIE *-hWa > IE *-x and Tyrrhenian *-ho > Etr -cHva,
-va).
Back to IE itself. Since *dom- presumably means "that which is
built", transitivity is not necessary in this passive construct since
we already know that something is being built... "a house". So I
wouldn't expect *-x- present here.
= gLeN