On Thu, 29 Jul 2004 13:23:53 +1000 (EST), Bromios King
<
bromiosking@...> wrote:
>Interesting.
>
>What is the process of chronos losing aspiration to become Kronos?
There is no such process.
>Another question! This one on Greek vowels. Do Greek vowels fit the zero, guna, and vriddhi pattern in word construction like Sanskrit? Could they be viewed this way?
Yes. Zero frade, full grade (gun.a) and lengthened grade
(vr.ddhi) can also be found in Greek, and both the Greek and
Sanskrit patterns are inherited from Proto-Indo-European
vowel gradation (Ablaut). There are some differences due to
the different ways in which the vowel and syllabic resonants
developed in Greek and Sanskrit. For instance, Sanskrit
merged *e and *o in closed syllables, but *o is reflected as
Skt. /a:/ in open syllables, which means that Skt. vr.ddhi
can correspond to either Greek o-grade or Greek lengthened
grade.
>And another one related. What is the IE system of vowel gradation in derived words? I'm thinking of the type like Kauravya from Kuru in the MBh,eg. What is the law governing these gradations?
The lengthened grade in derived words using the suffixes
-ya-, -a-, -i-, -(i)ka-, etc. (usually meaning "related to",
"derived from", "connected with") is a productive process in
Sanskrit (and I believe Indo-Iranian in general), but there
are fossilized traces of it elsewhere, suggesting that it
may have been a feature of PIE. A law is hard to give in
Sanskrit itself (some compounds have vrddhi, others not),
and as far as I know the situation isn't any clearer for
PIE. Maybe Jens Rasmussen here can provide some further
insights.
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...