> 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, more or less. It is because the same pattern can be detected in Greek
and Sanskrit (and other languages) that it is indisputably original, not an
invention by Indo-Iranian.
Greek zero grade is often found in older aorist forms (so-called second
aorist)
leipo gives zero grade aorist e-lip-on
guna grade in Sanskrit can come from either e grade or o grade. Both are
found in Greek:
leipo present le-loip-a perfect
vrddhi grade is a long diphthong. It has several origins, but is harder to
trace in Greek, because of Osthoff's law, which said that all long
diphthongs were reduced to short ones (i.e. vrddhi grade was reduced to
guna). Indo-Iranian provides the only direct evidence for these long
diphthongs, but sometimes traces of them can be reconstructed elsewhere, eg
in certain case forms.
Peter