Re: [tied] Re: IE lexical accent

Me:

> Yes, "in your opinion" (aka "my idle assumption"). There is no *e: in
> either forms so you have to dream it up in order to get your results.

Jens:

> There certainly is an allomorph with /e:/ in the locative *pe:d-su 'at
> the feet' reflected in OIr. i:s and Alb. peùr-posh 'down'. Also, the
> Avestan loc.sg. daNm 'in the house' reflects a long vowel; thus there
> must have been a long-e: form somewhere in the inflection,

Amazing how you warp the original meaning of the statement into something
else and then cloud the issue. Yes, there are forms with *e: in IE itself!
I was clearly talking about the _underlying_ forms however in some
prestage of IE.

We've gone over *pe:d-su. It's a bare locative with *-su attached to it.
Originally being *pe:d for both the singular and plural, its length can
be explained simply by the fact that it is a monosyllabic word. Mono-
syllabic nominal forms are always given added length. This same rule
also explains a locative *de:m as well as the nominal origin of verbs
like *ste:u-. The word *ye:kWr is from an earlier noun *ye:kW and in this
respect differs a little from *wodr which derives from a _verb_ stem
*wed-.

> Everybody else also accepts that *o and *e are there, but see they are not
> alone. In 'foot' you have *po:d-, *pod-, *ped-, and *pe:d-. In 'man' you
> have *Hne:r, *H2ner- and *H2nr-. For some reason you pick *pod- and
> *H2ner- as underlying.

The reason is clear. The nominative is automatically lengthened. This
case then cannot give us the original vocalism. The accusative represents
the original vocalism. The weak cases are lesser cases that have reduced
vocalism in many paradigms. Ergo, they too cannot be taken as representing
original vocalism. Only the accusative is our best hope.

So yes, I pick *pod- (as reflected in *pod-m) and *xner- (as reflected
in *xner-m). The choice is clear unless you have a bias for this strange
length rule.


Me:

> Where on earth is the reflex of **wedns? Why isn't _this_ double-
> asterisked?

Jens:

> One might say the same about (*)*wedno's.

Hittite /widenas/

> If you accept *wedno's you would also accept *yekW-n-o's which has a
> nom.-acc. *ye':kW-r.

Yes. You have the reduction of *e: in the strong cases to *e and the
addition of *-os, not *-s, to the heteroclitic stem. With *wodr, the
genitive shows the root as *wedn-. The *e here is yet again representing
the reduced form of *o in the nominoaccusative *wodr and *-os is again
attached to the consonant-ending stem.

> That ought to count for something, making it a fair assumption that
> strong forms of such paradigm forms can have o- or e:-vocalism.

I never objected to that. However, lengthened stems are not original.

> Now, you have also told us a story about the nom.sg. of thematic stems
> in *-os, saying that this is in origin a misanalyzed genitive. I somehow
> got this backwards, it *is* hard to remember since there are no facts to
> tell one how the story was, it has to be remembered by heart.

At least you get it now. Excellent.


Concerning the thematic differences between dur. and aor.:

> There isn't. The thematic form of *kWe'r-t is *kWe'r-e-t, like that of
> *gWhe'n-t is *gWhe'n-e-t. The generally accepted reason we do not find
> the structure *kWe'r-e-t as an aorist injunctive is that the aorist
> subjunctive became a thematic present, not aorist.

Alright. Let me see if I understand correctly. You're saying that the
durative and the aorist were both athematic at one time. Are you
saying that the durative was marked with *-i while aorist wasn't?
So thematicizing the verb forms caused the subjunctive. This subjunctive
later came to form the thematic present. Is that it? Can you draw me
a pretty diagram?

> So you believe there was originally an athematic present and a thematiic
> present which were formally distinct but functioned the same? And also
> both an athematic aorist and a thematic aorist of identical function,
> which however coalesced phonetically?

No, I believe in simplicity. I feel that all verb forms were once
thematic, whether it was durative, aorist or perfect. The rule of Syncope
is that *e reduces to *a and *a becomes zero. So, the only reason that
some forms should come to be athematic and others not lies merely in
the vocalism of the thematic vowel. Duratives contained *-e- while the
aorists and perfects were given the disappearing *-a-. The differences
in vocalism between aspects is very reminiscent of Semitic grammar
coincidentally.

> If Finnish has had syncope, how is the rule to be formulated?

I don't know. You're the one theorizing it so get to it and theorize
something credible ;)


Me:

> Afterall, if the genitive had *-os in the singular, we should expect
> plural **-oses right?

Jens:

> Wrong, of course. The genitive plural should not have a nominative
> plural morpheme hanging on it.

That was my whole point. We don't find it which means that plurality
in the genitive is not original to the language like it is for the
nominative and accusative cases.


= gLeN