From: Richard Wordingham
Message: 34722
Date: 2004-10-17
--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "petusek" <petusek@...> wrote:
Alex:
> > >> No. I did not meant the gothic "ahwa" (BTW why are you
> > >> using the laringial notation here for *akWa?; my
> > >> Dictionary is not sure and means there can be *akWa or
> > >> *ak^wa:)
> > >> I have to remember where I seen some toponims/hydronims in
> > >> Germanic space where "afa" is present and it was
> > >> translated as "water".
Brian:
> > > You're thinking of names like <Wisilaffa> 1027 (the
> > > Wieslauf, in Württemberg), <Biberaffa>, <Askaffa>,
> > > <Waldaffa>, etc.?
Alex:
> > Looks like what I mean but I don't try to pay my money without
the
> adequate
> > explanation. I simply don't know, have to see.
Petusek:
> Why couldn't one imagine devoicing under the influence of the
unvoiced veral
> component? I.e. akwa > (akBa >) akFa > affa > afa
Richard:
Aren't we talking about the word Pokorny is talking of in his second
paragraph under *ab (root #2):
"Root / lemma: ab-
German meaning: `Wasser, Fluß'
Material: Lat. amnis f., später m. c(*abnis); air. ab (*aba) Gen.
abae `Fluß', daneben abann, cymr. afon, orn. bret. auon, gall. brit.
FlN Abona, abgeleitet cymr. afanc `Biber, Wasserdämon, Zwerg', mir.
abac (*abankos `Biber, Zwerg', schweiz.-frz. avan~ `Weide' (*abanko-
); lett. FlN Abava.
Die westdeutschen FlN auf -apa, nhd. -affa, gehen wohl teils
aufsonst verlorengegangenes westgerm. *ap- (idg. *ab-), teils auf
ven.-ill. ap- (idg. *ap-) zurück.
References: WP. I 46 f., WH. I 40, Feist 19a, 579a, GIPatSR. II 134."
A development *akW- > Germanic (not German) *af- is quite possible;
the conventionally posited route would be *akW- > *axW- (Grimm's
law) > *af-; development from **apW- would be even more appealing.
The point is that High German /ff/ arises from Germanic *p.
Petusek:
> As for theorisizing whether kW or k'W, if we find external (i.e.
non-IE)
> parallels or internal etym., we can easily decide, otherwise we
cannot. We
> have to admit both possibilities until oneof them gets completely
excluded.
Richard:
PIE *kW and *k^w (I take it k'W is a mistyping of k'w) have
different reflexes. *kW yields Centum /kw/ and Satem /k/. *k^w is
a cluster, and yields (generally) Centum /kw/ and Satem *k^ reflex +
w. The best known example of *k^w is in *ek^wos 'horse', which
yields Sanskrit as'va-. Another example of the cluster is in
*k^won 'dog', but complications arise with the zero grade.
There may be some confusion as to what 'W' means. The commonest
convention here is that when one would normally use a
superscript 'h'or 'w' in writing PIE, one uses a capital letter.
This convention is often carried over into Greek and other
languages, so one can immediately see, for example, when one is
talking about an aspirate rather than stop + h. As an independent
phonetic symbol, [W] is a voiceless labiovelar approximant, as in
strict English RP. (British English speakers variously pronounce
<wh> as [w], [W] or [hw].) Reverting to 'W', it is generally used
in a (pre-)PIE context to indicate labialisation, so one will see
*sW, *tW and *pW, particularly in Miguel's postings.
Richard.