[tied] Re: Mi- and hi-conjugation in Germanic

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Miguel Carrasquer <mcv@...> wrote:

> >> What I object
> >> to, with Jasanoff, is the completely arbitrary and
> >> rigour-less way in which reduplication or lack of it is
> >> handled in "standard theory". The Hittite hi-conjugation is
> >> seen as a dereduplicated perfect, in spite of the fact that
> >> reduplication is not otherwise lost in Hittite, even in
> >> forms clearly associated with the perfect, like wewakta.
> >
> >I do not think there is any particular lack of rigour in the
> >conservative theory. wewak- is every bit as much of a loner as

beben

> >is in German and ded-/da:d- are in Balto-Slavic.
>
> Jasanoff makes a good case for it being a pluperfect. Now a
> pluperfect presupposes a perfect. And it's striking that we
> see the same thing in Hittite as in Gothic (perfect wak-,
> pluperfect wewak-, just like Goth hait-, preterit haìhait-).

I am quite convinced wewakta *is* a pluperfect. That also convinces
me that wewakki is a perfect, but one of present meaning. That is
not really pertinent evidence in a discussion of perfects that have
developed a preterite meaning. Is your quote "perfect wak-" from
Jasanoff's book?

> >One can say without
> >any appalling degree of latitude that reduplication was lost in
> >particular categories which invite identification with the

perfect.

> >In Germanic it was then lost wherever it was dispendable, which

it

> >was in staig, naut, band, bar, gaf, while it was transformed in
> >fo:r, strategies which could not work phonetically in haihald,
> >haihait which then retained it. The Hittite thing is even easier,
> >for the claim is not that the hi-conjugation continues the

perfect

> >directly; the claim is that verbs with o-vocalism (or vocalisms

that

> >were identified with o-vocalism) used the endings of the perfect

in

> >their preterite
>
> What about the present?

The present of the hi-conjugation is based on the preterite use of
the perfect endings, so that analogical primary endings were made to
function in the present. The same analogy must have worked when
aorists were continued as preterites and created presents by analogy
with verbs that had inherited both present and imperfect.

> >, the product being the root-form of the underlying
> >verb followed by the endings of the perfect. It would be like

Latin

> >spondeo spopondi, adjusted to pf. *spondi. I can't for the life

of

> >me see what is terrible with this scenario. For the Balto-Slavic
> >facts I have even added rigor by advocating a conservative
> >derivation from reduplicated intensive structures like *ml-mólH-
> >/*mél-mlH-, which I have supported by the evidence of the accent:
> >the action of Hirt's law demands an asyllabic laryngeal, which

can

> >only be supplied in *molH- if this was earlier reduplicated.
>
> Doesn't work for me.

I don't understand you. Do you mean it does not work for you because
you refuse to posit a reduplicated form, or do you mean it would not
work even if you did reduplicate the protoform?

> >I also see dereduplication in the Hitt. sk-verbs which are
> >iterative; I can understand an iterative function on the basis of
> >earlier reduplication, but not so well from the sk-form itself

which

> >was inchoative. I can then also understand the lack of syllabic
> >reflex of the laryngeal in zikizzi from *dhH1-sk^é- if this is

from

> >earlier *dhi-dhH1-sk^e-.
>
> Melchert claims that laryngeals do not syllabize in
> Anatolian (although I'm not sure I agree).

I know, I'm still waiting for an argument. And if they didn't, what
is it that is reflected in so similar fashion in the other
languages? Just nothing?

>
> >Most verbs that are reduplicated in Hittite
> >do not have transparent IE pedigrees and may then well belong to

a

> >later stage which is not relevant here.
> >
> >> The same goes for Tocharian: class III preterites and class
> >> V subjunctives are treated as dereduplicated perfects,
> >> despite the fact that Tocharian maintains the reduplicated
> >> aorist, and has reduplication in the perfect participle
> >> (kaknu/kekenu, etc.).
> >
> >So? Sbj. V shows general initial accent in B and so has

apparently

> >retained the reduplication. Can't reduplication be retained in

the

> >perfect participle and be lost in the finite forms of the perfect
> >that invaded the s-aorist?
>
> I don't suppport that scenario, but, certainly, it's
> possible that reduplication was lost in the Tocharian
> perfect. It's possible that it also happened in Germanic,
> and it's possible that it happened in Anatolian. It's
> possible that it happened in Slavic (e.g. bojoN, mogoN).
> But this tendency for reduplication to disappear in the
> perfect gets curiouser and curiouser with every new and
> different scenario that has to be set up to explain it.
>
> >> In LIV, Hitt. paddai, Lat. fodio and
> >> Slavic bodoN, bosti are derived, contrary to fact, from
> >> reduplicated *bhe-bhodhh2-, while the Slavic form is
> >> separated from its Baltic cognate Lith. bedù (besti)
> >> (supposedly from PIE *bhedhh2-e-). The same nonsense, but
> >> in reverse, is seen in the root "to grind", where Hitt.
> >> malli, Goth. malan and Lith. malù (málti) are derived from
> >> *me-molh2-, while Slavic meljoN, melti is derived from
> >> *melh2-. If we stick to the facts instead of preconceived
> >> notions, it should be obvious that neither *bhodhh2- nor
> >> *molh2- shows any reduplication anywhere, and that the
> >> alternation of o- and e-vocalism seen in Balto-Slavic is
> >> best explained as deriving it from the Ablaut o/e (sg.
> >> *bhodhh2- ~ pl. *bhedhh2-; sg. *molh2-, pl. *melh2-) which
> >> is in fact _attested_ in Hittite in this very same category
> >> of verbs.
> >
> >I do not feel responsible for LIV.
> >
> >One of the main reasons I cannot accept an original o/e ablaut in
> >the verb is that I cannot just copy it from the noun because I

have

> >an explanation for it in the noun, and the verb does not offer

the

> >conditions for that explanation. This is of course no problem to
> >those who have no explanation for the o/e ablaut anywhere, but

that

> >cannot really be put down as lack of rigour on my part.
>
> Indeed not. But I have an explanation for o/e ablaut which
> works for nouns and verbs alike: *ó is the reflex of an
> earlier lengthened vowel (**a:) under the stress, and *é
> results from the same lengthened vowel in pretonic position.

Then you don't have a place for /é:/ in the acrostatic paradigms.
You just killed Narten and now act innocent.

> Glen Gordon recently suggested here that lengthening of the
> root vowel was also a kind of reduplication (let's call it
> "glenuplication"), which is not bad concept in this context.

We are quite many who have said that over the years. We agree that
it deserves a place in the account that there are no lengthened-
grade reduplicated verbs, wherefore the underlying /e:/ looks very
much like the e:2-business of NW Germanic and some other cases of
reduplication leading more or less irregularly to long e-vowels.

> >The o/e
> >ablaut seen in the hi-conjugation is in my opinion well enough
> >explained from a reduced form of the intensive: *bhedh-bhódhH-
> >/*bhédh-bhdhH- -> *bhódhH-/*bhédhH-. The evidence for the exact
> >shape of the PIE intensive is not overwhelming, so if a squashed
> >variant *mélH- (reduced from *mél-mlH-) of PIE age helps I cannot
> >see it could not be accepted.
> >
> >> What this means for the relationship between the perfect and
> >> e.g. the hi-conjugation in Hittite is not entirely clear.
> >>
> >> Jasanoff sticks to the notion of the perfect as a
> >> reduplicated category (albeit originally with *o ~ *e
> >> Ablaut), which implies that the hi-conjugation is thus not
> >> simply derivable from the perfect. In fact, the perfect is
> >> derived according to Jasanoff from a certain hi-conjugation
> >> formation (the "stative-intransitive aorist") by
> >> reduplication. Apart from the fact that I find it
> >> impossible to explain Jasanoff's theory in one paragraph
> >> (it's much too complicated for that), it also fails to
> >> answer some of the obvious questions: what happened to the
> >> perfect in Hittite? Why do we not find reduplication in
> >> Germanic in formations that should be derived from the
> >> "classic" perfect (praeterito-presents, preterites from
> >> e-verbs), and why *do* we find reduplication in forms where,
> >> I think, we wouldn't expect it within the framework of
> >> Jasanoff's theory (the preterite of o-verbs, with o~e
> >> Ablaut)?
> >
> >I agree on most points. I would find it very strange to assume

that

> >Germanic man 'I remember' is not the same form as the synonymous
> >Lat. memini, Gk. mémona. For staig : haihait I think I have found
> >the answer (Osthoff excluding -o:-). You get close to a fine -o-/-

e-

> >ablaut in OE ha:tan heht if you count the vowel of the

reduplication.

>
> But the ugly truth is that the relict reduplicated forms in
> Anglian do not support the "dereduplication with contraction
> to e:2"-theory all that well. We have:
>
> la:can: leolc (vs. le:c)
> le:tan (læ:tan): leort (vs. le:t)
> re:dan (ræ:dan): reord (vs. re:d)
>
> What these forms actually suggest is that the e:2/eo/e does
> *not* originate in reduplication-with-contraction.

Do they not show the liquids twice? Is that not reduplication?

> [BTW, why is there no fracture in <heht>? There should be,
> if the form is old].

So <heht> is permitted to be not "old". Then why must the e-forms of
the hi-conjugation be?

> The van Coetsem theory, on the other hand, explains the NW
> Germanic facts quite elegantly.

Van Coetsem and you show a complete disregard for the complementary
distribution between the a-verbs of class VI and the a-verbs of
class VII. The a-verbs in class VII are those that could not form
the class-VI o:-type slo:h, fo:r, mo:l, ho:f, because they have
closed syllables: falthan, staldan, faNhan, ha:han, aikan, fraisan,
haitan, laitan, maitan, aukan. If you make the prestage of *fo:lth,
that also becomes *falth. Therefore nothing is gained by replacing
the reduplicated structure by the o:-form in this subgroup, so
faifalth lived on. I consider it extremely unelegant to have a
putative *far-/*fer- become far-/fo:r- if hait-/*heit- is retained.
Why would that be regulated by the root structure?

> >> The alternative would be to let go of reduplication as a
> >> necessary component of the PIE perfect, which is what I'm
> >> currently contemplating. I have no idea as yet whether
> >> that's a viable hypothesis and, if so, where it leads to.
> >> We'll just have to wait and see. Or shake one's head,
> >> whatever.
> >
> >I think we need original reduplication in the perfect; I actually
> >believe the reduplication is the cause of its o/zero ablaut.
>
> Well, I don't have that problem.

I don't regard that as a problem, rather a strength. A comprehensive
theory demands that there be reduplication in certain types, and lo
and behold, there really is. I don't think it's right if that counts
for nothing.

Another thing is of course that some of the cases of dereduplication
may have been accomplished in the protolanguage already. If a
structural reduction was on its way and its extent was part of the
lexicon, the double-headed result may have been generalized in one
form or the other in later stages. Maybe one should open up to such
possibilities that could make later coincidences less remarkable.

Jens