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

From: Miguel Carrasquer
Message: 36706
Date: 2005-03-11

On Fri, 11 Mar 2005 12:33:21 +0000, elmeras2000
<jer@...> wrote:

>
>
>--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Miguel Carrasquer <mcv@...> wrote:
>
>> >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 mean that in my view of Slavic accentology, any acute root
>> in a non-mobile paradigm attracts the accent, even if
>> unaffected by Hirt's law. Let's call it the "jábloko-rule".
>
>This is important. Could you rehearse the main evidence for such a
>rule? What shows that the accent has been moved in jábloko?

Mobile root (PBS *abó:l => obuoly~s etc.) (a.p. c),
immobilized by stressed (dominant) suffix *-kó(m) (=> a.p.
b). Stress retracted to Winter acute: a:bUlkó > a"bUlko (=>
a.p. a).

The main evidence. Where shall I begin?

Acutes caused by Winter's law (so no Hirt):
sed-téi > sê"sti
ed-téi > ê"sti
beg-ah2-téi (Hirt)> beg-a"-ti > bê"gati
beg-non-téi > bê"gnoNti
vid-eh1-téi (Hirt)> vidê"ti > vi"dêti
(in mobile ê-verbs the rule doesn't work:
beg-eh1-téi (Hirt)> bêz^ê"ti, idem sêdê"ti)

Double retraction:
Cases like seh1i-ah2-téi (Hirt)> sêja"ti > sê"jati, rê"zati,
etc.

Failure of Hirt's law due to laryngeal breaking (*i/uH2/3):
byla` (but by"ti)
vila` (but vy"ti)
gnila` (but gni"ti)
pila` (but pi"ti)
z^ila` (but z^i"ti)

Failure of Hirt's law due to euH, eiH, etc.:
c^u"ti (*keuh1-), du"ti (*deuh2-), rju"ti (*h3reuH-), etc.
(there are a handful of exception in mobile verbs with *erH,
*eNH: derti`, sterti`, perti` and peNti`, teNti`).

>> [...]
>> >> 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.
>>
>> Absolutely not. You are right of course that Narten-forms
>> are closely connected to the o/e-Ablaut I describe above.
>> They are different aspects of the same thing.
>>
>> Actually, most of the phenomena falling under "Narten" are
>> equally well described as cases of o/e-Ablaut according to
>> my definition above. For instance, if we look in LIV for
>> verbal forms classified as "acrostatic root presents", that
>> includes:
>>
>> (1) forms that show /e/ in otherwise weak paradigms (e.g.
>> the middle);
>> (2) forms that have /a:/ in Indo-Iranian in an open
>> syllable, not after a palatal.
>>
>> These might as well be cases of o/e-Ablaut.
>>
>> We are left with a relatively small but important group that
>> shows strong forms with /e:/ and weak forms with zero or /e/
>> (Ved. dá:s.t.i, má:rs.t.i, rá:s.ti, s'á:sti, tá:s.t.i;
>> ks.n.áuti, stáuti; perhaps some forms with BS /e:/, like
>> sêkoN, smêjoN, tré.s^kiu).
>>
>> These forms reflect a lengthened vowel *i:, which regularly
>> develops into /é:/ under the stress. That there are much
>> fewer cases of /e:/ than there are of /o/ is as expected,
>> given that /o/ is the result of the lengthening of both */a/
>> => /a:/ > /o/ and */u/ => /u:/ > /o/, while only */i/ =>
>> /i:/ gives /e:/. In the weak grade, we would expect *i: and
>> *u: to give zero, while *a: gives /e/. In practice, there
>> has been some levelling (zero grade in má:rs.t.i, mr.jánti;
>> stáuti, stuvánti; but /e/-grade in e.g. tá:s.t.i
>> [*té:tk^-ti], táks.ati [*tétk^-n.ti]).
>>
>> The levelling may have affected the expected Ablaut of roots
>> with original *u (o ~ zero) even more, at least I can't
>> think of a good example right now (the o ~ 0 Ablaut of the
>> perfect must explained otherwise). Presumably, there was a
>> tendency to unite the three expected Ablaut grades (o ~ e, o
>> ~ 0 and e: ~ 0) into either o ~ e or e: ~ e.
>>
>> There is one instance where perhaps Narten is endangered by
>> something you proposed, namely the explanation of Vedic 1sg.
>> past middle -i as from reduced *-h2. If we compare the
>> behaviour of the element *-e- added to the stative endings
>> *-h2, *-th2 etc. in the middle versus the
>> perfect/hi-conjugation, we see that this *-e- always carries
>> the stress in the middle forms (*-h2ái, *-th2ái, *-ói,
>> *-ntói, leaving the root in zero grade), while in the
>> perfect it is unstressed in the singular (o-grade + *-h2e,
>> *-th2e, *-e), but stressed in the 1/2 plural (zero-grade +
>> *-mé, *-té or something similar), and appears to be absent
>> in the 3pl. (perhaps expected *-né (*-ré) was replaced by
>> *-én > *-ér(s) here). But if -i indeed comes from *-&2 (I
>> would actually prefer *-h2-i, but that's not the point),
>> then perhaps the element originally behaved similarly in
>> both middle and perfect, and the middle singular once
>> regularly had e-grade and stress on the root, before it was
>> polarized as an end-stressed form. In that case, "Narten
>> middles" are in fact archaisms unrelated to the rest of the
>> Narten system. If my analysis of the middle vs. the
>> perfect/hi-conjuation is correct ("I have to X" vs. "I have
>> X'ed"), we wouldn't expect "lengthened grade" (e: or o) in
>> the middle anyway.
>
>You have lost me completely here. We are just not communicating;
>seems a pity.

What don't you understand?

My hypothesis was that the stative endings (*-h2, *-th2,
etc.) [originally an enclitic copula "I am", "you are",
etc.] when extended with the element *-e can roughly be
translated as "I have", "you have", etc. (by way of a "mihi
est" construction). When added to a verbal form that we can
roughly render as a past passive participle, we get the
perfect/stative "I have X'ed", and when added to a kind of
infinitive, we get the middle "I have to X" (for
involuntary, accidental and other acts over which the
subject has no control). We can see by the endings that the
middle and the stative are related, but I have never seen an
explanation that made sense and could be summarized in a few
words of *why* that is so. I think this one makes sense,
and can be summarized summarily as: "the endings mean "to
have"."


=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...