Re: [tied] IE *de:(y)- 'bind'.

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan" <proto-
language@...> wrote:

> Patrick writes:
>
> You are absolutely right. I grabbed a copy of Krahe, who begins

listing present tense forms right after he illustrates the imperfect
tense inflection, and a quick look produced 2+2=5.

>
> If the *-i does not occur in the imperfect, it is unsupportable

to regard it as durative.

>
> I apologize for wasting your time with speculation based on

imperfect recollection.

> ***

Fair enough, as long as you don't insist. No harm has been done.

JER:

> Where do you actually find "*k^el- 'incline'"? This is supposed

to

> be an empirical science, not a game where you can just imagine
> things. To keep my interest, you should now point to some actual
> material that points in the direction you say: What observations
> convinced you that this is as you say?
>
> ***
> Patrick writes:
>
> You really gave me a start. I thought: have I trusted to memory

again and made a blooper? or misinterpreted something?

>
> Thank goodness, on page 552 of Pokorny's Volume I, I thankfully

read:

>
> "2. k^el-, 'neigen"
>
> AHD has it on page 1522 as "kel-6. To lean, tilt"
>
> Pokorny has a good half page of derived forms so there seems

little realistic doubt as to its existence. He also notes: "Basis
der viel reicher entwickelten Wurzelf. ^klei-, 'lehnen' (s. unten)".

>
> If I felt it necessary to reconstruct a form that Pokorny or

some recognized authority did not acknowledge, rest assured, that I
would identify it as such.

>
> Whether you wish to question Pokorny's choice to list it or not,

I did not "just imagine things". And, I promise you, I will not if I
can avoid it.

> ***

Aha! I was not aware of that. This could indeed be construed as a
case of an extended root. But you still have not shown that the
final consonant of *k^ley- adds a durative note. The short root
*k^el-, if it really exists, is not known to form underived verbs,
so we can't know whether it would be a root aorist or a root
present. For *k^ley- we know it forms a root aorist in blatant
conflict with your claims.

>
> > When PIE started forming roots in *CVC, any *CVC that

reflected

> an earlier stem extension of a *CV root, would have been
> lexicalized, and redefined as an aorist/injunctive.
>
> And what is *that* statement based on?
>
> ***
> Patrick writes:
>
> The extraordinary lengths to which IE seems constrained to form

presents.

I do not even understand the English of that sentence, What do you
mean?

> And, the root-aorist.

Yeah, what about them?

> This is not only a pattern in IE but also in Sumerian, where

durative/present notice require endings not needed for the
aorist/past.

>
> Same for Egyptian: the oldest and simplest sDm=f form is a past

narrative.

Not necessarily so for IE: An unmarked stem is a root aorist only in
the case of roots with inherently punctual semantics; with such
roots the durative ("present stem") must be marked (by
reduplication, nasal infixation, *-ye/o-, or suppletion). If the
semantics of the root is durative in itself, the unmarked root is
used as a root present without any further marking; in that case the
punctual aspect ("aorist") must be marked (by *-s-, reduplication,
or suppletion).

>
> And theoretically, also. I believe that nouns preceded verbs as

a category in all these languages. And in all these languages,
singular is unmarked, which ties into a punctual (aorist) verb
simple form.

> ***

I do not see the relevance of that statement. What do you mean?

> For these pre-Nostratic roots, I think the only formant that

could explain *H in most cases is *?a, stative.

Why are you so occupied with explaining something which ot most does
not demand an explanation at all? All we see is a root having a
total of three consonants; there are many of those, and the fact
that they exist does not pose a problem or call for an analysis.
This is not affected in any essential way by the fact that one or
the other of the consonants of *deH1y- fails to show under special
conditions which are just regular points of neutralization. You need
to demonstrate that some of the material of the root *deH1y- is not
used in forms where it *could* have been present. Only in the case
of a serious demonstration of that kind can I seriously cobsider
ascribing morphematic status to some of the material appearing in
the longer root form. I have not seen any such demonstration. I have
read and listened to hundreds of attempts at proving such analyses,
but it has been just too pitifully easy to dismantle them.

>
> However, having former a stative, the root was redefined as *CVC

in PIE so that *deH- (and *daH-, etc.) were only felt as statives
selectively; and became lexicalized. Under those circumstance, a
*CVH- root was regarded as full par with another root that might be
*CVr-, *CVn-, *CVl-, using other (originally) formants, or *CVbh-.

I do not understand these sentences, could you rephrase?

> One has only to look at Slavic to realize that inflection has

been heaped on weakened inflection heaped on weakened inflection.

What are you thinking of in Slavic that makes you say that, and what
relevance does it have here?

> I saw 'scarce' and assumed incorrectly that you were referring

to its distribution rather than its meaning. I also grant that with
this meaning, di:ná- is surely to be derived from *daHy-.

I'm afraid that's not safe either. Actually Mayrhofer, following
Kuiper, tentatively derives it from "DAY1" of Ved.
dayate 'zerstören, zerfallen lassen', not with DA:4 'divide' (ava-
dyati) which I posit as *deH2y-. I'm sorry about the hasty report of
what is in fact confusing. The root is "DAY1" is said to be IE
*deyH1- seen also in Gk. deilós 'timid, miserable'. The meanings of
di:ná- given are "spärlich, seicht, nicht tief (Wasser); schwach,
gering". The gloss 'scarce' is the first meaning given by Monier-
Williams. If the root is *deyH1-, its zero-grade should of course be
*diH1- without any problems, and then the word has no connection
with a long-diphthong root.

>
> But as you point out, *-no would produce an identical form from

*deHy-.

>
> Also, Pokorny was no man's fool, would he not recognize as I

instantly do, that the semantics most logically connect this form
with *daHy-?

>
> Could there be another di:ná- with a meaning appropriate to

*deHy-? Perhaps not. That would be a smudge on Pokorny's sleeve,
would it not?

The question has been messed up now to the point that is has lost
its meaning.

> But respectfully, I think you have forgotten the purpose for

which di:ná was introduced into the discussion.

>
> If di:- represents the zero-grade of *deHy-, and I grant that it

does, and that is why _I_ introduced it, why do we _not_ find it
reflected in dyánti, where we expect zero-grade + -ánti? Would not a
zero-grade di:- + ánti produce **di(y)ánti?

> ***

It might, but doesn't have to, for the rule governing it makes
allowances. In this case it actually does: the single Rigvedic
attestation <adyas> is metrically [adi(y)as], just as you want it to
be. That can certainly not be construed to show that your
expectations are *not* met.

>
> > ***
> > Patrick wrote:
> >
> > 'Fraid you'd say that.
>
> It's up to you to give a different impression if you want us to
> have that. You can't just say that you wished there were

evidence to

> show that the alleged zero-grade alternants of *deH1y- point to

*di-

> and not to the *d&1y- you expect, you ought to point to such
> evidence. And when informed that "-&y-" just never occurs
> unambiguously in Indo-European, you ought to do better than

insist

> on some ambiguous reconstructions. The world has moved on since
> Pokorny who certainly wrote a masterful book, and one that can

still

> be used today if only one knows how to adjust its information.

We do

> not do any services to good scholarship if we refuse to face the
> very possibility that progress that has been achieved since the
> publication of a handbook half a century old. Since I am the

author

> of some of the analyses and rules that are claimed to be

instances

> of real progress in the present matter I of course ought to show
> some restraint in evaluating them. But I cannot accept that they

are

> being brushed aside to make way for alternatives that are based

on

> no serious evidence at all.
>
> ***
> Patrick writes:
>
> On your first point, di:ná- points to a zero-grade form of

*da/eHy- so I have demonstrated that.

If you mean that you have demonstrated that di:ná- shows *-&y- with
vocalized laryngeal (schwa) followed by /y/ with which the schwa
forms a diphthong, that just is not correct. Where laryngeals appear
in the environment CHyV, i.e. between a consonant and a
consonantal /y/, the /y/ is vocalized and the laryngeal is kept
consonantal.

> And, in Old Indian at least, it is *di:- before consonants.

It may sometimes be, but mostly it is /di-/, reflecting IE *dHi-
before voiced consonants, and *d&- before /t/. Forms with /i:/ may
be analogical on the full-grade alternant which has /a:/: The na:-
verbs have active -ná:-ti, middle -ni:-té, reflecting IE *-né-H-ti,
mid. *-n-&-tór.

>
> Of course, in dyáti, we need a zero-grade before a vowel. First,

we might ask why we want a zero-grade here. In dyánti we expect zero-
grade; in the third person singular, we normally expect full-grade,
is that not correct?

That depends on what present type it is. This is a class VI present,
the type tudáti, tudánti. That is generally explained as a
thematicization of an old root aorist.

> I would be very interested to know why that is not the case in

the third person singular if you have a good idea.

>
> We have the form Old Indian gáyati, 'sings', from *geHy-. This

seems to me to be the natural response of *CVHy- to a thematic third
person singular. Why is it different?

'Sing' forms the present stem gá:ya- from *géHy-e-. The Sanskrit
root vowel is long.

> Now I have _repeatedly_ asked you why we see an apparent zero-

grade in the third person singular form and you seem to be avoiding
an answer. Why is that?

Because it is a class VI present stem.

> Progress is in the eye of the beholder, is it not? I think that

progress would constitute looking beyond PIE to Nostratic and
earlier. You do not. Am I seeing the future or only my own
reflection in the mirror? Only time will tell.

I do indeed see potential progress brought about by looking beyond
into Nostratic, but one cannot "explain" the obscure by obscuring it
even further. If your insight into Nostratic has enabled you to see
rules and connections of an enlightening kind, you should be able to
show us that. One does that by pointing to actual observations and
explaining their relevance. I have not seen you make any attempt at
anything of this nature. Until some sensible-looking evidence is
produced I certainly refuse to give priority to what must appear to
be just empty assertions over the results of enduring and careful
analysis applied to the linguistic material we *can* handle.

> I absolutely deny that my alternatives are based on "no serious

evidence at all".

Then it's time to produce some. You may talk here.

Jens