Re: But where does *-mi come from?

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

>
> Some nominal and verbal suffixes are identical, as Alscher has

noted,

> e.g.
>
> locative *-i and primary *-i
> dative *-ei and middle *-oi
> 'locative' *-r and middle *-r
> [endingless locative and secondary?]
>
> Latin has a "double ablative", a dependent construction where a
> subject and a past pasticiple (*-tó-) of its verb are given ablative
> endings. Similar constructions exist in OCS (with dative) and

Sanskrit

> (several cases). Perhaps such a dependent construction is the origin
> of the mi-conjugation?
>

BTW the deictic character of the endings (*-mnw "at me", *-s "at him",
*-t "at it", *-r "somewhere") would explain why 1st and 2nd pl.
survived (not 'were taken over') from the hi-conjugation (but how -r
ended up in the hi-conjugation, I don't know).

Another thing: with a few exceptions the hi-survivors in Germanic are
modal verbs. That means they are constructed with an infinitive.
Placing the whole thing in a "double ablative" vel. sim. construction
would make the whole too complicated to understand; which I suppose is
why they never made the cross-over to the mi-conjugation.


Torsten