Re: But where does *-mi come from?

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

> According to Dixon: 'Ergativity' the main way for ergative

languages

> to change into accusative languages is this:
>
> intransitive sentences
> (subject in the absolutive + verb)
> are not changed
> If the verb agrees with the subject, nothing's changed in that

respect

> either.
>
> transitive sentences
> (subject in the ergative + object in the absolutive + verb)
> are gradually replaced by a competitor sentence type (the anti-

passive)

> (subject in the absolutive + object in some case like allative +

verb)

> Ex hypothesi the verb agreed with the subject in intransitive
> sentences, so nothing's changed here either.
>
> Now the accusative has some remaining allative functions in IE:

Latin

> Romam etc. Finnish has a to-case in -n: Helsingin "to Helsinki",

also

> used as accusative, I believe. The PIE accusative might therefore

have

> been a pre-PIE allative.
>
> PIE nominative is part endingless, part has -s, most likely from

the

> deictic *so. The PIE nominative might therefore have been a pre-

PIE

> absolutive.

That is non sequitur.

> In other words, nothing stands in the way of PIE being descended

from

> an ergative language with absolutive in *-Ø, and allative in *-m,

and

> with the verb agreeing with the absolutive (what the verb agreed

with

> in the transitive sentence we will never know, since that sentence
> type has gone extinct).

You are deriving the syntax that used the -m about the object from
an antipassive construction, since only that justifies the use of
your presumed absolutive *-s and your presumed allative *-m used of
the object. If you are so sure, please tell us, where is the
antipassive marker in IE?

> The same argument applies to the FU languages, of course.

Therefore,

> the fact that they are accusative does not imply they always were,
> specifically not all the way back to the split between them and IE.

If *-m marks the object in Uralic and Indo-European, what is it most
likely to have marked the day they split from each other? Something
completely different?

I do not see a PIE ergative system lying around in ruins. I do not
see an ergative system in the deep structure of the other families
either. Where I do see an ergative system, as in Eskimo-Aleut, it is
plainly secondary.

The *-m is used about the object in IE and Uralic. In EA it is used
of the agent of transitive verbs. Now, the verb is an active
participle in IE and Ur., but a passive participle in the EA
transitive sentence. The case in *-m is genitive in EA, which can
very well be the original function for all three:

"The bear's killer" is the one who has shot the bear; the use of an
active participle (agent noun) puts the patient in the genitive.

"The bear is the hunter's killed (one)" elaborates on the same, only
now using a passive participle. In that case the genitive marks the
agent.

Therefore, both the IE & Ur. use of accusative *-m of the object of
a verb derivable from an active participle and the EA use of
ergative *-m of the agent of a transitive verb derivable from a
passive participle are fully explained as functions of an original
genitive. That function ís synchronically alive in EA. This analysis
makes sense and sheds light on things; calling the transitive
agent "ergative" instead is cryptic and spreads darkness.

Jens