Re: But where does *-mi come from?

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

> > > 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.
>
> Erh, how so?
>
>
> > > 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?
>
> That's a problem, I admit.
>
> >
> > > 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?
>
> If the language was ergative at that time, the question makes no
> sense. Objects, along with subjects of intransive sentences, would
> of course be 'marked' with nothing, since the absolutive was
> endingless. And both languages would have an allative (or

illative)

> in *-m.
>
>
> > 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.
> >
> OK.
>
>
> Torsten