Re: Short and long vowels

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Tom Brophey" <TBrophey@...> wrote:

> Why do you presume there was a prop-vowel at all?
> You presume, for example, zero-grade: *aH3 > *&3H3
> Why not just zero-grade: *aH3 > *H3, where *H3 is voiced as /i/ to
> make it pronounceable? What's your evidence for multiplying

entities?

That seems to be a settled question by now. It does not multiply
entities, except in purely phonetic terms which is quite normal. If
a vowel is diphthongized in a language, and there even is a phase of
transition between its elements, is that also an unacceptable
mltiplication of entities? I wonder how many "entities" would be
necessary to describe Dutch <ui>.

I do not mean *eH3 (I refuse to write "a" for a vowel we know only
as /e/) > *&3H3, but rather *H3&3. It will seem that the fricative
when positioned between consonants by the loss of the unaccented
vowel (or even earlier than that) was split up in two halves, the
first consonantal, the second vocalic. This follows from quite a
number of observations, the most important one being the metrical
facts from the Rigveda pointed out by Kurylowicz. It is further
corroborated by the fact that the consonantal part of /h2/ preceding
the shwa only aspirates in Indo-Iranian, but not in Greek, and does
not produce an Anatolian /h/. That is fully undstandable if the
spirant part was shorter here than in a position adjacent to a full
vowel.

>
> >> It seems improbable that they would all make the same
> >> change. And if they did and were so similar, how did they
> maintain
> >> separate identities?
> >
> > Why is that improbable? All three IE k's have become /k/ in Old
> > Irish. All three Sanskrit sibilants are /s/ in any varieties of
> > Modern Indic. All short vowels have merged in Latin internal

open

> > syllables. Is it also improbable that the /h-/ of Greek hépomai,
> > hêpar, and hésperos has three different origins? They were

close,

> > yet different, phonological change can be very subtle.
> >
> But all three IE k's were velars, and all three Sanskrit sibilants
> were sibilants. For the laryngeals to become i-colored, they would
> have to become palatal. Whatever their initial pronunciations may
> have been, they were surely not palatal. Oh, I just noticed: In

all

> of your examples the sounds coalesced with each other, which
> supports _my_ point.

No, all laryngeals just have to be weak. That will be reason enough
for their consonantal part to vanish.

>
> > Opposed to this, I can see no evidence in favour of the idea you
> are
> > so bravely fighting for. Why this spin?
> >
> I don't know what "idea" you think I am so bravely fighting for.

You are insisting on giving Patrick's theory ever new chances even
when it has been proved null and void. There are differentiated
effects of the three laryngeals in some of the IE daughterlanguages,
ergo there must have been three different laryngeals in PIE. The
arguments make for reading on quite an advanced level of insight
into this however, and I revolt when that is countered by arrogant
schoolmaster pointers about the basics of the scholarly field. That
is what I was served by Patrick, and that is why I stopped talking
to him.

> If
> there is such an idea, it is that armies and navies have trouble
> doing battle together. After a brief but intense skirmish over

zero-

> grade in I-I, Patrick's critics abandoned the field to him. Aside
> from that skirmish, critical comments have only restated the
> orthodox 3-laryngeal hypothesis.

That is not true. I have quite solidly demonstrated the necessity of
the three laryngeals, and I have just as solidly - and very
patiently I'd say - shown the examples adduced in an attempt to
discredit it to be based on simple and elementary misunderstandings.

> To continue the military metaphor,
> this is an attack on a theater of battle the enemy does not occupy.

But that is the theater where the chosen conflict belongs. One
cannot solve a problem by looking the other way.

> As an instance of this "idea," notice that when I ask you about
> multiple laryngeals in I-I, I use multiple laryngeal notation --
> even though I am skeptical of it. Notice that when I reply to
> Patrick, I ask things that more knowledgeable people like you

should

> be asking: things like [What the heck are you talking about?] and
> [How do you account for H2owis?]. When I ask _you_ about Patrick's
> hypothesis, I ask [What evidence is there agains it?]. (I use []
> here as indirect quotation marks.)
>
> Your other replies will undoubtedly provide interesting chalenges

to

> Patrick.

I have come to doubt that very seriously.

> My opinion of Patrick's hypothesis (in case you are interested):
> * It is an interesting alternative hypothesis.
> * It hasn't been negated (at least not yet).
> * If it is not negated, it may be preferred by Occam's Razor, since
> it does not needlessly multiply laryngeals.
> * Insofar as there might be some merit in his (sometimes seemingly
> fanciful, to say the least) Nostratic reconstructions, his
> hypothesis may be a necessary consequence of those results.

I disagree on all counts. The "pre-Nostratic" chopped liver he makes
out of IE words is the worst kind of pseudoscholarhsip by fiat I
have ever seen in this field.

Jens