Piotr to Rob:
> In those positions where we would expect *e:
> itself to be lengthened (i.e. superlong), we find
> *o: (or *o as a conditioned shortened reflex
> thereof).
[gLeNny crInGes and shIvErs] Ick...
> In specific conditions we find even more exotic
> alternations that can be explained in similar ways,
> cf. *a/*e:/*o: in *káp-je/o- 'take, grasp' with an
> a-coloured vowel from earlier **kép-je/o- <
> ***ke:p-jé/ó- (Lat. capio:, Goth. hafjan) vs.
> *ke:p- (perhaps directly reflected in Lat. ce:pi:)
> vs. *kó:pah2 (Gk. kó:pe: 'handle') from **O-kép-
> e-h2 < ***O-ke:p-é-h2.
This is silly. First of all, let's get with the
21st century at write the stem properly as *qep-.
The *e is phonetically coloured to /A/ after the
uvular *q, just as it would be next to uvular *x
(trad. *h2). Still, the phoneme remains *e despite
allophony. Everyone get it? Good. :P
Now, with *qep- /k.Ap-/, the lengthened grade is
simply *qe:p- /k.e:p-/. Long vowels are not subject
to lowering because their added length helps to
reinforce their original quality. That takes care
of this all. And as for *qo:pax, there's nothing
about its ablaut that needs further explanation
unless you're swayed by a very assumptive conviction
that pre-IE must not have ablaut. The unnecessary
O-fix rule is steering us away from the big picture.
In short, this supposed ablaut pattern of *a/*e:/*o:
is only what you get when you mix the phonetics with
the phonemics. Phonemically it's still *e/*e:/*o:
like in a bunch of other non-uvular examples.
On the "lengthening" rule(s) behind nominative *-s:
> But they don't! Gen.sg. *-s doesn't lengthen
> anything, nor does the 2sg. -s in verbs, or the *s
> of *swek^s, whatever it is, etc.
An attack of my rules! I must defend! :)
I've already explained this fully. Semitic *s^idTu
is borrowed into MIE as *sWeksa. Syncope creates
*sweks and that's it. This is the normal effect of
this rule that drops MIE unaccented *a. The
lengthening is an _extra_ rule during Syncope. It was
caused by irregular clipping of monosyllabic
morphemes that were normally NOT allowed to undergo
Syncope for the sake of their preservation.
In the case of the nominative *-s however, the suffix
was used far too often to avoid the allure of Syncope.
This irregularity which even breaks this 'Suffix
Resistance' corollary of Syncope is what causes this
lengthening. The Syncope of eLIE genitive *-as from
MIE *-asa is again normal. So too is MIE 2ps *-as >
eLIE *-s, as seen later in the aorist and athematic
non-indicative.
As you can see, there's nothing left unexplained.
> As for the "overall coda" condition, there is no
> lengthening in *swek^stos,
Again, there would never be:
MIE *sWeksa > eLIE *sweks
So assuming for now that this form predates Syncope:
MIE *sWeksatása > eLIE *swekstás
No fuss, no muss. Lengthening is not the default rule.
It is an exception to the rule. It is the product of
Syncope in a *small* number of cases that should
otherwise have been exempt from it.
= gLeN
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com