Torsten:
> Let me get this straight: do you see the origin of
> the ablaut vowel (the "citation vowel" of most IE
> roots) as being /e/, backed to /a/ near uvulars,
> or /a/, fronted to /e/ except near uvulars?
In IE itself? In Proto-IE itself, I feel that there
is both coloured /A/ neighbouring uvulars (which
should be written as phonemic *e) and non-coloured *a
(the true *a). They are often confused in the
"traditional" spellings and its high time that we
make the effort to stop this phonemic/phonetic
mix-up.
= gLeN
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