--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Rob" <magwich78@...> wrote:
>
> Where do you see a "frequent preference for initial stress" in
IE? I
> do not see any such thing until the very end (perhaps even only
> dialectally).
May I barge in? I proposed this rule to account for the initial
accent on the *reduced* variant of the long-vowel ("Narten")
presents, which were then found to go by the same rules as long-
vowel nouns. It only becomes possible if one assumes a subsequent
retraction of the accent to the first full vowel of the word. I
found that such a rule could be postulated at little or no cost,
since the normal ablaut reductions had made monosyllables out of
most words anyway. Thus, when pre-ablaut 3pl *gWhen-ént, gen.sg.
*H2ner-ós, *te:k^T-ént, *ne:kWt-ós had become *gWhnént, *H2nrós,
*ték^Tnt, *nékWts with accent retraction in the last two, they were
*all* accented on their first real vowel. Accent differentiation
like that seen in tómos : tomós must then belong to a younger
period. I have found it relatively easy to work that into a coherent
account, and have been unable to do the same with other assumptions.
Jens