From: Patrick Ryan
Message: 40762
Date: 2005-09-27
----- Original Message -----
From: "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 27, 2005 11:01 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] Re: IE thematic presents and the origin of their
thematic vowel
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jens Elmegård Rasmussen" <jer@...>
> To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, September 27, 2005 7:13 AM
> Subject: [tied] Re: IE thematic presents and the origin of their thematic
> vowel
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, glen gordon <glengordon01@...>
> wrote:
> > Jens' initial claim:
> > > Because it was **még^-eH2 that became *még^H2.
> >
> > Jens explains:
> > > Certainly it's athematic, the vowel of the ablauting
> > > suffix //-eH2-// is not the thematic vowel.
> >
> > But the athematic feminine suffix is *-ih2 so we
> > expect *megih2.
>
> The suffix //-eH2-// belongs to the stem of the adjective
> meaning 'big' and is not a feminine marker. The fem. was *még^-H2-
> iH2 (Ved. mahí:, Hitt. mekki-).
>
> > > It is all based on the derivation of the Vedic
> > > acc. mahá:m from *még^-oH2-m. [...]
> >
> > Only Vedic. That doesn't carry much weight in IE
> > and I don't know where the hypothetical feminine
> > in **-oh2- comes from. The feminine is *-eh2 with
> > *e due to Schwa Diffusion because *-h2 was unvoiced.
> > There can be no **-oh2 unless it is *-o-h2.
>
> Vedic archaisms generally carry quite a lot of weight. Again, the
> segment *-oH2- is not a feminine marker, but a bound allomorph of a
> suffix pertaining to the adjective itself. Its structure is as in a
> normal acc.sg. like *H2ák^-mon-m. , Gk. ákmona.
>
> Jens
>
> ***
> Patrick:
>
> I am pretty sure Jens will not want to discuss this further as his views
> on the following matters (of my opinions) are on record but since, in the
> course of my investigations, I spent such an inordinate amount of time on
> this word, I will share what I think I found.
>
> 1) The pre-PIE form was *magh(a); the quality of initial root vowel is
> established by Sumerian mah, 'large';
>
> 2) The quality of the final vowel of the root is established by PIE
> *meg^-, an alternative form to *meg^h-; only words with final *-*gha in
> pre-PIE were de-aspirated to -*g in PIE;
>
> 3) That the final consonant of the root was, indeed, pre-PIE *gh is showed
> by Egyptian mH, 'full', where H represents Nostratic *k?xa or *k?xe,
> pre-PIE *gha or *ghe. Sumerian -h, on the other hand, cannot come from
> *k?xe, but only *k?xa, so the Nostratic form is *mak?xa leading to pre-PIE
> *magh(a);
>
> 4) The PIE palatalized dorsal can come from pre-PIE *ghe, but we have
> established the final was -*a; therefore, the palatalization must come
> from an additional formant, namely pre-PIE -*ye, PIE -*y, '-like';
>
> 5) Therefore, the pre-PIE was *maghye-, PIE *meg^(h)i-;
>
> 6) The question remains open as to whether the -*i formant was a part of
> the feminine formation or had an identity outside of it. We have PIE
> feminines in both -*ia: (also > -*i:) and -*a:;
>
> 7) Whichever, the simplest feminine formant is pre-PIE -*Ha, which results
> in PIE -*Ha > *-a:. It is incorrect to reconstruct the PIE feminine
> as -*a/eH or -*eH2;
>
> 8) Pre-PIE and PIE formants were originally independent words; no formant
> was simply formed by randomly plucking a consonant or vowel from the
> ether, and arbitrarily assigning it a grammatical function. This is simply
> not the way languages work. If a formant had the form **eH(x), it would
> mean that the word underlying it was *HeH since no PIE root (word) can
> begin with a vowel;
>
> 9) It is also possible that, instead of pre-PIE -*Ha, 'feminine', we are
> dealing with -*?a, 'stative', which also results in PIE -*?a > -*a:. I
> discount this possibility because I have not seen the stative formant
> added to an adjective in -*i(:);
>
> 10) It is vaguely possible that, instead of pre-PIE -*Ha, 'feminine', we
> are dealing with -*ya, 'collective', which results in PIE -*i(:). This
> might account for the palatalization but I discount this possibility
> because I do not believe that -*ya can become PIE -*Ya:.
>
> ***
>
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