Re: [tied] *kap-

----- Original Message -----
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, September 27, 2005 9:27 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] *kap-


> Grzegorz Jagodzinski wrote:
>
>> Of course it may be an old loan or an onomatopoeia. Of course Latin
>> habe:-
>> and Germanic habe:- may be unrelated.
>
> They _are_ morphologically parallel, but the one contains *kap- (the
> Germanic *b is due to Verner's Law) and the other *gHebH-.

The time of neogrammarians and their unexceptional ideas is over. If we had
known only one example of that kind, I would have agreed with you. But we
know much more such examples. See my post on hares.

And what do you think - are Polish "badyl" and "patyk" related or no? Must I
really continue with more examples?

>> Of course Latin capere and Germanic
>> kap-, ko:p- (two IE plain voiced stops in one root!) may be unrelated as
>> well. This all can be just a result of coincidence. And I have right not
>> to
>> believe in the coincidence here. Have I? Which is more, I have a firm
>> basis
>> for such a belief.
>
> You are absolutely free to believe in anything. But the intensity of
> your belief is no argument in a discussion.

You seem to believe in unexceptional character of phonetic changes and you
are free to believe in it as well. But it is also only belief.

> Most amateurs find it hard
> to believe that Gk. tHeos and Lat. deus are unrelated. Same meaning,
> similar form. So what? The similarity is accidental none the less. No
> matter how similar pre-English *ko:p-jan may be to <capio:>, we have no
> right to regard them as related until the irregular correspondence
> receives a plausible explanation.

*ko:p- < IE *go:b-. Do you know more roots with two plain voiced stops?
That's it! This is the base for my belief. And where is your base?

> What you have argued is that if we
> only squeeze enough laryngeals into the reconstructed root any
> correspondence becomes possible as long as the stops in question have
> the same place of articulation. I can't consider this sound methodology;
> it's just an excuse for ignoring the normal constraints on
> reconstructions.

OK, let all three *ghab(h)- (Lat. habe:re, Slavic gabati), *kap- (Gmc.
habe:-, Lat. capere), *go:b- (Eng. keep) be different roots in PIE. How many
different roots with similar meaning were there in PIE? Oh, PIE had to have
a very rich number of lexical units! Do you think that such a thesis is
methodologically correct?

>> See the list of more such "coincidences" on my page
>> http://www.aries.com.pl/grzegorzj/lingwen/iesem2.html (near the bottom of
>> the page). And notice that verbs meaning "have" change irregularily
>> because
>> of frequency and it is a LAW, not a coincidence. E.g. Polish miec'
>> instead
>> of imiec', Italian ho < habeo, Eng. has, had with no -v- etc.
>
> I'm sure you know that <miec'> instead of <imiec'> is just one of
> several cases of i-/zero doublets in Polish in words beginning with
> *jI-. We also have <gra ~ igra> 'game' (the latter variant obsolescent
> in Mod. Polish) and <skra ~ iskra> 'spark'.

Btw. another example of breaking the neogrammarian theses. But those are
just "several cases": <grac'> ~ <igrac'> 'play', <skra> ~ <iskra>, only
<miec'> (even if <imadl/o> 'vice'), only <z> (< <iz> 'out'). Have I missed
something? All the rest has i- preserved: <igl/a> 'needle', <igo> 'yoke' (in
the place name <Igol/omia>), <imie,> 'name', <inny> 'different, other' (yes,
from i- < *oi- here, not form *jI- < short *i-, but did Slavic languages
preserve the difference?), <iskac'> 'cleanse of vermin' < 'seek', <ide,> 'I
am walking / going'...

The conclusion is that ProtoSlavic *i-, *jI- yielded i- in Polish
everywhere, except frequently used words.

> This means that there's
> nothing exceptional about <miec'>. I agree that frequently used function
> words often undergo irregular phonetic attrition, but was PIE *káp-je-ti
> a function verb? The meaning of the root wasn't even 'have', strictly
> speaking, but something like 'take in hand, grasp, catch'.
>
> Piotr

And neogrammarian thinking again... Not "function words" (has Polish any?)
but words which are frequently used.

Is pan 'sir' < *zupan or *gupan (cf. Old Czech hpan) a function word? And
the same about English sir < sire?

Can 'imperator' be a function word? Cf. Pol. cesarz < ce^sarjI but Russ.
car' < cIsarjI.

Is was'c' < waszmos'c' 'sire' < wasza mil/os'c' 'your love' a function word?
Cf. Spanish usted < vuestra merced, Italian vossignoria < vostra signoria
etc.

Is mówic' 'speak' < mol/wic' a function word (cf. z.ól/w, zol/wa, chal/wa)?
And the same about English says [sez] and said [sed] (cf. lays, pays)? See
also Polish dialectal pry < prawi 'speaks, says, tells', Russian dial. gyt <
govorit 't.s.' etc.

Is czl/ek < czl/owiek 'man, human being' a function word? Cf. also OCS
c^love^kU instead of *c^elove^kU (hence the Polish form should also be
*czol/owiek).

Is choc' < chocia (cf. chociaz.) 'even if, though' a function word? And even
if it is, is chciec' < chociec' 'to want' a function word? Btw. <che,c'>
'wish, desire, inclination' is the evidence for the root *xQt-, not *xot- in
Slavic (so, chciec' < chociec' < xote^ti < *xQte^ti with two irregular
reductions).

Is the verb with the meaning 'to go' a function word? So, why Lat. ambulare
yielded pre-French *allare (> aller), Italian and pre-Spanish <andare>,
Catalan <anar> and Provençal <ana>? And what about English gone [gA.n]
instead of the expected form [goun]?

Is the numeral 'six' a function word? If it is not, why szes'c' <
*kswek^s-tis without -w- (cf. Avestan xs^vas^)? Btw. Sanskrit s.as. has a
highly exceptional initial s.- instead of the expected *ks.v-. Could you
explain this s.- ?

Is the numeral 'ten' a function word? If no, why Eng. ten < *te:n, even
if -teen in '13', '14' etc.?

Is 'fox' a function word? If no, how do you explain its various forms in
particular IE languages? And if you even do not believe in relation between
Engl. <fox> and Greek <alo:pek->, please explain how Old Gr. <alo:pek->
could have yielded modern <alepou> [alepu].

Is 'son' a function word? If no, what explanation could you present for Gmc.
*sunu- instead of the expected *su:nu-? And what with Slavic gen. syna
'son's, of son' instead of the expected form *synu?

Is 'horse' a function word? If no, how do you explain Pol. kon' < komon'
(cf. komonica 'a kind of plant, eaten by horses').

And finally, because you do not believe in possibility of irregular
development of 'to catch' due to frequency, how do you explain colloquial
Polish trzym instead of trzymaj 'catch!, imper. 2 sg.'?

Grzegorz J.



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