On Wed, 05 Oct 2005 08:52:40 +0200, Piotr Gasiorowski wrote:
> Miguel Carrasquer wrote:
>
>> Funny, I've always thought the _verb_ looked secondary in
>> this word-group. It is restricted to Germanic, where it has
>> a meaning ("find") which is a long way off the path followed
>> by the noun.
>
> Isn't that an argument in favour of the antiquity of *finþan?
It''s an argument against any recent derivation of the nouns in this group
from the verbal root.
> I'd derive *pénto:h2s from *penth2- as a root noun, assuming that an
> anaptyctic vowel developed already in pre-PIE between the final
> obstruents because of the untypical sonority profile of the root
> (something that didn't happen in the -eRH configuration):
>
> *penth2-z --> *pent&h2-z --> pénto:h2s
>
> We have the very same thing in *meg^o:h2-s. Now the o-grade forms aren't
> terribly problematic: *pónth2o- can be explained as a "Rasmussen
> derivative" (**O-pn.th2-ó-, substantivised, with shifted accent);
> *pónth2i- is a variant thereof with a reduced thematic vowel (perhaps
> decompositional); regular syncope after a sonorant plus /t/ yields Lat.
> pons.
I see no reason to separate the Indo-Iranian forms from the others,
especially since there is no trace of the verb *pent(h2)- there (or
anywhere else besides Germanic). The Ablaut of the root is o ~ zero, as
shown by Slav. poNtI vs. OPruss. pintis, Grk. póntos vs. pátos, and Skt.
pántha:s vs. oblique path- (Avestan pantå: ~ paþ-). I think that rules out
a thematic formation.
An interesting form is OPersian acc.sg. paþim. When Jens first pointed it
out to me, I was highly surprised, but it all makes sense now. Since the
root is heavy (having a long vowel > *o _and_ ending in -nt), there could
be no svarita lengthening in this word, so the expected paradigm is (taking
**-ah2- to be a suffix):
**pú:nt-ax-z
**pú:nt-ax-m
**pu:nt-áx-a:s,
which regularly becomes:
**pónt&:xs
**pónt&xm
**p&nt&xós,
and after zero grade:
**pónto:h2s
**pónth2m.
**pn.th2ós.
This directly explains the Indo-Iranian forms. The oddity of the resulting
nominative/accusative pair was resolved in favour of the nominative in
Indo-Iranian (except Old Persian), in favour of the accusative in
Balto-Slavic (*pantis, *pantim, *pintes) and presumably Latin (pons,
pontem, pontis) and Armenian (hun, hni), with additional Ausgleich of the
root Ablaut in both directions. Greek has thematized.