Re: [tied] Path [was: Re: Gypsies again]

On Thu, 06 Oct 2005 12:43:53 +0200, Piotr Gasiorowski wrote:

> Miguel Carrasquer Vidal wrote:
>
>> It's an argument against any recent derivation of the nouns in this group
>> from the verbal root.
>
> Do you know of any Germanic strong verbs (let's say, for simplicity, in
> the first three classes) that are back-derived from an o-grade noun?

I wasn't suggesting that it was. I thought you were suggesting different
deverbal formations in post-PIE times.

>> 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.
>
> I don't separate the Indo-Iranian forms from the rest. I only regard the
> o-vocalism in the cognates as due to secondary infixation, not to
> derivation from an o-grade base.

But then you *are* separating them. Just because I-I <pant(h)-> *can* be
from *pent(H)-, besides *pont(H)-, I see no reason to think the I-I strong
cases didn't have o-vocalism, as they have everywhere else.

It's not as if o ~ zero Ablaut is limited to this word. Off the top of my
head, there's also *h3noghW- / *h3n.ghW- "nail", and a number of other
examples.

> A "Rasmussen thematic" like *O-pnth2-o-
> may be regarded as based on a root noun rather than directly on a verb
> -- not that it makes any difference on the surface, but compare cases
> like *tor(h1)-m-os or *por(h2)-n-ah2, clearly derived from abstracts in
> *-men-.
>
> Assuming that the meaning of *penth2o:s was 'passage, way, route', the
> expected thematic adjective would have meant 'connected with passage',
> and the substantivised *pónth2o-s could refer to any thing that afforded
> or facilitated passage from one place to another, such as a bridge, a
> beaten road, or a sea route.

It's ingenious, but I still think unnecessary.

> Of course *pn.th2i- and *pn.th2o- can be regarded as related to the same
> root noun without an infix.
>
>> 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),
>
> According to my understanding of the term, this root is "heavy" no
> matter what the vowel is.

Yes.

>BTW, I'm tempted to reconstruct *pe:nth2- as
> the pre-PIE shape of the noun stem, since I'd expect a lenthened vowel
> in a resulative root noun. But since it wouldn't have been affected by
> the nominative lengthening, and an Osthoff-type shortening would
> probably have repaired the syllabic overweight at an early stage, the
> length doesn't seem to matter in the further developments and I'm
> content with *penth2-.

I think Jens would disagree there. In his theory, lengthened */e:/ would
have given*/o:/, and the Osthoff shortening reduces that to */o/.

>> 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.
>
> I'd reconstruct nom.sg. *pénto:h2s, acc.sg. *pénth2m. ~ analogical
> *pénto:m, gen.sg. *pn.th2ós. Is it much of a difference, and does it
> hinder our understanding of OPer. p(an)þim vs. Av. pan.ta,m, RV pántHa:m?

That it doesn't.

> Finally, as argued by Joshua Katz, an original *e in the Indo-Iranian
> word is evidenced by PIIr. loans in Finno-Ugric (Khanty p&nt and Komi
> pad), but I know this stuff second-hand and cannot assess it on my own.
>
> Piotr