Re: Slavic palatalistions: why /c^/, /c/?

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

>
>
>
> I understand from Sihler (not the most obviuos place to find it)
> that the first(?) Slavic palatalisation was (*kWe, *kWi >) *ke, *ki
> > c^e, c^i (before original PIE i, e), and the second(?) was (*kWoy,
> *kWay >) *ki: > ci .
>
> As far as I know, the "natural" development of palatalisation is
> k > c^ > c > s^ > s. So /c/ should be more front than /c^/, but in
> this case /c^/ and /c/ go together with (/e/, /i/) and (/oy/, /ay/)
> respectively, of which the former is more front than the latter.
> That puzzles me, how did the results of last palatalisation "pass"
> the the results of the first, on their "way to the front"?

As far as I'm aware, the paths are:

k > c^ > c > s
k > c^ > s^ > s
and k > c > s

Old French has the 'first palatalisation' k > c (no comment on
intermediate stages), i.e. the Common Romance palatalisation, and a
'second palatalisation' k > c^ before original Latin *a. These thave
simplified c > s and c^ > s^, as in _cent chevaux_ from _centum
caballos_ 'a hundred horses'.

As to the overtaking, the 'first palatalisation' was k > c^ in Picard
and the second was k > c, so there's nothing unique about Slavic. I
think k > c directly is indeed possible.

As an indication of the independence of paths, you might like to also
consider the Romance softening /k/ > /c^/ in Romanian with the
Daco-Romance softening /t/ > /c/ (i.e. '<tz>').

Richard.