[tied] Re: PIE voiceless aspirates

From: david_russell_watson
Message: 41945
Date: 2005-11-09

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Patrick Ryan" <proto-language@...>
wrote:
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "david_russell_watson"
<liberty@...> wrote:
>
> This is certainly _not_ irrelevant. It is my position that
> palatalization effects occurred at the time when pPIE became
> PIE; PIE *k^hV became IA *S; and merged with *S from PIE k^.

You still don't understand that there was a second
palatalization, that the evidence _demands_ that
there was a second palatalization.

> And I do not appreciate your categorization of my position
> as isolated.

It _is_ isolated. That's simply a fact.

> Should I slink into a corner and hide myself until I can get
> my own gang together? Whether you approve or not, there are
> many Nostraticists in this world who would have no problem
> with the sequence I have outlined.

No, you should just stop asserting as fact what are
no more than your own unproven and unconvincing
theories.

> If you want to discuss this, then stop being so patronizing.
> If you cannot stop, I will go back to working on something
> else of greater benefit.

I've never seen a more patronizing individual on this
list than yourself.

> First, what did this famous second palatalization do -
> specifically - that the first palatalization did _not_ do?

In the first palatalization it was the PALATO-VELARS
of P.I.E. that were fronted and affricatized, while
in the second palatalization it was the reflexes in
Proto-Satem of the PLAIN VELARS and LABIO-VELARS of
P.I.E. that were fronted and affricatized, although
only those immediately preceding a front vowel or *y.

By the time of the second palatalization the affricate
series from the first had further fronted and so the
two series didn't overlap.

I've uploaded a chart to the files section entitled
"The First and Second Palatalizations" demonstrating
the series of changes. At the top of the chart is an
explanation of the notation that I use.

> As far as I am concerned, your data is seriously skewed.

No, sir. It's rather that you're simply unfamiliar
with some of the most basic sound changes that took
place between P.I.E. and Proto-Indo-Aryan. What I'm
trying to explain to you here isn't something of my
own creation, nor some new untested theory from the
fringe, but rather just what you will find in Beekes,
Lehmann, etc. It's just the mainstream theory.

> Look through your own IE dictionary, and you will see that PIE
> *k becomes Old Indian <k> and PIE *k^ (including *k^h) becomes
> Old Indian <S> - not <c> as you so blithely assert.

I never asserted any such thing. I said that *k, not
*k^, became Sanskrit 'c' when it originally preceded
a front vowel or *y.

> A quick scan of initials revealed only two examples where PIE
> *k appears as Old Indian <c>;

Well right here in your very next line you show that
you understood that it was indeed *k and not *k^ that
I meant.

> and both are not marked as palatals. Evidently, you must think
> that Pokorny was simply crazy???

No, but I'm beginning to wonder if you are not crazy,
for I never said that Sanskrit 'c' came from a P.I.E.
palatal. What I said, is that it came from Proto-Satem
*k when immediately followed by a front vowel or *y.
Proto-Satem *k, of course, arose out of the merging of
P.I.E. *kW and P.I.E. *k, neither of which was a palatal,
and neither of which did I ever claim was a palatal.

> One example, *(s)kend-, probably reflects PIE *sk -> OI <c>.
> The other example, <camara> supposedly from *kem-, even if it is
> correct, hardly supports your "c and k" scenario.

Then you don't believe that Sanskrit 'cakra-' comes from
P.I.E. *kWekWlos?

> Of course, *kh newly brought into contact with *y could
> palatalize.
>
> One example is *g(y)eu-, BS *Zyauyo:.

That's not an example. *g(y)ew- doesn't contain *kh/*kH.

> > When an affricate phoneme is either fronted or backed
> > under whatever conditions, the stop component and the
> > fricative component do so together; they are always
> > homorganic or they cease to be an affricate. If your
> > supposed *kx were truly a single phoneme, then after
> > palatalization nothing other than *t­ç (in which <t>
> > stands for a palatal stop) could have ever been the
> > result.
>
> Well in Heaven's name are you using <t> to indicate a palatal
> dorsal stop???

It matters not in the least what I use to indicate it,
so long as I make it clear what I mean, which I did.
The I.P.A. symbol for a voiceless palatal stop is <c>.
Would you have been happier with that? If so, why don't
you use it yourself?

> > Only *k + *x (a sequence of _two_ phonemes) could after
> > palatalization ever produce anything like *kç.
>
> Dead wrong. I thought you might have understood that the /k/ was
> also move forward but since you evidently did not, or cannot,
> then /k'ç/.

In exactly what way am I dead wrong? After correcting
your notation it's apparent that you were referring to
essential the SAME THING AS I WAS, so how then can you
say that I'm dead wrong?

Moreover, do you really believe it appropriate to be
rude to _me_ for mistaking the intent of notation that
_you_ didn't make clear?

> Wrong again even if you are constitutionally unable to imagine
> a palatal position for a voiceless dorsal stop combined with a
> palatalized dorsal fricative.

Where do you get off saying that I can't imagine it? I
wrote [tç], in which 'ç' represents a voiceless palatal
stop, and then specifically noted that I was using 't'
there to represent a palatal stop. That, if you cannot
see, amounts to a voiceless palatal stop combined with
a voiceless palatal fricative.

> > > Now do not try to claim Sanskrit ch as the palatalized
> > > counterpart of Sanskrit kh, because ch is a geminate
> > > (cch), whether always written as such or not, and came
> > > from PIE *sk.

Oh that should have been *sk^.

> > > Fine. PIE *k^he becames <S> in Old Indian.

Oh I missed the ^ again. *k^ + laryngeal does indeed
result in Sanskrit 'š', but then so does *k^ without a
laryngeal, and so this doesn't prove the existence of
an aspirated *k^ in P.I.E.

> Well, here is an example of where an IEist must peer beyond IE to
> get a real idea of what is going on.

Nope. Proto-Indo-European is based upon comparing Indo-
European languages... period. There is no accepted
Nostratic theory yet, and so there is no other proper
basis for reconstructing P.I.E.

> Since the responses to PIE *k^h and *k^ were conflated in IA,

Meaning that Indo-Aryan provides no evidence of *k^H,
correct?

> > Well it's simply ridiculous to try to deny the second
> > palatalization. Do you deny that Satem *kekore resulted
> > in Sanskrit cakara? If you do not, then what do you
> > call the stage in which *k before a front vowel fronted
> > to something eventually resulting in an affricate in
> > Sanskrit and Iranian?
>
> Yes, I certainly do deny that Satem *kekore led to Old Indian
> <cakara>.

Well apparently I simply can't refer to Satem with you
and be at all understood.

> That stage is called PIE. PIE had *k^ and *k^h; they did not
> simply come about when satem languages diverged.

Who said that it didn't have *k^? What I said is that it
didn't have *k^H, meaning a voiceless aspirated k^ as a
single phoneme at the P.I.E. stage. Sanskrit 'kh' comes
from a sequence in P.I.E. of *k (plain velar) + laryngeal,
while P.I.E. *k^ + laryngeal would have become in Proto-
Indo-Iranian *c^ + laryngeal, and finally in Proto-Indo-
Aryan *š + laryngeal. Finally, some time before Sanskrit
was first written down, the laryngeal was lost.

> It is obvious, or it should be, from the information I provided
> above, that initial PIE *k^ did _not_ become Old Indian <c> under
> normal conditions.
>
> _Do you dispute that?_

Of course not, but then I never once said that P.I.E. *k^
resulted in Sanskrit 'c', but rather that P.I.E. *k or *kW
when originally preceding a front vowel or *y, resulted in
Sanskrit 'c'.

> Old Indian <c> is normally understood as the affricate /tS/. We
> have to look for something which might have affricated the
> expected /k/ to /tS/; without the mystery element, we would have
> had simply *kakara.

Well there's no mystery to anybody else besides yourself:
the element was a front vowel, in this case *e.

> We might notice <pari-Skar-> and imagine **skakara perhaps becoming
> *tSakara.

There's no need; the real explanation does just fine.

> On the other hand, where we do see Old Indian <c> is as a reflex
> of PIE *kW - quite regularly.

Just as I've been saying.

> If we imagine that *kWer- formed a reduplicated *kWe-kWer,
> we would only have to suppose that the actual verbal root was
> simplified to arrive at *tSakara - without the necessity of
> some secondary palatalization.

Did you miss the fact that your first *kW resulted in *tS,
but your second *kW did not? The later change of *kW to
*tS before *e is called "the second palatalization".

> Remember, PIE *ke and *ko exist alongside *k^e and *k^o - the
> *e-form of the Ablaut vowel *e/*o/*Ø does _not_ palatalize a
> preceding dorsal stop (or affriacte).

No, not until the time of the second palatalization.

> I have shown above, and you can verify it for yourself from any
> decent IE dictionary, that "Sanskrit" <k> and <c> are _NOT_
> reflexes of satem *k so your books cannot help me much - nor
> you, I am afraid.

Just what is it that you think I mean when I write "Satem *k"?
Do you not realize that it's supposed to come out of P.I.E. *k
(plain velar) and *kW (labio-velar)? We've already read above
a few times that you don't deny that Sanskrit 'c' comes out of
P.I.E. *k or *kW, so what is your problem? Do you call the
stage after which the P.I.E. plain velars and labio-velars
merged something besides 'Satem'? If so, what?

> > If your references had anything worthwhile to contribute,
> > you would already have quoted it.

You don't know how to access the files section, do you?

> I cannot spit and kick on gold I cannot see, and gold you refuse
> to show me.

I've directed you to the files section more than once.
If you have some problem accessing the files, or don't
know how to download the TITUS Cyberbit Basic font,
then I can't convert them to plain text for you.

> Now, your assignment if you care to accept it, is to show me that
> PIE *k^ results in Old Indian <c>.

I have no desire to show you any such thing, I don't
believe any such thing, and I have never said any such
thing.

> David

Please try to stop leaving _my_ signature at the bottom
of _your_ posts. Thank you.

David