Re: [tied] Re: h1,h2,h3 in Albanian

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 42584
Date: 2005-12-21

alexandru_mg3 wrote:

> Taking one of our example and trying to test the above supposition
> (true or false) : if in bhrHg^- the laryngeal was vocalized and not
> the resonant we will have PIE *brh1g^- > PAlb *bredz/*berdz (and not
> PAlb *bardza that was the case: Alb bardhë <-> Rom. bar(d)za) => so
> we could have only brh2g^- or brh3g^- for the PAlb *bardza 'white'
>
> (maybe the root was bhh1rh2(3)g^- that gave *bherag^- after
> vocalization from where bherg^/bhrag^~bharg^

No, no, no. It wasn't anything of that order of monstroisity, see below.

> (Also in *prh3-wo seems 'probable' that 'only' h3 was vocalized *pro-
> wo > *por-wo > *par-wa > etc...)

A minor point: the vocalisation of *h3 yields *&(3), not *o. But anyway,
*pr&3wo- with a vocalised laryngeal would have given PAlb. *prawa-, not
*parwa-.

> It's true that Lubotsky (->Beekes) talked only about an initial RHC
> cluster and my examples are CRHC , but I wanted only to show what a
> big difference we can have if we will consider a later vocalization
> of the resonants (and not their 'global' vocalization in 'classical'
> PIE)

Lubotsky and Beekes talk about word-initial sequences for a very good
reason: they (as well as everybody else in the IE business) know what
happened word-medially. The resonant was syllabified before the
laryngeal. If in several branches the reflexes of *Cr.HC are different
from those of *Cr.C, it's because the subsequent weakening and loss of
the laryngeal in the individual IE dialects affected the neighbouring
segments. To take the example of *pr.h3wó-: in Slavic the reflex of the
*r.h3 sequence in *pIrvU is similar to that of *r., but carries a
different accent (acute), betraying the former presence of a laryngeal.
In Vedic we get <pu:rvá-> and in Iranian *parwa-; both forms developed
out of PIIr. *pr.Hwá-> *pr.:wá-; the extra length of the syllabic rhotic
is reflected as a full vowel before the *r in Iranian ("plain" *r. would
have remained as such) and a different (and lengthened) prop vowel in
Vedic. The development in Albanian was like that in Iranian.

> P.S. I trust you: but from where you found h1 in brHg^- ? The Balto-
> Slavic form is reconstructed as *berHg^-o on Leiden and the Indo-
> Arian form as br.Hg^-o (so both, only with H)

The verb root is *bHreh1g^-, as in Ved. bHra:jate and Av. bra:zaiti
'shine, beam'. The Balto-Slavic cognates (from *bHreh1g^-(sk^e-) 'to
dawn') show *e:, demonstrating that the laryngeal was *h1. The 'birch'
word is a vr.ddhi derivative with the secondary e-grade inserted in the
"wrong" interconsonantal slot, as quite often happens in this kind of
formation. The original pattern was most likely *bHérh1g^-o-s, coll.
*bHr.h1g^-áh2, levelled out with various results. The Albanian adjective
seems to go back to *bHr.h1g^-ó- (perhaps from dissimilated
*bHr.h1g^-ró-).

Piotr

Piotr