> Thanks. As you see, I'm trying to make sense of adjective-forming
*-ro-
> by incorporating it into Olsen's analysis of *-nt- formations less
> hesitantly than she does herself. I can't see how else this could
be
> achieved if not by accepting *-r as a very old allomorph of *-nt
also in
> participles. If so, some fossilised remnants of such a formation
should
> be lurking somewhere in the IE lexicon, and the *-r-/*-n-
heteroclita
> seem to be the most obvious candidates.
>
> > Functionally, one may wonder if the
> > connection is even deeper: If re:x and regens mean pretty much
the
> > same, it is perhaps rather the "individualizing" function of the
n(t)-
> > suffix that may here be extended to include also the r-
allomorph. From
> > collectives, the suffix denotes a single particular
manifestation,
> > sometimes directly a singulative; and from animates it denotes
the
> > particular one which the speaker has in mind. It seems to come
close
> > to a definite article.
>
> Well, I can only agree; cf. the use of weak adjectives with
> demonstrative pronouns (and in other "definite" contexts) in
Germanic.
>
I know (but forgot from where) that some have proposed prenasalised
stops for a limited number of PIE glosses. This one seems a good
candidate for a *-Nd-.
Then there's that *-bh-, *-m-, *-mbh- complex around *m.bhi "around"
(MHG umbi), Latin ambo, Greek ampho "both", *bhi "by" (cf Arabic
fi), dat.-instr. pl. *-m- and -*bh-. This is a good candidate for a
*-Mb-.
But the latter is most likely a loan in IE. Is the participial PIE
*-n-, *-t-, *-nt-, *-r- (?) too?
Sagart in "Sino-Tibetan-Austronesian, an updated and improved
argument" (in Sagart et al. "The Peopling of East Asia")
compares "the Proto-Austronesian nominaliser and Goal Focus marker
-&n and the Tibeto-Burman nominalising suffix -n":
Austronesian
Atayal niq "to eat" : niq-un "eaten thing"
Paiwan alap "to take" : alap-en "object being taken"
Amis as^ik "to sweep" : aas^ik-en "place to sweep"
Sino-Tibetan
Tibetan
za-ba "to eat" : za:n "food, fodder, pap, porridge"
skyi-ba "to borrow" : skyi-n-pa "borrowed thing, loan"
rdzu-ba "to delude, to falsify" : rdzu-n-pa "falsehood, fiction, lie"
Lepcha
hru "to be hot" : â-hru-n "heat"
bu "to carry" : â-bu-n "vehicle"
Starosta in "Proto-East Asian and the Origin and Dispersal of the
languages of East and Southeast Asia and the Pacific" (ibd.)
compares various grammantical features of the members of great East
Asian language family, among them
East Asian (Storosta's invention)
...Vn]: patient of V-ing
[sV...: instrument of V-ing
Proto-Austronesian
...Vn]: patient of V-ing
[sV...: instrument of V-ing
Sino-Tibetan-Yangzian (Storosta's invention)
Vn]: patient of V-ing
[sV...: instrument of V-ing
Sino-Tibetan
Vn]: patient of V-ing
[s-V: instrument of V-ing
Sinitic
..n]: -n gives a name of patient 'thing V-ed'
[s..: s- gives a noun which is either an instrument, or a place, in
short a circumstance of the action
where
Proto East Asian -> Sino-Tibetan-Yangzian, Proto-Austronesian
Sino-Tibetan-Yangzian -> Pre-Sino-Tibetan, Proto-Yangzian
Pre-Sino-Tibetan -> Sino-Bodic, Proto-Himalayo-Burman
Sino-Bodic -> Sinitic
Proto-Himalayo-Burman -> Tangut-Bodic
Tangut-Bodic -> Tibetan, Tangut-Himalayan
Proto-Yangzian -> Proto-Hmong-Mien, Proto-Austro-Asiatic
Proto-Austro-Asiatic -> Munda, Mon-Khmer
Proto-Austronesian -> Proto-Extra-Formosan
Proto-Extra-Formosan -> Tai-Kadai, Malayo-Polynesian
Now if the PIE *-n-, *-t-, *-nt-, *-r- suffix is actually a *-Nd-,
that would set it apart among the other PIE glosses and morphemes.
Semantically it fits beautifully with those East Asian V..n "thing
V'ed" suffixes. An extra piece of circumstantial evidence is the
phonetic and semantic fit between the East Asian 'instrument'-prefix
construction s-V vs. the Semitic causatives of the form s-V and the
PIE verbs with s-mobile and sometimes suitable semantics, eg. Engl.
melt : smelt.
Cf. the fate of Romance '-able' in English.
Torsten