--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...>
wrote:
>
> On 2006-04-08 12:04, tgpedersen wrote:
>
> > Exactly. A root with Jens' *O- as prefix is a compound with *O
as
> > first element. The question is whether any first element will
cause
> > the same effects as an *O-prefix.
>
> No. Other kinds of agentive compounds (especially the dHarma-bHr.t-
> type) seems to be older, and no such effect is visible in them.
That would be an athematic *-bhr.t. I proposed that they would
survive too.
>Nor do
> we have any o-grades in pure root nouns occurring as second
members (the
> nr.-han- type, which also includes Latin compounds with -spex, -
ceps,
> etc.). There is no O-infixation in typical bahuvrihis -- probably
the
> most widespread type of compound in PIE.
>
No o-grade, you mean, or the argument is circular. But reflexes of
*bhorós and *bhorós exist. For semantic reasons they would mostly
have been constructed with an object, so I should write them instead
as *-bhorós and *-bhóros. Since they are thematic, they are derived
by generalizing an athematic root noun N *´-bh&r.&s, G *-bh&rós,
decompounded N *bhór-&s, G *bh&rós. First an adjective was formed
from it by generalising its genitive: N *-bh&r-ós, G *-bh&rós-yo,
then the action noun was formed by generalising the nominative: N
*bhór&s, G *bhór&s-yo. (And then somehow the remaining schwa's were
turned into *o's by mutual influence, or whatever)
> Besides, O-infixation
o-grade
>occurs regularly in at least one morphological
> category in which it can't be decompositional -- the
> causative/iterative verbs like *monéje/o-.
>
I think the PIE verbal root itself was a verbal noun. From it we
might derive:
1 *bher- "carrying"
-> (reduplication)
2 *bhe-bhr.- "several carryings"
(by several agents, on several occasions and/or of several objects)
-> (dereduplication)
3 *bhor- "one single carrying"
(by one agent, on one occasion and of one object)
Note that the *o of stem 3 is another restressed *e/schwa (PPIE *a)
The causative/iterative verbs are derived from stem 3 (as is perf
sg, frequentatives and perf plur are from stem 2)
Torsten