Re: [tied] Re: Helios

--- In cybalist@... s.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:
>
> On 2006-08-26 00:59, Sean Whalen wrote:
>
> > Since *sulnika existed in PSlav the possibility
> > should be examined. This would be the only case of
> > original ul-n in PGer. If l>L (velarized) in some
> > cases *(melgY- > meLg- > miluk-) including after u
> > there's no problem if Ln>nn then ln>ll.
>
> Why wasn't it velarised in *fulna- > *fulla- or *wulno: > *wullo:?
> Positing arbitrary velarisation just to "explain" a single aberrant
form
> is a non-solution.
>

First a few quotes from Pulleyblank (again!, sigh)
w¨ French u as a glide
Ü Same sound affecting a velar (thus palato-labio- velar)

"
1 The Historical and Prehistorical Relationshps of Old Chinese

19. SEA
Ch. ha^i .. EMC x&j' < *mx&´G? < *mx&´Ü? 'sea; large lake.'
Initial *m is indicated by the inclusion of the graph for
'mother' in the phonetic. The phonetic is, however, me^i ..
EMC *m&j' with an additional graphic element that is perhaps
connected with the fact that the Middle Chinese final is
-&j rather than -&w. The final -&w after a labial initial
in the word 'mother' could well be the result of spreading
from the labial initial but I assume that -j implies a
velar glide *-y (more accurately *-w¨ in IPA). I have
suggested elsewhere that this was derived partly from
original *-G, but also partly from *-q, since there is
no *-&w¨ rhyme in Old Chinese corresponding to the
hóu .. rhyme group which I now reconstruct as *-aw¨
(Pulleyblank 1991c). There are xiéshe_ng contacts between
the zhi .. group and hóu .. group such as ér .. EMC ,nï,
phonetic in xu_ .. EMC sua^. There is also have wu^ .. EMC
mua^ 'insult,' which has me^i .. as phonetic and rhymes
in the hóu group, implying a reconstruction *màw¨?. On
this basis we can emend the reconstruction of ha^i .. to
*mx&´w¨?. The supposition that Middle Chinese x- derives
from a cluster *mx- needs more evidence to confirm it
but seems plausible.
The a vowel in Latin mare 'sea' from a root also
found in Gothic mari-saiws 'lake,' English mere, etc.
(Pokorny 1959: 748) seems to imply the 'laryngeal'
*h2, that is, *x, and one can therefore compare it to
Proto-Chinese *mx&´w¨?. As I have noted above, [q] is a
source of initial [R] in some cases in Modern Chinese
and, along with *n,Ü, is probably one of the sources
of *r in Old Chinese.

2 Early Contacts between Indo-Europeans and Chinese

Words Associated with Horses and Chariotry
Since chariotry was undoubtedly an importation from
the west and most likely from an Indo-European source,
it is natural to look to it as a possible field in
which to find borrowed words. This is a quite separate
question from that of the possible genetic relationship
between Sino-Tibetan and Indo-European. Even if there
is such a relationship, it must have been broken off
long before the domestication of horses and the invention
of wheeled vehicles. There are two possible candidates
for Chinese loanwords in this field that I shall
discuss here. The first is the Chinese word for 'horse,'
ma^ .. EMC maï', which is undoubtedly related to
Mongolian mori and Korean mal. Compare also Burmese
mràn, and Kachin kumran,. *m- may be a prefix in these
forms, however. On the basis of Kanauri ran,´, Manchati
hran, Bunan s'ran,s, Chepang se^ran,, Benedict to
reconstructs TB *s-ran, ~ *m-ran, (1972: 43). The
Tibeto-Burman forms, which are, of course, all much
later than the Chinese and belong to southerly
languages, may therefore be unrelated. Tibetan rta
'horse' must also be from a separate root.
The Chinese word has often been compared to IE *marko-,
found in Irish marc, Old High German marah 'horse,'
English mare, etc. An obvious difficulty is that
this is not the most widespread Indo-European
word for 'horse,' *ek^wo-, found in Sanskrit
as´va-, Greek hippos, Latin equus, Tocharian A
yuk, B yakwe, etc., and is confined to the western
branches, Celtic and Germanic. On the other hand,
Celtic and Germanic are not usually thought to
be especially close to one another and it could
be that they have preserved an old word lost elsewhere.
In Old English eoh, derived from *ek^wo-, means
specifically 'war horse.' One might suppose that *marko-
was an older generic term that was replaced by *ek^wo-
at first as a term for 'war horse,' later extended to
the generic meaning in most dialects. The fact that
Tocharian as we know it only has words derived from
*ek^wo- is a problem but less so when we recall that
the attested forms in Tocharian are at least 2000
years later than the presumed time of borrowing into
Proto-Chinese.
How shall we reconstruct the Old Chinese form? The now
widely accepted assumption that the Grade II vocalism
in Middle Chinese implies an initial *mr-cluster and
that the Old Chinese rhyme category implies either
an open *-a vowel or a velar glide followed by a
glottal stop to account for the Rising Tone leads to
the form *mra(y)?. There is further support of the
presence of a velar coda of some kind in the fact
that the graph is used as phonetic in the Departing
Tone word mà .. EMC maïH, 'sacrifice to the god of
the soil made by an army on expedition,' which is
also written as .., with gè .. EMC kak as phonetic.
The use of a word with initial *k to spell a work
with initial *m is highly unusual and, on the face
of it, very strange but it is confirmed by the
use of the same character .. not only for háo
EMC Gak 'racoon dog' but also as an alternative
writing for Mò .. EMC maïjk, the name of a non-Chinese
people in the northeast. It supports the view, for
which there are other grounds, that gè .. had a labiovelar
initial *kW in Old Chinese. Leaving this question aside,
the alternative spellings for the name of the sacrifice
show a connection with words in *-k and strengthen
the possibility of some kind of velar consonant
following the vowel, already implied by the bracketed
(G) in the form *mrá(G)?.
We can go one step farther. I have proposed elsewhere
that Old Chinese monosyllables had a vocalic suffix *-a
which left its trace after nasal finals as a glottal
stop, reflected as the Rising Tone in Middle Chinese.
This will account for the morphology in cases like
zha^ng .. EMC trïan,' < *-ag? < **-an,a 'lengthen,
grow' (intrans.), derived from zha_ng .. trïan, <
*-ag 'stretch.' If the same suffix followed a final
stop, one might expect that there would be intervocalic
voicing of the stop leaving the corresponding voiced
continuant and glottal stop. This will account for a
case like fù .. EMC buw' 'carry on the back,' which
is in the OC zhi_ .. rhyme group in *-&(G) and, as
suggested by Baxter (1992:323), must be a derivative
of be^i .. EMC p&k 'turn the back on; north,' along
with bèi .. EMC p&jH < *p&´k-s^ 'back' and EMC b&jH <
*a^p&´k-s^ 'turn one's back on, desert.' I reconstruct
fù .. as **a^p&`ka^ (with two asterisks to emphasize
that it belongs to a time long before the OC of the
Shijing rhymes). By analogy one can reconstruct ma^ ..
'horse' as **mráka, bringing it very close indeed
to IE *marko-.
"

So, both the "sea" and the "mare" word can be related
to Chinese words. Their problematic a's and their
Northern connections indicate they might be loans
(from LBK-Rössen?) in PIE. Is it possible that the
"sun" word might have been too? Pulleyblank points
out remarkable points of correspondence of mythology
between Indo-Europeans, eg. that the sun is pulled
across the sky by horses.

As for *ek^wo-, since *gWou- and *gWi(g)w- might be
related (as 'mobile property', I believe), would the
word fit in there?

BTW, gemination occurs often in words from Nordwestblock.

Torsten

---

Novidade no Yahoo! Mail: receba alertas de novas mensagens no seu celular. Registre seu aparelho agora!