Re: Slavic *-je/o

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

> Here's another take:
> The *-je/o- extension appears just before the endings. It is a
> type of thematic ending.
> Suppose (Schmalstieg) the original verbal (mi-)inflection was
> the semithematic one, ie the one where those endings that have
> -o- in the thematic inflection (before voiced) are there and
> those that have -e- in the thematic (before unvoiced) aren't
> there. Such a version of a verb with the *-jo-/je- suffix
> would look like *-jo-/-i- instead. Suppose further that the
> thematic inflection was produced from the semithematic one by
> placing -e-'s before the unvoiced endings.

Voiced too, cf. OCS 1st and 3rd pl.

How's this different from the assumption of a fully thematic
conjugation, except that you add an intermediate stage with
*-jo-/*-i-, which doesn't seem to be attested? What's the gain?

> We'd now have
> *-jó-/-íe-, it being so late that the latter (corresponding
> to your *-ih-) didn't go -> *-jé-, and therefore later could
> go to Slavic *i, like *ei and *i: did.

There are accentual differences between *-ih- (or anything that
behaves like inherited *-ih-, like the vowel of the infinitive) and
vowels resulting from such contractions. And of course the Baltic
infinitive must be explained as well.

Piotr