Re: [tied] Re: Slavic endings

On Uto, rujan 12, 2006 6:09 am, pielewe reče:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
> wrote:
>
>
>> Why not a neuter ending, given the fact that the formation is
>> hypocoristic?
>
> Two reasons: because the semantics are definitely masculine (heroes
> routinely have names in -o, the word "hypocoristic" conveniently
> papers over this point) and because there is the problem of the
> indeclinability. Both points are unproblematic on the basis of Nsg -o
> and remain unexplained otherwise.

Just a note, perhaps it is not relevant. In Croatian, the names ending in
-o can be both short-names and hypocoristics, which is differentiated by
accent/declension. Thus, Sta^nko (G. Sta^nka) is just a shortened name and
Stánko (G. Stánke:) is a hypocoristic. All kinds of generalizations exist
of course. But this also proves that not all of o-names are hypocoristic.

Mate