--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> > What I imagine, very sketchily, is an early situation with regard to
> > verb stems something like this:
> >
> > PPIE *CaC- -> PIE *CeC-, normal neutral stem
> > PPIE *a-CaC- -> PIE *iCoC- -> *CoC-,
> > indicating singularity of action
> > PPIE *Ca-CaC -> PIE *CeCC-,
> > indicating plurality of action, ie multiple subjects, repetition
> > (and similarly with root vowels i and u, obviously)
>
> And I also believe that these verbal stems of the hi-conjugation
> were nominal in nature. Cf. the words of the "language of bird
> names".
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/25888
>
> Now watch me do tricks with my new nominal prefix:
>
> PPIE *pad- -> PIE *ped-
> PPIE *a-pad- -> *i-pod- -> PIE *pod-
>
> Nice, huh? I get this free of charge by positing the prefix.
> This ablaut relation is particularly hard to crack, since
> there is normally not any surroundings to the root to "blame"
> for the ablaut. The attempts I've seen to derive it from
> different cases have not been convincing.
>
> It would be nice to observe that the a- prefix means "singular"
> or "piece of" in the language of bird names. In fact, it's the
> other way round. Back to the drawing board.
>
Actually, it can be done even simpler, without assuming a PPIE
*a-prefix. We can instead start from the 'i-pod' rule. If
PIE had composites of the type obj-verbalroot (eg PPIE X-a-táms,
X-a-tamás -> PIE *X-i-tóms, *X-i-tmós "X-cut, X-cutting", later
split into *X-i-tomós, *X-i-tomós-yo and *X-i-tómos,
*X-i-tómos-yo), we would have an adjectival or nominal form of
the verb with o-grade root vowel, which could be used in the
iterative-causative *-eje/o derivative verbs.
Now note in the article summary by Bubenik
http://tinyurl.com/k74nh
the following
"
I will discuss a number of typological parallels to the Semitic
development of the inflectional perfect from the derivational
diathetic category seen in the development of the Indo-European
perfect, the Hittite hi-conjugation and the mediopassive from a
common source (as articulated most recently by Jasanoff, 2003).
In both phyla the crux of the matter is the primordial split between
'active' and 'stative' groups of verbs. On the IE side these two were
characterized by two distinct sets of endings, *-m vs. *-h2e, with
the latter representing the 'middle-perfect'; on the Semitic side,
the diathetically ambivalent stative was actually a finitized verbal
adjective (*CaCiC). Typologically, Proto-Semitic represents an earlier
state of affairs in its transparent derivational relationship of its
'middle-perfect' and the stative to the verbal adjective. In Pre-PIE
the perfect is based derivationally on the ablauted verbal root and
the same o-grade is found in primary nominal and adjectival
derivatives. Further parallels will be provided from the later history
of the perfect in both phyla, esp. its easy transformation into a
narrative 'tense' helped, among others, by its derivational affinity
to the perfective (aorist).
"
In other words, typologically it would not be wrong to assume that
the IE perfect and/or stative is based on a verbal adjective, ie.
*CoC-.
Torsten