From: Carl Edlund Anderson
Message: 46984
Date: 2007-01-17
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Carl Edlund Anderson <cea@...>
>> What's the -mon suffix in dai-mon? Where else does it crop up?
>
> -mon is ablauted variant of -men with zero-grade form *mn.-. It is a
> suffix that forms nouns and adjectives, as in *krei-men 'a judging',
> cf. Lat crimen, -minis, discri-men, -minis. It is also attested in
> Illyrian personal name Ger-man and in place name Dush-man, river
> name Bar-man.
On 16/01/2007 19:36, alexandru_mg3 wrote:
> PIE *<X>-men means "possesing as its main property, as its single
> property (-men) the <X>"
> The basic example is h2ek^-men 'stone' => 'possesing as its main
> property the <sharpness> *h2ek^-
Thanks for that :)
Can anyone comment on the variation between /e/ and /i/ in the Latin
reflexes of -mn.- ? I know /n./ normally goes to /en/ in Latin (which
would account happily for /krimen/, so is there some some effect of the
following vowel (or something like that) in the oblique stems to create
forms like -minis?
Or is the proto-form behind the Latin not actually -mn.- but the e-grade
-men-, and it's the /e/ in that form being affected in the oblique stems
(rather than an /n./)?
Cheers,
Carl
--
Carl Edlund Anderson
mailto:cea@...
http://www.carlaz.com/