--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham" <richard@>
> wrote:
> > I'll stick to the conventional scenario:
> >
> > Pali: Mata 2. [pp. of marati, mr.] dead. < PIE *mer
> >
> > Proto-Afroasiatic: *mawVt - not only Semitic, but also Egyptian
> > mwt, Berber forms mostly &mm&t (& = schwa), and Chadic (e.g.
> > Hausa _mútù_).
> >
> > See http://tinyurl.com/2dtvoh for the entry in the Tower of
> > Babel's Afroasiatic database.
>
> Borean is nice too (ibd.). Dravidian *mad.- "die, perish".
According to B. Krishnamurti and other Dravidian linguists, there is
no /*d./ (retroflex /d/) phoneme in Proto-Dravidian. Therefore,
<*mad.-> may be a non-existent Dravidian proto-form. In line
with this, in his latest book _Reconstructing Proto-Nostratic:
Comparative Phonology, Morphology, and Vocabulary_ (2007; here
quoted from a preprint copy recorded on CD), Allan R. Bomhard
proposes (see below) a different Proto-Dravidian root as a possible
cognate to the Proto-Indo-European root <*mer-> `to die' cited in
Richard's post.
Moreover, the Proto-Afroasiatic root compared with Proto-Indo-
European <*mer-> in Starostin's databases is <ma(Ha)r-> `to be
ill, weak', not <*mawVt-> `to die' as suggested by Richard (check
at <
http://tinyurl.com/2focm9> and <
http://tinyurl.com/2dtvoh>).
Thus Bomhard:
Proto-Nostratic <*mar'-> ~ <*m&r'-> [/*r'/ =
palatalized /r/] `(vb.) to be weakened, to wither away, to decay; to
be or become sick, to fall ill; to die (from a fatal disease), to
perish; (n.) sickness, illness, fatal disease, malady, ailment;
death'. Material:
1. Proto-Indo-European <*mer-/*mor-/*mr.-> `(vb.) to die; (n.)
death';
2. Proto-Afrasian [= Proto-Afroasiatic] <*mar-> [reconstructed as
<ma(Ha)r-> by A. Militarev and O. Stolbova in Starostin's
databases] `(vb.) to be weakened, to wither away, to decay; to be
or become sick, to fall ill; to die (from a fatal disease), to
perish; (n.) sickness, illness, disease, malady, ailment; death';
3 and Proto-Dravidian <*maz.-V-> `to delay, to be dull' [so
reconstructed in B. Krishnamurti's _The Dravidian Languages_;
actually, Bomhard gives here only a list of lexemes -- some of which
have the meaning `to die, to perish' -- taken from the DEDR entry
#4750 at <
http://tinyurl.com/2vsadw>, but he does not venture to
reconstruct the underlying Proto-Dravidian root. This choice of
Bomhard's seemingly depends on the fact that, according to his own
Nostratic phonological theory, at the Proto-Nostratic level Proto-
Dravidian /*z./ would correspond to /*r'/.]
Kindest regards,
Francesco Brighenti