Re: S mobile (Was : PS Emphatics)

Earliest PIE had _no_ gender markings.

Later, our ancestors being chauvinists par excellence, they introduced two
suffixes to designate females: -*tm 'one who accompanies the male doer named
in the root'; and -*(H)a:, which references a female's sexual
characteristics.

Somewhat later, a masculine in -*w was introduced, highlighting the
'strength' of the male.

Shifting the stress-accent to the last syllable produced *CV'CV instead of
the usual *CVC(V), which signified incomplete activity. This 'thematic
vowel' became the basis for the masculine -*o declension.


Patrick

----- Original Message -----
From: "fournet.arnaud" <fournet.arnaud@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2008 2:51 AM
Subject: Re:Re: [tied] Re: S mobile (Was : PS Emphatics)


>
> n 2008-02-05 09:12, fournet.arnaud wrote:
>
> > The major problem is about all roots have or have not #s-
> > it's not just a couple of odd words.
> > it's widespread.
>
> No, having or not having "s mobile" is an idiosyncratic property of
> individual roots. Lots of roots never show it, and there are also many
> roots which have *st-, *sn-, *sw-, *sr- etc., but no forms without *s.
> In the Wiki article there are some erroneous claims like *sneigWH- being
> a root with "s mobile", which it isn't. The *s- is missing only in those
> languages which regularly lose it before nasals (like Latin and Greek).
>
> Piotr
> ============
> Not so sure.
>
> What about Mordvin low "snow" < *n_(gh)w ? (vowel unclear)
> No s- because it is Uralic..
> And connection with Chinese *ning "to freeze, to congeal" ?
> These words have no #s-.
>
> What does "idiosyncratic" means when 50 % exhibit #s- ?
>
> You know PIE had no masculine grammatical gender.
> It's just an idiosyncratic feature displayed by less than 50%
> of words...
>
> Arnaud
> ================
>
>
>