--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@...> wrote:
>
> Could you elaborate on your noun class theory?
> To me, s-mobile means something like German "echt"
> --like an intensifying adjective or adverb
My hypothesis (I suppose it's not well developed enough to be
considered a theory) is that Nostratic had noun classes, kind of like
the Bantu languages. I assume that PIE has some fossilized prefixes
left over from Nostratic. The most common would be *s, the s-mobile,
but *d, *w, and *y also abound. Much less widespread is the *k prefix
I assume the class prefix was affixed to both the noun and the verb
(which agreed with the subject or perhaps focus). In PIE these
prefixes have apparently lost any semantic content they once had. PAA
retains *t'(which loses the ejective feature in PAA and which
corresponds to PIE *d-) and *s (PIE s-mobile) as the feminine suffix
and causative prefix, respectively. This suggest that Nostratic *t'
was a feminine noun class and *s was an animate noun class. Or
something like that. I'm still very my in the early stage of my
investigation.
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I'm glad somebody else is working in the same direction
this is always reassuring.
But I don't really believe to the noun-class idea.
Have you written anything on this ?
Arnaud.
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