Re: Not "catching the wind " , or, what ARE we discussing?

On 2008-04-16 00:54, stlatos wrote:

> Maybe you don't understand what I'm proposing. If CuwVCV > CwVCV
> and CwV# > CuwV# etc. in In-Ir

The latter (optional *CR- > *CR.R- in monosyllabic words) is Lindemann's
Law. There is no converse of LL in Indo-Iranian in polysyllabic words,
as far as I can see.

> there's no way to prove which form for
> 'dog' is older by In-Ir evidence itself. However, a borrowing from
> before the rules operated could be seen in Russian.

> Your description of what "we actually find" seems to regard a
> borrowing in another language as less important in reconstructing the
> ancestral form than non-borrowed descendants. Since I know you regard
> other borrowings as showing features lost in the source language, what
> if anything makes this case different?

Borrowing in _Russian_? The word is completely unknown outside of East
Slavic. How old can it be, especially as the vocalism doesn't match
anything like *suvaka-, which would have become Slavic *sUvokU (even *v
--> b, which however doesn't seem to occur in Slavic words suspected of
Iranian origin wouldn't help). If the word is a loan, it must be from
some relatively modern source.

Piotr