Re: That old Odin scenario ...

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> On 2008-05-04 17:04, tgpedersen wrote:
>
> > It is difficult in at least Russian to analyze out the *em- verb
> > from prefixed compounds of it, since the preverbs add an extra
> > -n-. From that one might be false analysis arrive at a root *nem-.
> > Now if that process had been more widespread in the IE languages,
> > the vacillation between *em- and *nem- could be explained that
> > way.
>
> If we are talking about Proto-Slavic, you don't have to abstract
> *(j)eNti (*(j)ImoN) out of anything. It's very well attested on its
> own (OCS jeNti/imoN, ORu jati/imu, Ukr. jaty/jmu, Pol. ja,c'/(OPol.)
> ime,, Serb./Cr. jeti/imem, etc.),

No, I was saying that if a situation similar to that in Russian
existed in some early version of PIE, you might expect people to make
*em- out of *nem-, or vice versa, whichever form was the original.
This might be borrowed into neighboring dialects.

> and of course not _all_ preverbs add an extra -n-, even in Russian.

That's right, and such a situation makes the risk of faulty division
by new learners even higher. Cf.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/47507

> By contrast, there is no +neNti/+nImoN in any Slavic language

Nor is there any *emU- "understanding" or "wise".
And there is an alternation in Latvian.

Torsten