Re: Scientist's etymology vs. scientific etymology

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

>
>
> > I agree with Mr. Kilday on this one: there are enough Latin words
> > that preserved original *o after labials that suggest to me that
> > this law is not true -- cf. <monile> "necklace", <mons> "mountain",
> > <mox> "soon", <pons> "bridge", <potis> "able", <post> "after",
> > <podager> "suffering from sore feet", <fodere> "to dig", and perhaps
> > <fons> "spring".
>
> Latin 'coast words' tend to have *a, cf the Kuhn quote
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/30032
> A scenario where Proto-Latin in Central Europe had an 'a-language'
> (one in which PPIE *a didn't become *e/o/zero or which reverted to *a
> like IIr) between itself and the coast would explain that.
>
>

Point for consideration (?): If /a/ is always of foreign origin
(since the original PIE didn't have /a/), why then didn't /a/ of
foreign languages become borrowed as /e/ or /o/ or some other native
sound? As an example, after English lost the phonemes /y/ and /y:/,
Old French /y:/ was borrowed as /eu/ (> /iu/ > /ju:/)(as in <pure>)
and Old French /y/ was borrowed as /u/ (as in <punish>). So if Latin,
being a descendant of PIE, didn't have any /a/ inherited from PIE, why
then did they adopt an entirely new unfamiliar sound?

Andrew