Re: Scientist's etymology vs. scientific etymology

--- Andrew Jarrette <anjarrette@...> wrote:

> --- 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>).

English lost /y/ twice --once in Old English for
native words and once in Middle English for French
words, so it did pick up French <u> as /y/. And /y/
still exists in some dialects --some southern
Appalachian dialects and in at least some dialects of
Scots.

>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
>
>

Languages pick uo unfamiliar sounds all the time