From: tgpedersen
Message: 61198
Date: 2008-11-02
>Aren't Gmc. wa- and ja- stems thematicized old u- and i- stems? If so,
> On 2008-11-01 22:19, tgpedersen wrote:
>
> > We're talking different things. Of course PIE -we- gives -u- in
> > zero grade morphologically. I'm saying that unstressed -we- or
> > -wo- -> -u- doesn't make much sense phonetically. I'd like to see
> > an example of it elsewhere.
>
> Will English do? Here's a classic example. In *-wa- stems like
> *Barwaz 'grove, wood' the loss of the unstressed vowel in the
> second syllable led to the vocalisation of the stranded *w:
>
> *Barwa- > *baru > OE bearu (pl. bearwas)
>
> Do you really think it makes no sense phonetically? Similarly, with
> the palatal approximant,
>
> *xarja- > *herja > *heri > here