Re: Sos-

2009/1/29 Arnaud Fournet <fournet.arnaud@...>:

> Why is it that Pumpokol _only_ has a back vowel,
> when the other languages do not ?
> This is _dirty_.
>
> A.
>
> ========

a) Pumpokol went extinct around 1750. Who knows what the precise vowel
quality was.
b) And yet, this is the observation. I will return to the problem later, anyway.

> This is not an answer, Arnaud. Tell me, what is the actual reflex of
> PY */s/ in Yeniseic? And if it is not /t/ next to back vowels, does
> Pumpokol have any reflex of /s/ at all? Does PY have any */s/? You
> know, the */s/ > */t/ development makes pretty good sense in the
> context of Pumpokol and Yeniseic.
>
> ======
>
> So far, you have provided a couple of convincing examples of *su > tu or *us
>> tu in Pumpokol.
> There are some unclean examples.
> And there is no examples with *o
> and is *a to be considered a back vowel or not ?
>
> A.
>
> =======

Whether /a/ is back phonetically is not that important, but yes, it is
much further in the back than /e/ and /i/. At the same vowel height,
there is no opposition to be sure. Ok then. Let me rephrase the
descriptive rule: ALL vowels except /e/ and /i/.

> t in Pumpokol where Ostyak and Samoyedic have t as well.
> Conservation of *s elsewhere.
> This "coincidence" is troublesome for a "spontaneous" Yeniseian development.

Well, whether spontaneous or contact-induced, it doesn't matter. These
things can spread across language borders.

> Well, have you read Vovin's article on the possible Yeniseic
> membership in the Hunnic alliance? (I don't recall the precise
> reference at the moment) If he is right, this may have interesting
> implications...
>
> ====
>
> i haven't but I'm interested to do so !
>
> A.

I'm not sure I have it. I'll try to find it though.

>> /cía-N/ < */si-/ "four" (front vowel, anlaut)
>> /ciku/ < */s[U]Ga/ "year" (front vowel, anlaut)
>> /cel/ < */so?ol/ "sleigh" (front vowel, anlaut)
>> => this last one looks like Turcic.
>
> Dear Arnaud, this is typical you. :-) You throw a claim here and don't
> give it a proper back up. Which Turkic word do you have in mind? The
> /KUzak/ etymon or the /K(i)aN/ one? (http://tinyurl.com/dlxs8u)
>
> ======
> I was talking about the last one,
> and the Turcic origin is mentioned by Starostin himself.
> A.
> ========

You have misread the comments. It says there: "...he [ also adds
Kott., Ass. čogar / čegar 'sleigh' - obvious Turkic loanwords that are
to be separated from the above root."

Apparently, the last one cannot be the source. I rather think the
source was something like *sVR-, cf. similar roots in Turkic meaning
"to drag" etc.

>>> I'm still waiting for a conditioning factor in Yeniseic.
>
> Mostly the factor is the back/front opposition in (Pre-)Pumpokol, but
> as I mentioned above, I'm going to get back to it some time soon.
>
> ====
> ok
> A.
> ======

I'll probably have some time during the weekend.

> Where's the problem, Arnaud? What I meant was that the few last bits
> of an original population, when surrounded by a majority of, say,
> Uralic speakers, would be willing to adopt the vital vocabulary in
> order to trade and, after all, survive. So, the fact that Yeniseians
> have borrowed from Uralic doesn't in itself constitute a sufficient
> proof they are not native to Siberia. They may just come from a
> different part of it or have gradually adopted to survive in the
> overwhelmingly non-Yeniseic land (whether it once was Yeniseic or
> not). Consider the situation of Basque in Iberia. Heavily romanized,
> but still, much longer there than Romance...
>
> ========
>
> Hm
> So this is the implicit premice I have mentioned before,
>
> How comes that _none_ of the languages 3000 km around Yeniseic does not
> share _any_ typological feature (Mongolian, Turcic, Korean, Uralic,
> Tungusic, Japanese, etc) ?

How come that none of the languages surrounding Basque share its
typological profile? Why has Basque not influenced Romance
considerably?

> There is no doubt that Basque is not like Indo-European, nor Berber and
> that's a major reason to think it's autochthonous.
> Yeniseian is not like Mongolian, Turcic, Korean, Uralic, Tungusic, Japanese,
> etc and that's a major reason to think it's _not_ autochthonous.

I don't get it.

Basque is unlike the surrounding languages, hence it is autochthonous.
Yeniseic is unlike the surrounding languages, hence it is not autochthonous.

Interesting. :-)

> Which part of Siberia could Yeniseic be native to ?

Until you prove that ALL the vocabulary relating to the Siberian
lifestyle is borrowed from the surrounding languages, Yeniseic still
can be considered as originating in Siberia..

> All, all languages there have the same syntaxic and morphological system.
> From the Volga to the Pacific ocean.

And? This proves little.

> You may disagree with Yeniseic being IE but one thing is clear : it does not
> originate in Siberia.

I disagree. It is as yet far from "clear".

Best wishes,

Petr