RE : [tied] Re: North of the Somme

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

>
> > > > > Once we get into gadflies & such, Uralic also has *parma,
> > > > > in Finnic, Mari and Khanty at least; and Samic *poaró.
> > > > > Mordvinic puromo fits better together with the latter.
>
> > > *parma is represented regularly by Finnic *parma, Mari *paarmo
> > > and Khanty _puur@... Mordvinic *u and Samic *oa are both
> > > normally from *o.
> > >
> > a/u 'ablaut' is a feature of the ar-/ur- substrate language (hence
> > the name).
>
> This isn't a/u however, it's a/o. Similar alternation BTW appears
> in loans from Indo-Iranian. It may be an adaptation issue, if the
> original phoneme was both open and rounded.

There's is plenty of 'abnormal' a/o: 'ablaut' in Germanic:
hat/hood
cake/cookie (Dutch dim. of koek "cake")
all class VI strong verbs
and I wondered earlier if that reflected original a/u ablaut of loans or something else.

>

...

> > > > > Also plain "fly":
> > > > > F. *kärpä- (Livonian käärmi), Mo. karvo, Ma. karme
> > > > > with an irregular (non-inherited?) cluster.
> > > >
> > > > Metathesis k - p?
> > >
> > > I would rather consider the possibility that the "(gad)fly"
> > > words come from a root of the shape #kwarPa- (with #P some
> > > labial), specifically "fly" from a de-labialized descendant
> > > #karPa, and "gadfly" from a de-velarized #parPa. By the
> > > semantics we expect these words to be closer related than the
> > > "worm" group.
> > >
> > > > It would seem we have two suffixes, -k and -m. -k is a NWB
> > > > suffix too. -m is part of the Caland set.
> > >
> > > I'm not sure if plain -m works. Substrate loans in western
> > > Uralic commonly include the correspondence of Mordvinic /v/ vs.
> > > /m/ elsewhere (for example "linden", "fog": F. lehmus, sumu ~
> > > Mo. levos, suv). However here we have /p/ in Central Finnic.
> > > Unless the Livonian form with the expected /m/ means that *p is
> > > a later (onomatopoetic) variant?
> >
> > How about my favorite phoneme: /n,W/, the nasal labio-velar?
>
> Well if we want to derive them all from a single form. But that
> doesn't seem to be necessary. This case rather looks like related
> substrate languages having related, but distinct, invertebrate
> terminology.

Ends up as the same thing: if we want to know the structure of that language family, we will have to posit proto-forms,. And labial/velar stop/nasal alternation is one of the characteristics of the language of geminates as defined already, eg. dup-/dump-/dunk-/duck-.

>
> > > > > Finnic has probably affectiv fronting.
> > > >
> > > > Affective... hm.
> > > > Is that similar to the *vëlki/*volki alternation you mentioned
> > > > to me?
> >
> > > No, this is a reasonably common Finnic-internal process, not
> > > unlike the "expressiv palatalization" in Basque.
> >
> > Similar to the 'pejorative j" in the Scandinavian languages
> > (and p-/pt- (< *p-/*pj-) alternations in Greek)?
> > http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/31015
> >
> > Torsten
>
> That too. For example _otus_ "creature", _ötökkä_ "bug"; _tuhma_
> "naughty", _tyhmä_ "stupid"; _tormata_ "to rush"_, _törmätä_ "to
> crash"; _harottaa_ "to be spred out", _häröttää_ "to be mess'd
> up"... and plenty of phonesthetic coinages too.

Torsten