Re: Nordwestblock, Germani, and Grimm's law

> > > > Chiefly, no weird consonant alternations. *tSai never becomes
> > > > /dZia/, or *kAhvi never becomes /kubbi/, etc.
> > >
> > > None in mine either.
> >
> > Um, no, they're full of that stuff. *kaNt- > *kansa for one
> > example (the sound change t > s is not required by any receptor
> > language and must be added as an assumption).
>
> t > s is a weird consonant alternation?

Like I just said, it's unmotivated, therefore weird (to see it in this supposed word, not in general).

> And yes, it must. And?

Precisely the point I was making: wanderwords such as "tea" do not require assuming any sound laws just for the purpose of their propagation. Yours does. Making assumptions = minus points. Should be elementary.

> > > > > > "hand",
> > > > > See the Epimakhov, Koryakova quote in
> > > > > http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/65159
> > > > > With a societal division like that, and with a metaphor of
> > > > > the wings (note the English metaphor) as arms/hands of the
> > > > > main body, you get an easy semantic slide "side" <-> "hand"
> > > >
> > > > Yes, "limb" > "side" is well attested (also "my right hand"
> > > > etc.) However I do not like the opposite direction of
> > > > development at all. Much too specific without motivation.
> > > > Tons of things are at the sides of something.
> > >
> > > But in English, it's specifically 'left/right hand side'. No
> > > other bodypart is used.
> >
> > That's still the direction "limb" > "side".
>
> But it shows the specific connection between "hand" and "side". The direction "side" > "limb" is shown in the metaphor "wing" used in an attacking army (cf. Latin 'ala', German 'Flügel').

That's still "limb" > "side" too. "Wing" originally means "limb" and its meaning is extended to the side of an army. Try again.

> > > > > > Also, only the first of those is an innovation by any
> > > > > > stretch.
> > > > >
> > > > > The second goes with the first as its antonym (if they were
> > > > > once both adjectives): ordered mass vs. unordered mass.
> > > >
> > > > A concept of "group" in general would have existed even
> > > > before.
> > >
> > > Before the necessity of organizing people and land according to
> > > the demand for 100 cavalry?
> >
> > Yes. "Family". "Tribe". "Humans (of any tribe)". "Herd of
> > animals". "A group of objects of any sort". "A group of hunters".
> > And so on.
>
> You misunderstand. I was pointing out that such words would be irrelevant to the new concept of placing the responsibility for providing a certain number of cavalry on a particular group or area.

Sounds better.

> No doubt some languages would use existing words, but others used the new one.

Yes, that sounds fine too. But it does not seem that this actual specific meaning ever surfaces in the words you have in there. So you have to assume it. More minus points.

> > > Note that it is involved in the "long" sense.
> >
> > I have no idea what you mean by that.
> >
> Pokorny here
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/65525

A root meaning "long", so?

> and connected to 'tongue' by some
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/65531
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/65530

Again with trying to turn contesting derivation patterns into one set. "Tongue" could perhaps come from "long", or it could come from an ethnonym, but getting "long" from "tongue" is again all backwards. Getting "long" from "an arrangement of soldiers" is also completely unrealistic. Basic vocabulary does not tend to come from sophisticated cultural concepts. Your assumed developments are on the same level as /kokakola/ ending up as "red".

I don't see you even trying to explain there how a single *L could yield all of *g *gl *dVl *d *l etc. That has to rake up some half a dozen assumptions at least. There's no semantic nor phonological basis at all for merging all this into one set.

> > > So it has to do with ordered vs. unordered (single file) march
> > > through the landscape.
> >
> > More assumptions.
>
> It's the way to do it.
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marching

First this was supposed to refer to unordered masses, now it's supposed to also refer to the military too, and also in a specific formation this time. Not to say that this particular meaning also seems to be unattested. The assumptions just keep piling up with no end in sight; and that's why Occam would puke.

John Vertical