From: Torsten
Message: 65865
Date: 2010-02-16
>Her's my take on it:
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@> wrote:
> >
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Torsten" <tgpedersen@> wrote:
> > >
> > > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > [...]
> > > > The real problem here is that the words with /a/ seldom show
> > > > the "upper-class" variants with /e/ and /o/.
> > >
> > > Class VI 'draw' vs. class I 'drive', perhaps (all of class VI
> > > strong verbs are best explained as PPGmc -a-/-a:-/-a:-/-a- >
> > > PGmc -a-/-o:-/-o:-/-a-), Engl. grab vs OIc grípa, Engl. wag vs.
> > > OIc víkja "move"? Futher the OIc. class III verb exceptions
> > > gjalda "pay", gjalla "shout", hjálpa "help", skjálfa "tremble",
> > > skjalla "scold" with present root vowel /a(:)/ for /i/ (< PIE
> > > -é- before R). Other than that note the alternation -eu-/-u:-
> > > in most of the class II verbs vs. OE scu:fan, OHG su:fan; that
> > > alternation is of the same PIE/PPIE type as the -a-/-e- you
> > > were looking for. Note how large the -u:- subclass is in Dutch,
> > > as expected, I'm not convinced it grew later.
> > >
> > > Note also that some of the class II -u:C- subclass have -uCC-
> > > geminated counterparts: OHG su:f-, Engl. sup, sip, Schrijver's
> > > *dubb- etc, Sw class III dimpa, damp,
> > > http://ordnet.dk/ods/opslag?id=437209
> > >
> > > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_strong_verb
> >
> > I can't give a quick answer to the <scu:fan> business, or the
> > geminates.
>
> Class II strong verbs with /u:/-presents do not form an
> etymologically homogeneous group, so no simple explanation suffices
> for all. A thorough treatment requires examining these verbs one
> at a time, which is a job for another day. Nevertheless the fact
> that this subclass is significantly better represented in Dutch
> than in High German, along with the peculiar consonantism of some
> of the verbs, suggests that borrowing from Kuhn's Nordwestblock may
> be involved in many of them. In this posting I will focus on the
> verb appearing in Old English as <du:fan>. This verb and
> associated words illustrate the difficulties of this subclass quite
> well. Furthermore, since Schrijver uses some of the associated
> words as parade-examples for his Language of Geminates, the choice
> of <du:fan> enables us to gauge whether Schrijver's approach or an
> extension of Kuhn's approach is better suited to the problems at
> hand.
>
> Old English <du:fan> 'to go underwater, dive, sink' and its weak
> causative <dy:fan> 'to submerge, immerse, dip' continued into
> Middle English as <du:ven> and <dy:ven>, which became confounded in
> the 12th century; eventually the strong verb disappeared and the
> weak one replaced it as an intransitive. Modern English <dive> has
> acquired a strong preterit <dove> by analogy with Class I (<drive>,
> <drove>), though <dived> is still in use. Old Norse <du:fa> and
> <dy:fa> correspond to OE <du:fan> and <dy:fan>, and ON <deyfa> is
> cited as a synonym of <dy:fa>. In Middle Low German we have
> <bedu:ven> 'to be drenched with water' and in Middle Dutch
> <bedu:ven> 'to sink into water', which continues into Modern Dutch
> as <beduiven>.
>
> The 'dive' group of words above is generally considered related to
> the 'deep' group, which is well represented in Germanic. Here we
> have Gothic <diups>, ON <dju:pr>, OE <de:op>, Old Frisian <dia:p>,
> Old Saxon <diop>, <diap>, and Old High German <tiuf>, <tiof>
> 'deep', from which Gmc. *deupaz and Indo-European *dHeub- are
> readily inferred. An /o/-grade Gmc. causative *daupjan 'to dip,
> immerse' is reflected in Goth. <daupjan>, ON <deypa>, Faeroese
> <doypa>, OE <di:epan>, OFrs <de:pa>, OS <do:pian>, and OHG
> <touffan>. Outside Germanic we have Lithuanian <dubùs> 'deep,
> hollow', <daubà> 'gorge', and Old Church Slavic <dUbrI> 'gorge'.
>
> Phonetically, the 'dive' words could represent Gmc. *du:f- (thus
> Pokorny, Idg. et. Wb., and de Vries, An. et. Wb.) or *du:b- (thus
> Watkins, AHD, and Köbler, Ae. Wb.). Pokorny refers the 'dive'
> group to an IE root *dHeu-p- parallel to *dHeu-b- 'deep, hollow',
> and suggests that *dHeu-g- 'to duck' may belong to the same master
> root with a different extension. De Vries goes further and derives
> *dHeu-r- 'door' from the same master root *dHeu- 'wickerwork'. The
> senses 'hollow, deep' are supposed to have been extracted from the
> characteristics of wicker vessels. This is ingenious, but it
> smacks of hyperanalysis. I do not deny that root-extensions were
> used in Proto-Indo-European word-formation, but until we can deduce
> reliable meanings for the extensions, we are on thin ice trying to
> connect 'deep' with 'door'. Moreover the extensions had not been
> productive for many centuries at the time when the Germanic
> languages were diverging. The real questions here are whether
> Common Germanic effectively had, beside *deup-, another root *deuf-
> or *deub- of similar meaning, and whether such a parallel root is
> responsible for the 'dive' group. In favor of IE *dHeup- and Gmc.
> *deuf-, Pokorny and de Vries cite OCS <duplU> 'hollow' and <dupina>
> 'hole', other Slavic words, and OHG <tobal> 'narrow valley'. This
> does seem to establish IE *dHeup- in the sense of 'hollow' or the
> like, with a Gmc. reflex, and one might well separate it in sense
> from *dHeub- 'deep'. Due to root-restrictions, the -p- here very
> likely is an extension, and I have no serious objection to -b- as
> another extension. But *dHeup- fails to explain the /u:/-vocalism
> of the 'dive' group. If the latter comes from an IE root parallel
> to *dHeub-, it should show the same vocalism. In fact the best
> example, ON <deyfa>, apparently from Gmc. *daufjan, can be regarded
> instead as a contamination of <deypa> (from *daupjan, from IE
> *dHeub-) with the -f- of <du:fa> and <dy:fa>. Similarly OE
> <a:-di:efan> can be understood as a contamination of <di:epan> with
> the -f- of <du:fan> and <dy:fan>.
>
> The same objection applies to Watkins's parallel IE root *dHeubH-
> 'deep'. Köbler postulates a Gmc. *du:ban 'to dive', along with its
> causative *du:bjan, derived from IE *dHeub- without specifying the
> mechanism of derivation. I think the most plausible mechanism is
> the borrowing of this root into West (not Common) Germanic from the
> Nordwestblock, with subsequent borrowing of *du:ban and *du:bjan by
> North Gmc. from WGmc. In this view the NWBlock language merged
> aspirated and unaspirated IE mediae into plain mediae, as did
> Celtic, Baltic, Slavic, Messapic, and Lusitanian. As for the
> /u:/-vocalism, it will be noticed that Kuhn's list of NWB
> protoforms with initial /p/ (Anlautend P- im Germanischen, ZMaf
> 28:1-31, 1961; Kl. Schr. 1:361-389) has no examples of */eu/, but
> several of */u:/, */au/, and */u/. This suggests that the IE
> ablaut-series */eu/, */ou/, */u/ ended up as */u:/, */au/, */u/ in
> WGmc when the forms were borrowed from NWB rather than inherited to
> yield the usual */eu/, */au/, */u/.
>
> It might be objected that a language would be unlikely to
> monophthongize inherited */eu/ but not */ou/. I do not think that
> the NWB language did so. Instead, I think that NWB first shifted
> its inherited */o/ to */a/, and along with it */ou/ to */au/, as
> Germanic and Baltic also did. NWB then shifted */eu/ to a
> secondary */ou/, yielding the ablaut-series */ou/, */au/, */u/, and
> this is what the West Gmc. dialects borrowed, probably in the 2nd
> and 1st centuries BCE, before secondary Gmc. */o/ had arisen from
> */u/ in certain environments. Now, by van Wijk's Law (Zur
> relativen Chronologie urgermanischer Lautgesetze, PBB 28:243-253,
> 1903), when a language has more than one high close vowel, whatever
> happens to one will happen simultaneously to the other(s). In
> particular if /ei/ is monophthongized to /i:/, /ou/ must
> simultaneously go to /u:/, which as we know happened in
> pre-classical Latin. The Germanic monophthongization of inherited
> */ei/ to */i:/ in stressed syllables can be regarded as
> tautosyllabic umlaut, and in fact coincident with the process by
> which stressed */e/ became */i/ when followed by */i/ or */j/ in
> the next syllable. This process in turn can be dated to the 1st
> cent. CE, since Tacitus still has forms like <Segime:rus>. I place
> the WGmc monophthongization of stressed */ou/ (in NWB loanwords) to
> */u:/ at the same time.
>
> Forms with Gmc. *-pp- can be explained by Kluge's Law without
> invoking NWB loanwords. They could, in principle, reflect IE
> *dHeub- or *dHeup-, or even *dHeubH-. The meaning however is much
> more compatible with *dHeub- than with *dHeup-, and Occam's razor
> shaves away *dHeubH-. These forms include *duppjan 'to immerse,
> dip' (OE <dyppan> 'id.', OHG <tupfen> 'to wash', Low German
> <düppen> 'id.'), denominal from an abstract *duppo:-, IE
> *dHub-ná:-, and *duppan- 'diving bird, dipper' (OE <-doppa>), from
> IE *dHub-nón- 'diver'. OE <dy:pan> 'to dip' is apparently a cross
> of <dyppan> with <dy:fan>, and <du:fedoppa> 'pelican' is probably
> an appositional compound of <-doppa> with a synonymous *du:fe or
> *du:fa 'diver' rather than 'dove-diver, Taubentaucher', since the
> pelican dives after fish, not underwater doves. This noun *du:fe
> or *du:fa would continue a WGmc *du:bo:n- borrowed from NWB
> *doubo:n-, in turn reflecting an IE /e/-grade *dHéub-o:n- 'diver'.
> Obviously the WGmc strong verb *du:ban could not have been formed
> from this noun, but required a separate borrowing from NWB *doub-
> 'to go deep, dive'. It is not necessary to suppose that all three
> ablaut-grades of the verb were borrowed. Strong Class II already
> existed with verbs having */eu/ in the present, so it is not
> implausible that once the present stem *doub- had been established
> in WGmc (probably in the 2nd or 1st cent. BCE), the preterit
> singular *daub- and plural/participal *dub- would follow by
> analogy, since */ou/ would have sounded closer to */eu/ than to
> other present-stem nuclei. After monophthongization of */ou/ to
> */u:/ (prob. 1st cent. CE), the ablaut-grades would be *du:b-,
> *daub-, *dub-, just what we see in OE <du:fan>, <de:af>, <dufon>,
> <dofen>.
>
> Presumably the motivation in forming the OE tautological compound
> <du:fedoppa> was to avoid confusion with *du:fe 'dove', unattested
> in OE but represented in ME <do(u)ve> and in other Gmc. languages.
> This brings up another point. This bird-name is found in WGmc, in
> ON <du:fa>, and in Goth. <du:bo:>. Following Kuhn's viewpoint in
> the paper cited, we may expect NWB loanwords to WGmc to be
> occasionally borrowed further into NGmc, but seldom or never into
> Gothic. We must thus regard *du:bo:n- 'dove' as Common Germanic.
> The inherited */u:/ likely represents the zero-grade */uh2/, and
> the IE root involved is *dHeuh2bH-. As a rough diagnostic, then,
> if WGmc */u:/ agrees with Goth. /u:/, we have Gmc. */u:/ and no
> basis to suppose a NWB loanword. But if WGmc */u:/ corresponds to
> Goth. /iu/ reflecting */eu/, we can at least suspect a loanword, or
> the influence of one, in WGmc. For example OE <scu:fan> st. II 'to
> shove' corresponds to OFrs <sku:va> and ON <sku:fa>, but Goth.
> <af-skiuban> (likewise OHG <scioban> and the OE variant <sce:ofan>)
> requires */eu/. Here (by the processes outlined above) IE *skeubH-
> became *skeub- in both Gmc. and NWB, and the NWB present stem was
> borrowed into Western Common Gmc. as *skoub-, later monophthongized
> to *sku:b-, which competed with the inherited Gmc. present stem
> *skeub- and even spread to North Gmc., but there was no such
> competition in East Gmc.
>
> We are now in a position to examine the set of words given by
> Schrijver (and cited by Torsten in message #62677) as evidence for
> a Language of Geminates. These include ON <du:fa> and LG <düppen>
> already covered above, Dutch <duypen> 'to hang one's head' which
> can be assigned to Gmc. *daupjan above, and Norse <duppa> 'to dive'
> which can be regarded as a denominative from Gmc. *duppo:- or
> *duppan- above. The nasalized forms, Norse <dump> 'hole, pit,
> pond', etc., have been adequately explained by Pokorny as
> reflecting IE *dHumb- 'Erdvertiefung (mit Wasser gefüllt)', an
> ordinary zero-grade nasalized derivative of *dHeub- 'tief'. The
> remaining words are Faeroese <duffa> 'to bob in the water,
> schaukeln' (said of a boat), Norse <dubba> 'to stoop', and MD
> <dubben> 'to immerse'. To these last might be added Norse <dobbe>
> 'swampy land' and MLG <dobber> 'buoy, fishing bobber' (also in
> Dutch in both senses, and New York English (W. Irving) as 'bobber').
>
> I believe the forms with -bb- are best explained as derived from
> *dub-, the zero-grade NWB form of IE *dHeub-. The gemination in
> this case might have arisen regularly in WGmc, or it might have
> occurred already in NWB words. The reason for suspecting the
> latter is that some OE and OHG words containing geminated mediae
> and etymologizable in a similar way lack the /j/-umlaut expected
> from WGmc /j/-gemination. Of course, a systematic study of WGmc
> words with geminated mediae is a job for another day. In this
> case, NWB *doub- 'to go deep, dive' was presumably associated with
> zero-grade nouns such as *dubjan- 'diver', *dubno:- 'depth', etc.
> If WGmc /j/-gemination produced the -bb-, the protoforms of the
> words above were likely *dubjo:n-, *dubbjo:n- 'deep spot, Tiefe,
> Vertiefung' vel sim. with a denominal verb *dubjan, *dubbjan 'to go
> deep, go down, dip, bob'. If (as I consider likely) NWB already
> had nouns with *-bb-, this could have arisen in principle either
> from *-bj- or *-bn-, and the WGmc denominal verb might have been
> *dubbjan or *dubbo:jan. More study is required in order to exclude
> various possibilities.
> Finally, Faeroese <duffa> can hardly be a NGmc word. Since it is aI think you're right. Note Danish
> maritime term, borrowing from a Dutch or Low German dialect in
> which WGmc *-b- was regularly reflected as -ff- is likely. Several
> words of this type are found in standard Dutch such as <gaffel>
> 'pitchfork', <schoffel> 'hoe', and <doffer> 'male dove, Tauber'
> (one would expect *duiver on the basis of <duif> 'dove', pl.
> <duiven>). Probably Faer. <duffa> was borrowed from such a dialect
> in which WGmc *du:ban 'to dive' was reflected as *du:ffen, so that
> <duffa> is historically the same verb as ON <du:fa> and the rest.
>
> All in all, the words cited by Schrijver as evidence for a LanguageAs far as I can see, Schrijver's language of geminates *is* Kuhn's ar-/ur- language.
> of Geminates do not require any new substrate. They can be
> explained adequately as ordinary inherited words, as loans from
> Kuhn's NWBlock substrate, or as loans between different Germanic
> languages.
>