From: Torsten
Message: 69352
Date: 2012-04-17
>That's nice. Now, if you want the rest of us to accept that pre-Greek was IE, you should present his arguments here.
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Torsten" <tgpedersen@> wrote:
> >
> > They *all* have -ph-, so no reason to let particularly kséphas be
> > Pelasgian, if that's what you mean. And if you mean the whole set,
> > Beekes explicitly refutes that.
> >
> > > References, please?
> >
> > R.S.P. BEEKES
> > Pre-Greek
> > The Pre-Greek loans in Greek
> > p. 4
> > 'As to 'Pelasgian' and related theories which assume an
> Indo-European substratum in Greece, these theories have failed, and
> I no longer mention them (in my etymological dictionary). The theory
> has been extensively discussed by Furnée (37-68). 'Pelasgian' has
> done much harm, and it is time to definitely reject it. '
> >
> I'm afraid Beekes' "refutation" isn't actually a refutation. Also
> Furnée's "Pelasgian" has little to do with Georgiev's. The Bulgarian
> author, in his book "Introduction to the history of IE languages"
> (3rd edition, 1981), characterizes Thracian as an IE-satem language
> with a stop system similar to the one of Germanic and Armenian. He
> then defines "Pelasgian" as a close relative of Thracian, which he
> group together into a Thraco-Pelasgian group. And as its stop series
> I is voiceless aspirated, then *p- would be rendered as *pH in
> loanwords to Greek.
> > But since they word most likely is a loan (because of theWrong. The fact that a word appears in an IE language does not mean it's a native word; if it did, we wouldn't be having this debate.
> > alternations) historical IE rules are off the table.
> >
> > > In the inherited lexicon, Greek voiceless aspirated dcerive from
> > > PIE series III (tradtional "voiced aspirated"), but in these
> > > words, Greek /ph/ corresponds to series I. This indicates a
> > > loanword.
> >
> > We never disagreed on that. The question is why you assume the
> > source was an IE language.
> >
> Precisely because the word is attested in other IE languages.
> > which also takes care of the odd Lithuanian form with d-That's nonsense. The fact that a word appears in Altaic or Kartvelian does not mean that they appear in some 'paleo-IE' dialect, and if they did, that would not explain the single supposed occurrence n- -> d- of Lithuanian. That is explained much better by the assumption of an original cluster *dhn- vel sim.
> >
> > > IMHO This would be explained as a denasalization *n- > *d-.
> >
> > That's not an explanation. It's not even a proposal since it's the
> > usual way of explaining this unique occurrence (thus weak).
> >
> > > I disagree.
> >
> > With what? It's the usual way of explaining this unique
> > occurrence, and since it's unique, it's ad hoc. With hat exactly
> > do you disagree?
> >
> You said it was no explanation but I think it is, because
> denasalization is a rather common phonetic process. And it
> consistently happens at word-initial in some paleo-IE dialect (I use
> traditional reconstructions for the sake of clarity, not because I
> endorse "voiced aspirated"):
>
> Altaic *mál^e 'wildcat' ~ IE *bhel- 'wildcat'
> Altaic *maNga (~ -o) 'big, strong' ~ IE *bhengh-u- 'thick, abundant'
> Altaic *n^ikrV 'a k. of thorny tree' ~ IE *dhergh-(no)- 'sloe tree,
> blackthorn'
> Kartvelian *marts'q'w- 'wild strawberry' ~ IE *bhreh2g^- 'strawberry'
> (Latin fra:gum)
> > > > Semantically "darkness" and "cloud" match.So are the shifts "darkness" > "night" and "darkness" > "fog".
> >
> > > That's right, but 'night, evening' has got preference.
> >
> > What's that supposed to mean? The original set of words under
> > discussion (psephas, knephas, dnophos, zophos, gnophos) all mean
> > "darkness".
> >
> > > But you forget the Indo-Iranian, Hittite and Altaic cognates
> > > whose meaning is 'night'.
> >
> > And that, in your opinion, has preference why?
> >
> Because the meaning shift 'night' > 'darkness' is straightforward.
> also forgot to mention zéphyros 'west wind'. And sun sets around the?? You forgot to mention zéphyros "west wind" because sun sets around the west?
> west, you know.