From: Tavi
Message: 69374
Date: 2012-04-19
>>
> The fact that a word appears in Altaic or Kartvelian does not mean
> that they appear in some 'paleo-IE' dialect.
> > This is because you stick to the traditional PIE model, which isThis is precisely my point: your "PIE" is precisely the paleo-IE dialect where this word became denasalized. As I said many times, IMHO the so-called "PIE roots" don't belong to a single language but come from several paleo-dialects.
> > both incomplete (it doesn't explain all the IE facts) and
> > isolacionst.
>
> No, it is because I'm sticking to logic. The fact that a set of nasal-initial words appears in Altaic or Kartvelian on the one hand and in a denasalized form in IE does not necessarily mean that they appear in some 'paleo-IE' dialect, since they could all have been borrowed from a now lost language, being denasalized when borrowed by PIE and not when when borrowed by Altaic and Kartvelian.
>
> How do you explaim then that the "fog" word is denasalized only in Lithuanian, but your examples (presumably) are denasalized in many more IE languages?The fact the nasal survived to denasalization makes me think the word had originally a laryngeal at word-initial: *Hn- (clusters *Hn-/*Hr- are rather common in Proto-NEC, as for example in the 'night' word), then lost in "PIE". Remember that besides *nebh- we've also got *ºnbh- (e.g. Greek aphrós 'foam' < *ºnbh-r-o-).
>
> The supposed singular n- -> d- of Lithuanian debesìs is explainedNo, I haven't. These are totally independent etymologies.
> much better by the assumption of an original cluster *dhn- vel sim
> in the "fog" word.
>
> > I disagree.
>
> No, you don't, since you have now incorporated into your proposals my idea of adding the "fog" word to the group of words for "darkness" with initial *gn-, *dn-.
>