Re: Ligurian

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Bhrihskwobhloukstroy <bhrihstlobhrouzghdhroy@...> wrote:

>
> 2012/5/1, Anders <ollga_loudec@...>:
> >
> > Do we have corroborating evidence for this chronology, i.e. *o: > *a: before
> > Osthoff's Law in Celtic? Intuitively, I'd suspect *o:RC > *oRC in Celtic,
> > but I'm not aware of any examples at the moment.
>
> Bhrihskwobhloukstroy:
>
> OIr. alt -o-, n. 'joint, articulation, state' : Gk. péplos,
> laryngealless (does it exist?) 3. √*pel- (Pokorny 802-803, Mallory -
> Adams 1997: 63); Matasović's *pol-to- (121) implies a loan from
> Germanic, but *po:l-to-m would be regular

Sure, this is a possible etymology. The meaning of *pel- seems to be 'to fold', from which 'joint, articulation' is a plausible development. But the etymology is hardly inevitable.

>
> OIr. bairt -i-, f. 'maiden' : Gothic barn 'child', √*bher-; the only
> alternative to appertinentive Vrddhi *bho:r-ti-s would from seá¹­
> variant *bherH- with zero-grade and, pace Jens, derivative -h2 (from
> feminine) *bhrH-th2-i-s (> Celtic *barti-s like *bardo-s <
> *gwrH-dhh1-o-s with 'Schrijver's Law')

According to DIL, bairt is only attested once, glossed _ingen_ 'girl' in the Auraicept na n-éces. Hence its existence is more than a little doubtful.

This is not to say that *o: > *a: may not precede *V:RC > *VRC, only that the above material doesn't settle the matter.

Anders