--- In Nostratica@..., "Gerry" <waluk@...> wrote:

> --- In Nostratica@..., "Richard Wordingham"
> <richard.wordingham@...> wrote:
> >
> > I will be looking at roots. I think we've exhausted the issue of
> > affixes, but we shall see. I don't think syntactic parallels have
> > been mentioned, except for a very few set phrases, such as 'eye of
> the
> > day' = 'sun'.
>
> Good morning Richard. Top of the morning to you. Have I perhaps
> given two examples of syntactic parallels?

Parallels to what? Paul Manansala made the point that several
languages use phrases whose literal meanings are 'eye of the day' to
mean 'sun'. English 'good day' is parallel to French 'bonjour'; I
have always assumed that 'top of the morning' has a parallel in Irish.
I'm not sure these really count as syntactic parallels. A better
example of a syntactic parallels is the accusative and infinitive in
both Greek and Latin, which may well not have been inherited.
(Proto-Indo-European may not have had an infinitive as we know it!)

It often serves to express the fact that they don't!

A very common syllable structure is (C)V, but sometimes it is CV, i.e.
words and syllables don't begin with vowels, but have to start with a
consonant. I find it hard to take this seriously when the glottal
stop is an allowable consonant, but that I think is my failing.
Another widespread syllable structure is CV(C), which I think is the
Nostratic syllable structure. It's certainly the typical Altaic and
Semitic syllable structure. Farsi has a structure CV(CC), while
Standard Thai has C(C)V(C). Proto-Slavonic seemed to be heading for
(CC)CV, but only got as far as (CCC)VC. Incidentally, '(CC)' is to be
read as 'no, 1 or 2 consonants', not as '0 or 2 consonants'. Beyond
this, it gets more complicated. To say that English has a syllable
structure (CCC)V(CCCC) (e.g. 'strengths') is of limited use; one needs
a better idea of what clusters occur. In discussing Indo-European, it
is very useful to include R for resonant - /l/, /r/, /w/, /y/, /m/,
/n/ - in the code. This is a very useful notation, sometimes used
with R restricted to a smaller set. For example, it is much more
informative to say that Proto-Slavonic had a syllable structure
(CCC)V(R) or that Standard Thai has C(R)V(C). For an example of this
notation in action, you could read Witzel's paper 'Autochthonous
Aryans' ( http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~witzel/EJVS-7-3.htm ),
where he points how one can identify non-Indo-European words in Vedic
Sanskrit.

The code is also very useful in identifying phonetic environments when
describing sound changes.

Finally, 'V' is often used to indicate a vowel whose form is
determined by vowel harmony, or alternatively, in reconstructions, no
longer determinable.

Richard.