Re: General Rule

--- In Nostratica@yahoogroups.com, "H.M. Hubey" <hubeyh@...> wrote:

>
>
> Richard Wordingham wrote:
>
> > --- In Nostratica@yahoogroups.com,
> > "H.M. Hubey" <hubeyh@...> wrote:
> > > The final result as far as I can
> > see is:
> > >
> > > If the words are IE, then there
> > is a strong case for making Turkic
> > IE.
> > > If on the other hand people
> > insist Turkic is not IE, then the
> > words are
> > > not IE.
> > There is another explanation,
> > namely that they have a
> > *discernible* common ancestor, a
> > descendant of Proto-Nostratic.
>
>
> Yes, but even if they have a common ancestor
> an ancestor has descendents, and descendants
> have their own words.

I'm afraid I don't understand what point you are making. Are you
saying anything that wouldn't apply to a comparison of English and
German?

> > In any case, there is a case for
> > putting Turkic in the vicinity of
> > IE in
> > > ancient
> > > times. It was, as far as present
> > knowledge allows, either somewhere
> > in the
> > > Mideast (especially Gamkrelidze
> > and Ivanov are correct) or in the
> > diamond
> > > shaped area in the steppes; south
> > end is Turkmenistan, north is the
> > Urals,
> > > the west is Black Sea steppes,
> > and the east, somewhere in Central
> > Asia.
> > > Except for minor change e.g. put
> > Slavic homeland slightly more to
> > the
> > > east, and make Tokharian a recent
> > accident of some sorts, the diamond
> > also
> > > splits the satem and centum
> > branches.
> > No, Baltic, Albanian, Dacian and
> > Thracian are satem languages to its
> > West.
>
>
> That would be likely late move like Russian but it could
> be wrong.

It's more likely that Turkic came (back?) South. Kazakhstan is seen
as having been Indo-Iranian in speech at one time.

While the satem languages may be a genetic unit, there is no evidence
that the centum languages are.

> > > But again, there has to be
> > general principles that have to be
> > applied
> > > consistently.
> > >
> > > There are only two of them:
> > >
> > > 1. recurrent sound change
> > > 2. some words are not borrowable;
> > e.g. Swadesh 100 list, Yakhontov 35
> > list
> > > etc are formalization of this
> > concept.
> > Have you looked at the meanings on
> > the 100 word list? 'Egg' and
> > 'skin' are Norse, 'give' is more
> > Norse than Old English, 'mountain'
> > is Romance. I will allow that the
> > English word for 'person' is 'man'.
> > Richard.
>
> I have the list someplace, but I am not sure what
> you are getting at. Are you talking about Kessler's book?

The point is that words on the Swadesh list do get replaced,
sometimes by internal development, sometimes by borrowing. The
history of the Swadesh word lists is interesting; they started out as
meanings for which every language should have a word. A few meanings
on the 100-word list are particular liable to replacement - 'road' is
one example, and some much stabler meanings are omitted from the 100-
word list - e.g. 'salt', 'snow'. 'Snow' is missing because it is not
an important word in hot climates. I am not sure about 'salt';
perhaps it is a less stable among Australian Aborigines, who have
less use for it than the rest of us.

In general, there are, inconveniently, regional variations in
relative stability - S.E. Asian personal pronouns are less stable
than elsewhere, and IE numerals (cardinals, that is) are remarkably
stable.

Richard.