ETRUSCAN

The Etruscan verb is a largely unknown entity. About all that is
clear is that the 3rd. person preterite ended in -ce (/-ke/) with a
passive form in -che (-kHe).

The only personal pronoun known with certainty is the first person
sg.:

Nom. mi
Acc. mini, mine, mene

Other pronouns also have an accusative:

"this" (early) N. ika A. ikan > (late) ca, cn
"that" (early) N. ita A. itan, itun > (late) ta, tn
"which" N ipa, A. inpa

The acc. suffix then seems to be *-n. In the acc. of "me", *mi-n has
perhaps been extended with a (deictic) suffix *-i or *-e.

More is kown about the Etruscan noun. According to Beekes '91, the
following forms are found:

a-stems e-stems i-stems u-stems C-stems
nom/acc -a > -0 -e > -0 -i > -0 -u > -0 -C
gen(1) -as' -es' -is' -us' -Cs'
abl(1) -es' -e(i)s' -is' -uis' -Cs'
dat(1) -as'i -us'i -Cs'i
gen(2) -al -el -ul -Cl
abl(2) -al(a)s
dat(2) -ale, -althi
loc(1) -e -e(i)
loc(2) -aithi > -ethi

PL.
nom/acc -r
gen(1) -ras'
dat(1) -ras'i
loc(2) -rthi

There are two genitives, one in -s', the other in -l.
The ablative is made by adding the genitive ending -s' to the
genitive: we have -las' > -ls' and -s'is' > -is', which implies that
the genitive endings can be reconstructed as *-la and *-si.

The dative was made by adding the locative in -i to the genitive:
*-la-i > -le, *-si-i > -s'i.

The plural in -r was earlier *-ra, as shown by e.g. gen. -ras'.

The reconstructed Etruscan declension:

SG.
nom/acc *-0
gen(1) *-si
abl(1) *-si-si
dat(1) *-si-i
gen(2) *-la
abl(2) *-la-si
dat(2) *-la-i, *-la-i-thi
loc(1) *-i
loc(2) *-i-thi

PL.
nom/acc *-ra
gen(1) *-ra-si
dat(1) *-ra-si-i
loc(2) *-ra-i-thi

The genitive in *-si can be equated with the IE genitive in *-Vs(i),
and with the Luwian adjectival suffix -assi-, which is used instead of
the genitive in Luwian.

The genitive in *-la is reminiscent of the Hittite pronominal genitive
in -e:l (amme:l "mine", tue:l "your", ke:l "of this", kue:l "whose?").

The locative in *-i also has its counterpart in the PIE suffix *-i,
added there to the dative and locative.


=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...