H1 and t??

Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen jer at cphling.dk
Fri Apr 2 13:55:28 UTC 1999


On Mon, 29 Mar 1999, Miguel Carrasquer Vidal wrote:
> [...]
>There is not a shred of evidence that the neuter nom/acc. forms
> should be derived from *-sd, *-rd/*-nd/*-ld, *-id or *-ud.
>[...]
> I like JER's suggestion of -n > -r (and I would add -nt > -r(t),
> to explain yakrt etc., and -mn > -mn to explain the neuter
> n-stems), and I like (of course) my own suggestion of -t > -H1,
> -k > -H2 (which would make the feminines in -H2 (-H1?) originally
> neuters, which is good).

Well, thanks for that, words of a kind rarely experienced. As to the hot
question of **t going to *H1 in pre-PIE times, I was of course as appalled
by the idea as supposedly most everyone else, but it IS a fact that the
stative verbs (morpheme /-eH1-/ of Lat. sed-e:-re) and the neuter s-stems
go together (Lat. sede:s 'seat'; more impressively e.g. fri:gus/frigeo;
rigor/rigeo; tepor/tepeo etc.), in that the s-stems denote the state
something is in if the stative verb can be used about it (what friget is
in frigore etc.). Now, it is also a fact that s-stems have alternants with
stm-final /t/: *nem-os/-es- 'worship', *nem-eto-s 'holy'; *lewk-ot/-es-
'daylight', and the eternally troublesome *meH1-not-/*meH1-ns- 'month' and
the ptc. in *-wot-/-us-. These testify to the earlier existence of an
independent phoneme (in PIE a morphophoneme) that could be posited as /c/
and given the "reading rule" that it is realized as /-s/ word-finally, and
as /t-/ in other positions. It would be the IE marker of second person,
verbal 2sg *-s, 2pl *-te (2du *-t- + unclear stuff, but surely something
more than just the -t-), pron. *tu, *t(w)e [I'll keep my derivation of
*yu(:)s, *usme and *wos from protoforms with *t(w)- out of this] which
shows that the rules run deep. --- Now to the point: Is there any way of
formulating a sound rule so as to get a stative noun *le'wk-ot/-es- to
contain the same suffix as the stative verb *luk-e'H1-, i.e. have we any
way of equating nominal //le'wk-ec-// and verbal //lewk-e'H1-//?? It does
not look like a word-final change of *t to *H1. I also think it too simple
to have /c/ go to /H1/ immediately after the accent, as the simple formula
ivites one to assume. It is perhaps significant that the verbal stem is
always followed by verbal morphemes, either the personal markers directly
or the durative aspect marker *-ye'/o'- or a mood marker. On the other
hand, I do not think it significant that the functional relationship
between the noun and the verb appears to differ a bit from that of
denominative verbs at large, for, even if *luk-eH1- is not "make light",
but to "be light", that may simply be the middle voice of the denominative
which would of course explain the middle inflection of the Sanskrit
passive which is this category, say s'ru:yate 'is heard' from
*k^lu-H1-ye'-tor, where the underlying stem //k^lew-e'H1-// would then be
the same alternant of //k^le'w-ec-// (*k^le'w-os 'fame, rumour') as in the
other pairs. A change from [t] to [h] (which is what /H1/ was in PIE when
retained as a consonant) is parallelled by Irish and Middle Iranian as the
development of spirantized /t/. So, if there is reason to believe that a
pre-PIE *k could be spirantized to PIE *H2, as in the non-active 1sg
marker (perfect *-H2a, middle thematic *-a-H2 corresponding to other
Eurasian *-k), we may also envisage a spirantization of the funny dental
of the "s-stems" (better, "s/t-stems") into something which thereupon
developed further to [h] (H1). But under what conditions? Who can answer
this problem by "Ni' hansae"?

Jens



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