Personal Pronouns

[Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen]

On Wed, 12 May 1999, Patrick C. Ryan wrote:

> Dear Jens and IEists:

>  ----- Original Message -----
> From: Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen <jer at cphling.dk>
> Sent: Monday, May 10, 1999 5:50 PM

> > On Sat, 1 May 1999, Patrick C. Ryan wrote:

> >> What is so "intangible" about supposing that *te is the basal form, that
> >> there was an inflection - *-wV which produced -*twe, and that the original
> >> significance of -*twe being lost, both forms came into use as bases for
> >> other forms but with a bias towards the form with -*wV for the nominative
> >> (through its former topical use): -*tu/u:?

> > That you have to postulate a change before you even start.

> And what change is that?

The change in function. Quite often theories are rejected because they are
"ad hoc", the assumption being that in principle anyone can explain
anything if he is allowed to make the necessary extra assumptions. Still,
the easiest ad hoc solution ought at least to be specified, so as to be
evaluated on its own merits and to be kept in mind reconsideration in
case additional evidence later emerges. But you theory is not "ad hoc", it
is "ad aliud": it simply explains something different from what we find.
To be of interest, such a theory must have something _very_ elegant and
simplyfing about it, otherwise there is hardly a chance it could be true.

> > You are disqualifying the evidence which points in a different
> > direction than you want to go.

> I am discounting an alternate interpretation of the evidence.

That may be put down as a plea of guilty.

> > And it is _very_ unsatisfactory to have the preform of *swe 'oneself, sich'
> > be a nominative.

> Well, perhaps it your view but not in Pokorny's, where we find *swe listed
> under *se as *s(e)we, and "*se- und *s(e)we-, Reflexivpronomen fu{"}r alle
> Personen, Gechlechter und Numeri".  *swe means simply 'self', and, as such,
> is no case-dependent as compounds like *s(w)e-bh(o)- surely show (cf. also
> Armenian <in-kn>).

Pokorny also knew that sich, se, sego did not form a nominative. The lack
of "Kasus" in the enumeration of the global function of the pronoun is
eloquent. - That derivatives or compounds containing the reflexive stem
can occur in all cases is a consequence of the complex meaning of the
result and does not reflect a nominative case meaning of the reflexive
itself. By the same logic, you might say that Lat. no:s 'we, us' could be
the singular, just because there is a derivative noster that can be used
in all the forms an adjective can have.

> >>> [On Gk. mo:^mar : amu:'mo:n as reflecting *mwoH-/*muH-:]

> >>> And, are you asserting, that IE *mow(V)- could *not* result in Gk.
> >>> mo:{^}-?

> > Of course I am.

> Then, of course, you are wrong in view of Greek <no:{^}i>.

I have never derived Gk. no:^i 'us two' from any IE or post-IE preform
with *now(V)-. I have derived the acc. no:^e from *nH3we via
Proto-Gk. *no:we, this equating the form with the IIr. stem /a:va(-)/.

Jens