Pre-Basque Phonology

[Roslyn M. Frank]

To: Indo-European at xkl.com
From: "Roslyn M. Frank" <roz-frank at uiowa.edu>
Subject: Re: Fwd: Re: Pre-Basque Phonology
In-Reply-To:
    <Pine.GSO.4.03.9910031404180.6056-100000 at rsunx.crn.cogs.susx.ac.uk>
References: <4.1.19990929211028.009a0970 at blue.weeg.uiowa.edu>

At 02:21 PM 10/3/99 +0100, Larry Trask wrote:
>On Wed, 29 Sep 1999, Roslyn M. Frank wrote:

>>> [LT]
>>>>> And <bat> `one' is pretty clearly derived from earlier *<bade>.

[RF]
>> Larry, is this theory on *<bade> yours or did you glean it from some
>> other souce? And if it isn't yours, could you share with us who
>> first came up with it and when? Did that person use the same
>> explanation?

[LT]
>The comparison of <bat> with <bederatzi> `nine', and the consequent
>suggestion that <bat> must derive from something of the form *<bad->,
>was first made by Henri Gavel early in this century.  The further
>comparisons with <bedera> `one apiece'

[RF]
In other words, for you the meaning of <bedera> is "one apiece"? I think
you defined it this way in an earlier mailing, also.

[LT]
> and other items, and the proposed
>reconstruction *<bade>, were put forward by Michelena, in his book
>Fonetica Historica Vasca, p. 134 and p. 235.

[RF]
 Hence, the data set under analysis consists solely of <bedera> and
<bederatzi> since these are the only two examples mentioned by Michelena,
right?

[LT]
>I can claim no credit here, but I do endorse Gavel's and Michelena's
>suggestions.  But note that, for lack of compelling evidence, Michelena
>did not regard the reconstruction *<bade> as secure, but only as a
>plausible suggestion.

[RF]
You have shared with us two statements concerning the etymology of <bat>:
First your own which you phrased as follows:

1). that <bat> "is pretty clearly derived from earlier *<bade>."

Then you provided us with a paraphrase or synopsis of Michelena's
statements on the topic:

2). that in Michelena's opinion the etymology from *<bade> "lacked
compelling evidence" and hence
"was not secure." It should be considered, therefore, "only a plausible
suggestion."

Having read over Michelena's comments, I believe your summary of them,
provided above, is quite accurate and appropriate. It expands on
Michelena's representation of *<bade> as "*<bade>?". He clearly didn't feel
fully confident about it. Also, above you state that you "endorse Gavel's
and Michelena's suggestions," once again emphasizing the tentative nature
of the reconstruction and once again a very measured statement on your part.

However, there is a third instance in which you have spoken about this same
problem although in rather different terms. Specifically on that occasion
you stated the following:

"It is most unusual for a native Basque word to end in a plosive, and <bat>
is clearly from earlier *<bade> or *<bada>  suggested by  the morph <bede->
in derivatives as (northern) <bedera> 'one apiece' and <bederatzi> 'nine'."

To my knowledge Michelena did not list the second etymon *<bada>, although
perhaps he did so on some other occasion, i.e., not in his work _Fonetica
Historica Vasca_.

As you will recall, the above quote is found on page 273 of your book _The
History of Basque_. Your statement, therefore, seems to contradict what you
have shared with us on the IE list or at least to be far less cautious.
Furthermore, I note that in your book you list <bede-> as a morph, not as
*<bede->. Earlier on this list you also affirmed that <bedere(n> contains
the same morph, if my memory serves me right.

Before you wrote your book, did you discover additional evidence -beyond
that presented by Gavel and Michelena- which strengthened your conviction
concerning this version of events? And if you did find additional proof for
this position, could you share it with us?

Furthermore, based on your statements in the email on this topic cited
above ("I can claim no credit."), you seem to be saying that all you have
done is repeat the positions of Gavel and Michelena, nothing more. Yet in
this section of your book you do not cite or otherwise overtly refer to the
specific works of Gavel nor Michelena where they discuss this problem.
Indeed, your statement "<bat> is clearly from earlier *<bade> or *<bada>"
leaves the impression that there is no other possibility: that yours is a
summary of the consensus opinion.

In that respect I would mention that Ribary in his _Ensayo sobre la lengua
vasca_, translated by Julian Vinson (Paris, 1877) argued that the first
element in <bederatzi> was <bat>, i.e., that the word should be broken down
into <bed-era-tzi>) and where <bat> had taken on the shape of *<bed>.  In
other words, he doesn't question the original shape of the root-stem. (As
an aside I should mention that I don't agree with Ribary's etymology of the
ending on <bederatzi>).

For anyone working in comparative linguistics it is important to be able to
build on the works of those who have gone before. However, there is always
the possibility that somewhere in the chain of transmissions -like in the
proverbial game of telephone- the message gets garbled. The danger is that
others can start using that version of linguistic realities as a basis for
further descriptions of the phenomena under study, i.e., utilizing
paraphrases of others' works rather than testing the data themselves.

At least in the case of Euskera, it has been my experience that sometimes
it can be a risky business unless each aspect of the data sets used in
reconstructing the phonology of the language is well researched, checked
and double-checked for accuracy. This is obviously a monumental task in the
case of (P)IE comparative linguistics (given the massive volume of earlier
research), but perhaps it is still possible in the case of Euskera given
the much more restricted number of detailed investigations on these aspects
of the language and the circumscribed nature of the data themselves.

Comments anyone?

Ondo ibili,
Roz

************************************************************************
Roslyn M. Frank
Professor
************************************************************************
Department of Spanish & Portuguese
University of Iowa
Iowa City, IA 52242
email: <roz-frank at uiowa.edu>
fax: (319)-335-2990