the Wheel and Dating PIE

[X99Lynx at aol.com]

I wrote:
There is a huge gap of time potentially there.  And if this particular word
for wheel entered after PIE dispersed but before those sound changes, then
we'd should have exactly the same outcome.

In a message dated 1/31/00 7:02:46 PM, sarima at friesen.net wrote:

<<True, for any given *specific* word, this objection is meaningful.  But the
vocabulary placing PIE in the late Neolithic or early Bronze Age consists
of more than just one word, indeed more than just a few words.>>

Yes, well, the only way to examine 'more than just a few words' is one word
at a time - because otherwise that statement becomes incontrovertible.  And
please recall that we are not just talking about ONLY words here - the only
reason those words have any value in dating PIE is that they are tied to some
object. IF THE DATE OF THAT OBJECT CHANGES, THEN IN THEORY THE DATE OF PIE
CHANGES.

So, we have questions as to:
A. the date of the sound changes (after PIE's dispersal)
B. the latest date of the object
C. whether the word in fact referred to the object or was an extension of an
earlier meaning (e.g., *kuklos as a round object.)
D. whether the sound changes visible in the word can be explained otherwise
(e.g *rot(H)o- may be pre-Celtic)

You wrote:
<<So, bring in axle, and metal, and horse, and so on.  They cannot *all* have
fortuitously involved only sounds that changed relatively late!>>

The horse was known on the Steppes before 6000BC.  How does this help you
give a late date for PIE?   I will try to get to metals and the axle shortly.
 None of this looks very fortuitous to say the least.

You wrote:
<<<Latin, rota; Lith, ratas; OHG, rod; Ir, roth - cf. Skt, ratha?)>
It is not the drasticness, it is the regularity and *opacity* of the
changes.  For instance., modern Lithuanian has round vowels, so mapping
borrowed words with 'o' to 'a' would be odd, to say the least.  And
changing t > d is totally unexpected in early German borrowings (and vice
versa).   Thus the differences seen above would be unusual, at least, in
borrowed words, but completely normal in shared heritage.>>

Would you care to address this thought by Miguel Carrasquer Vidal about one
of the two words for wheel that are claimed to demonstrate a date for PIE?

<<...whether *rot(H)o-, might not be a (pre-)Celtic
borrowing in the other IE lgs. that have it (Latin, Germanic,
Baltic, Indo-Iranian).  The root *ret(H)- "run", besides the word
for "wheel", does not have any semantic development (or e-Stufe
forms) outside of a bit in Baltic and Germanic, but especially in
Celtic.  On account of the *o, the word can't be Germanic or
Baltic (with the above caveats, but this is a merger *o > *a).
If the word is a borrowing from Celtic, we can also dispense with
the laryngeal.  Celtic, like Armenian and Germanic, probably had
started aspirating the IE tenues at an early stage (which would
account for the loss of *p in Celtic [and Armenian]).  A Celtic
*rotos ([rothos]) would have been borrowed as *rathas in
Indo-Iranian, and as there was no root *ret- (*rat-) in I-I,
there would have been no pressure to make the word conform to its
non-existent native cognates.>>

Regards,
Steve Long