NW vs. E Gmc

[Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen]

On Sat, 22 Jan 2000, Sean Crist wrote:

> I'd like to bring up a few points which were discussed in connection with
> the distinction between NW and E Germanic:

> 1.  Both Marc Pierce and Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen cited *z > r as an
> example of a shared innovation in NWGmc.  It's true that a sound change
> along these lines operated in both WGmc and NGmc, but it can be shown that
> this is a parallel change which operated after the two dialects had
> separated.  The evidence is that there are rules both in WGmc and in NGmc
> which are sensitive to the *z/*r distinction; the merger of the two
> categories must have happened _after_ the two dialects had developed
> separately for a while.

I know that, but still there is also an s/z distinction in the rules, so
the "/z/" phoneme appears to be in the process of turning into something
else; that's why I wrote "is developed in the direction of /r/" - so, as
far as it goes, this _is_ a point of agreement between North and West
Germanic.

Jens