"centum"/"satem" "exceptions" [was Re: Northwest IE attributes]

[Eduard Selleslagh]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Miguel Carrasquer Vidal" <mcv at wxs.nl>
Sent: Monday, January 24, 2000 7:25 PM

>> Sean Crist <kurisuto at unagi.cis.upenn.edu> wrote:
>> As for Albanian, I can't say much; it's so heavily mutated that it's not
>> of much use in reconstructing PIE, and I know next to nothing about the
>> sound changes it underwent.  I can say that I've never heard anyone claim
>> that Albanian underwent the satem shift.

> Albanian is satem, or rather "thatem" (*k^ > th).

> Miguel Carrasquer Vidal mcv at wxs.nl

[Ed Selleslagh]
Miguel,

Forgive me my ignorance, but could you elaborate on the relationship (or not)
of this phenomenon with a similar one in Greek, at least in some positions or
cases: thermos, -te, etc.?

Another note on Albanian: Yesterday I saw a picture in the newspaper showing a
woman (in Prishtinë) waving a poster with the picture of some loved one and
the caption "Ku është? [Ku e/¨shte/¨] Where is he?".

Isn't it remarkable that such an extremely short text (2 words) could reveal so
much about the kind of language it is in, if e.g. Albanian had died out and
only this text had been found.

BTW, in this case apparently *k^ > k, correct me if I'm wrong, not unlike Greek
in some cases (even though in this particular case it would have been 'pou'),
cf. *kwekwlos > kyklos.

Ed.