Motivating the Root Restrictions of PIE

[Stanley Friesen]

At 11:39 AM 11/11/00 -0600, David L. White wrote:

>According to Lehmann, PIE shows three kinds of root restrictions.  Accepting
>for now the traditional interpretation and using "D" to represent any voiced
>plosive, "T" to represent any voiceless plosive, and "DH" to represent any
>voiced aspirate plosve, these are:

>                 1) no /DeD/
>                 2) no /TeDH/
>                 3) no /DHeT/

>correct, these restrictions (not to mention the /b/-gap) do not make sense.
>So here is one way (the only way I can see) that they could make sense.

>         1)  The voiced plosives were orginally not voiced but pharyngealized.

>         2) The voiceless plosives were orginally laryngealized (which is not
>            the same as glottalized).

>         3) The voiced aspirates were as traditionally posited, technically
>            murmured.

I suspect that a slightly different set of alternatives can cover most of
the same problems.

1. The traditional voiced plosives were actually voiceless unaspirated
plosives.
2. The traditional voiceless plosives were actually voiceless *aspirated*
plosives.
3. The traditional voiced aspirates were either simple voiced plosive or
voiced fricatives.

At the very least this avoids the typological issues.

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May the peace of God be with you.         sarima at ix.netcom.com