Slavonic imperfect; IE subjunctive

[Miguel Carrasquer Vidal]

Jens Elmegaard Rasmussen <jer at cphling.dk> wrote:

>On Sun, 11 Apr 1999, Miguel Carrasquer Vidal wrote:

>[...]
>> Unlikely.  Meillet apparently suggested that -e^ax- derives from
>> the copula (j)es- cliticized to the verbal root (cf. the Latin
>> imperfect with *bhu-a:-).  But in view of the association of the
>> optative with the imperfect in Tocharian, Armenian, Iranian and
>> maybe Celtic, I would favour a derivation from the optative
>> *-oih1- > e^, followed by -ax- < *-eh2-s-.  In other words, a
>> "past optative". [...]

>You have overlooked that the Slavic imperfect caused first palatalization

Sure.

=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv at wxs.nl
Amsterdam