gender

[Patrick C. Ryan]

Dear Rich and IEists:

 -----Original Message-----
From: Patrick C. Ryan <proto-language at email.msn.com>
Date: Monday, February 08, 1999 12:58 AM

[ moderator snip ]

>Without IE -*H(1)a, a completely new word for 'queen' would have had to have
>been invented in Latin.

>[ Moderator's query:
>  Do you mean the a-coloring laryngeal, or the e/non-coloring laryngeal,
>  above?
>  --rma ]

Sorry for being a little misleading with the subscript. In your terms, it
would be H(2), the a-coloring "laryngeal".

But, I believe that all "laryngeals" were coloring-equal; and that the vowel
that is seen is a result of a retention of an earlier vowel quality through
length.

That is, I believe IE feminine -a: derived from -/ha/ while collective -a:
derived from -/?a/.

The augment, IE e-, derives from /?e/-; same "laryngeal" as the last example
but different vowel-quality/

I believe there were only four laryngeals, /?,h,$,H/, which affected vowel
quality neutrally.

The arguments to support this thesis are the correspondences with laryngals
and pharyngals we see in AA for the identification of the IE "laryngeal" but
one must go beyond Nostratic to determine the actual vowel quality.

I know these matters are beyond the scope of this list, and I will not
elaborate them here. They are explained in my essays on AFRASIAN at the
wbsite.

Pat

[ Moderator's response:
  In other words, you reject the laryngeal theory completely, substituting in
  its place a set of vowels which still exhibit the odd behaviours which led
  Saussure to post a lost set of consonants in the first place--with _ad hoc_
  segments which you call laryngeals but which are otherwise no better than
  Hirt's various reduced vowels, his answer to Saussure.  Sorry, the laryngeal
  theory as it has developed in mainstream Indo-European linguistics explains
  far too much to be thrown out like this.
  --rma ]