Plosive-liquid clusters in euskara borrowed from IE?

[Jon Patrick]

[ Moderator's note:
  I am posting this after some discussion with Mr. Patrick, in which he assures
  me that he is not angry, was not angry in previous posts, and is not looking
  to start a fight.  I ask others to give him the benefit of the doubt.

  I have done some editing for format, but made no other changes.
  --rma ]

    Date:       Tue, 11 May 1999 09:45:04 +0100 (BST)
    From:       Larry Trask <larryt at cogs.susx.ac.uk>

It is taken me sometime to reply to this message as it left me so incredulous
after first reading it.

    [on my claim that Pre-Basque did not permit plosive-liquid clusters and
    Jon's query in terms of words in Azkue's 1905 dictionary of Basque
    containing such clusters]

    > I note that my original reference referred to native words and hence the
    > diversion of this response into "ancient" words is just that.

    I am mystified.  My assertion was about the Pre-Basque of some 2000
    years ago, and about nothing else whatever.  As I pointed out earlier,
    words in Pre-Basque did not contain such clusters, regardless of whether
    they were native or borrowed.  So, it is `ancient' which is relevant
    here, not `native'.

Clearly with a language like basque which you yourself have said is
conservative one would be expect a strong relationship between what is
"ancient" and what is "native"
    [LT]

    >     Third, Azkue does not claim that the words entered in his dictionary
    >     are native.  On the contrary, he declares explicitly, in section IX
    >     of his prologue, that he is entering words of foreign origin which
    >     are well established in Basque

    [JP]

    > As you presented in a later message and which arrived as I was
    > preparing this response the relevant section of Azkue's dictionary
    > is Section XXIV.5, which states that the words in uppercase are
    > primitives or non-derivatives "les mots en capitales ou majuscules
    > sont primitifs ou non derives" (pardon the lack for accents)

    > These are the words I sent to you in the previous email. I believe
    > my comment "he asserts are native words" is a valid interpretation
    > of his work. I was particularly concerned that your first email did
    > not reference this section and was going to refer you to it. Now it
    > appears that you are aware of the section and was remiss in not
    > referring to it in your first message.

    No, not at all.  My reference to section IX was not a response to you at
    all, but to somebody else who had commented on Azkue's use of upper case
    for certain entries.  I was only commenting on that point.

    I'm afraid I can't agree that your interpretation of Azkue's "primitifs
    ou non derives" as `native' is valid.  It seems perfectly clear that
    what Azkue means here is, in modern terminology, `monomorphemic', and
    not `native'.  Even if there could be any doubt about this, Azkue
    explains clearly in section XXIV.5 what he means.  To the best of my
    knowledge, Azkue nowhere uses the term `native', or any equivalent, in
    his prologue.

On translating the french we have the expression "primitive or non--derived"
which I can only take as attributes such as "early", "native", "original". As
well the or(ou) can be read as an inclusive "or" encompassing both primitive
words AND foreign words.

    >    [LT]

    >     That said, I cannot possibly comment on every word in Jon's long
    >     list.

    > Why not? They constitute the whole corpus of material that Azkue has
    > presented which is contrary to your claim.

    No.

    First of all, Azkue has not presented any material at all which is
    contrary to my claim.  My claim is about the Pre-Basque of 2000 years
    ago.  Azkue's book is a dictionary of the Basque of the 16th-19th
    centuries, a completely different period during which Basque has plainly
    tolerated plosive-liquid clusters.  Azkue's dictionary has not one word
    to say about Pre-Basque.

I have searched for words to describe this text and the best I can come up
with is "bizarre". Putting the translation problem above aside we have the
following situation.

1. basque is a conservative language (something you've asserted elsewhere)

2. most materials we have from Roman times that are clearly basque or
prebasque (sometimes called Aquitanian) are readable as such and offer little
problem in recognition.

3. Azkue gives a list of words that he regards as "primitive or non-derived"

4. Therefore those words in Azkue's list that are not identifiable as loans
represent significant evidence about the possible form of ancient/early basque.

5. Those non-loan words are valid and meaningful for appraisal of any  theory
about "early basque"  for whatever time period you want that term to be
applied to.

    Second, your list was hundreds of words long.  Do you really think I
    have so much time on my hands that I can afford to devote days to
    ferreting out known or probable etymologies for every single word in
    that list?

If you want to justify you hypothesis, yes I do expect it.
This comment smells to me like I have contaminated a much loved theory with
some live data and it has raised an unbearable stench.

    > I doubt that any such list has ever been compiled before for basque
    > scholars to investigate. Here is the perfect opportunity for you to
    > settle once and for all if your claim can be substantiated. Do you
    > have no wish to explore and re-investigate old knowledge no matter
    > how well established it is, in the light of new evidence? Is there
    > no sense of true scientific exploration in your spirit where
    > everything is always up for reappraisal?

    The problem is that the entries in Azkue's dictionary are of no
    relevance whatever to the nature of Pre-Basque.

I think my statements above have explained why I find this comment simply
"bizarre"

    Specialists believe that Pre-Old-English had only 16 consonants.
    Any decent dictionary of modern English will reveal that the language
    now has 24 consonants (in most accents).  Would anybody regard this
    observation as casting doubt on the validity of the claim about
    Pre-Old-English?

    English has changed its phonology substantially in the last 1500 years
    or so.  And, of course, Basque has changed its phonology in the last
    2000 years.

    Old English had no phonemic voiced fricatives; modern English has four
    of them.  Pre-Basque did not tolerate plosive-liquid clusters; modern
    Basque does.  These things happen.

The evidence available in english is not the evidence available in basque.
Azkue is one of the largest evidence sources available for studying the
development of basque, all be its limitations. As you so often say we should
look at the evidence. I'm merely asserting the importance of not excluding
evidence that is legitimately admissible for appraisal.

    > In terms of examples you have chosen and the tone of the remainder of
    > your message I can only say I feel you have totally compromised you usual
    > high standards of scholarship. You were asked:

    > " Larry would you say that there is not one word in this list that is
    >  not problematic for your thesis,..."

    > and you chose not to answer that question.

    Sorry, but I did answer it.  I pointed out that the terms `native' and
    `ancient' are utterly independent, and that my claim was about ancient
    words, not about native ones.

here we disagree, the two terms are not independent.

    > Rather you selectively ignored the bulk of the evidence and chose
    > the most extreme examples of the total set to covertly ridicule my
    > attempt to explore and understand this claim and in the end divert
    > the topic to a comic play off on words.

    No, nothing of the sort.  If I've inadvertently offended you, then I
    apologize, but that was never my intent.  All I did was to select a few
    representative words from the list whose origins were familiar or
    obvious, and point out that these words, of varying origins, could not
    be ancient in Basque.  No ridicule was intended.

I don't accept your apology, it is clearly not sincere.

    > As basque scholars know, you included, the Azkue dictionary has its
    > flaws but it is also a fine piece of scholarship, and you have
    > applauded his work in your own book, so any material based on his
    > dictionary deserves close scrutiny, despite the fact we know we will
    > find some clear mistakes.

    Agreed, and in fact the late Luis Michelena devoted a fair amount of
    time to uncovering the mistakes in Azkue's dictionary.  In my book The
    History of Basque, I myself point out some of the major shortcomings of
    the dictionary which users should be aware of.  But the bottom line is
    that a dictionary of modern Basque is of no direct relevance to the
    nature of Pre-Basque.

I have responded to this above.

    >  I have seen many examples in this list and on other lists where you
    > have insisted that claims for phenomena are unjustified because
    > there is no supporting evidence. Yet in this case you are prepared
    > to omit evidence that can be rightfully presented for appraisal. Can
    > we expect that on other occasions you have also played fast and free
    > with omitting legitimate evidence for appraisal because it didn't
    > suit your case?

    Gee whiz, Jon -- you seem to be really cheesed off for some reason, and
    I can't imagine why.

I think the sarcasm here, which as far as I am concerned is inappropriate in
professional discourse, further demonstrates the lack of sincerity in your
apology above.

     that clearly
    Azkue's dictionary is of no relevance here.  What *is* relevant, as I
    pointed out briefly in an earlier posting, is the treatment of Latin
    loans into Pre-Basque.  In these loans, plosive-liquid clusters were
    *invariably* eliminated in one way or another.  This shows clearly that
    the phonology of Pre-Basque did not permit such clusters -- or, in plain
    English, that the speakers of Pre-Basque could not pronounce them.

This evidence is clearly informative but so is the list of Azkue words that
cannot be attributed to loans.

My sole point is that admissable evidence be admitted to the debate and be
appraised. It may well turn out that that evidence supports your hypothesis
and hence strengthens your case. That doesn't mean that it is not open to
scrutiny again at another time. The essence of good scholarship in my
experience, admittedly from non-linguistic disciplines(computing, &
psychotherapy) was to always be prepared to revise even the oldest "laws". I
characterise this notion as perpetual preparedness for flexibility.

cheers
Jon
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