The UPenn IE Tree (Celtic as PIE)

[Richard M. Alderson III]

First, a note on terminology.  Below, I use "satem" as short-hand for "Indo-
Iranian, Balto-Slavic, Armenian, etc." and "centum" as short-hand for "*NOT*
Indo-Iranian, Balto-Slavic, Armenian, etc."  I will not debate this choice of
short-hand with anyone.

On 3 Sep 1999, Steve Long wrote:

>Wait! <<PIE distinguishes three different series of dorsal obstruents>>!!!!

>No it doesn't.  Not in the scenario I gave you.  Celtic IS PIE!  It
>distinguishes only two.

Your experiment falls apart at this juncture.

The evidence for three different series of dorsals is pan-IE:  The canonical
examples are things like Skt. _kravis._ "raw meat", Latin _cruor_ "gore, blood"
in which the "satem" data lead the linguist to expect a labiovelar in "centum"
dialects, while the "centum" data lead the linguist to expect a palatal or
alveolar fricative in "satem" dialects.

(The fact of Luwian maintenance of the three-way distinction is simply icing on
the cake of the comparative method.)

There is no way to predict which velars in Celtic will be represented as such,
and which as palatals, in the "satem" dialects.  Therefore, if you insist on
placing Celtic at the top of the tree, you make incorrect predictions of the
facts in evidence, and you fail.

>So, how many mergers does that leave that would have to be unmerged if Celtic
>were the hypothetical parent?  Again, Celtic never merged palatal and velar.
>Because Celtic IS PIE.  So you call whatever is unique in IIr an innovation.
>(An unshared innovation.)  And your problem is solved.  Isn't it?  No
>unmergings needed.

The "innovation" is not unshared, but rather occurs across the spectrum.

>I was always talking about how the Stammbaum would change and about the real
>data you were using..  My scenario mades Celtic equal PIE specifically to
>reveal the kind of assumptions being made that might go beyond the data.

It is not a matter of assumptions about PIE, but of real data in multiple
languages.  Your insistence otherwise reveals nothing about the Ringe tree.

								Rich Alderson