No Proto-Celtic?

[Eduard Selleslagh]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Xavier Delamarre" <xavier.delamarre at free.fr>
Sent: Sunday, May 20, 2001 9:58 PM

[ moderator snip ]

>     And Calvert Warkins answered that both were probably wrong (his article
> on syntax reprinted in his "Selected Writings", IBS), PIE being a flexional
> language, with free word order (every student in Latin knows this) where the
> SOV / VSO controversy has no relevance.

[Ed]

It seems to me that this 'free word order' in Latin belongs rather to poetic
license or special uses (e.g. emphasis) than to normal speech, which seems to
have been rather strictly SOV. But there are indeed exceptions to this general
statement ("sunt mihi mitia poma"). Of course it is true that flexion allows a
lot of freedom since it decouples word function from its place in a sentence,
up to a point.

Besides, similar exceptions also occur in Latin languages (normally SVO), e.g.
in (rather archaic or colloquial) Spanish: "Vendese esta casa" (this house is
for sale, cette maison se vend), "Vino un hombre" (a man came, un homme est
venu, il est venu un homme).

Ed Selleslagh