altepetl

[Juan Alvarez Cuauhtemoc]

To Anthony Appleyard:

What is a dvandva?  Never heard of it?  It is not even in a dictionary!  Is
this a neologism?

So, how does a dvandva differ from a compound?  And is a dvandva another
"term" for "disfrasismo"?

Juan Alvarez C.


----- Original Message -----
From: "ANTHONY APPLEYARD" <a.appleyard at BTINTERNET.COM>
To: <NAHUAT-L at LISTS.UMN.EDU>
Sent: Saturday, May 28, 2005 3:31 PM
Subject: Re: altepetl


> --- zorrah at ATT.NET wrote:
>> Maybe I didn't understand the lesson in the "Chimalpahin" thread, but
>> can someone please clarify why "altepetl" does not follow the general
>> assimilation patterns as these other examples do:
>> General Assimilation Examples:
>> 1)  na:huatl + tlahto:lli (word, language) = na:huallahto:lli
>> 'Nahuatl language'
>> 2)  a:tl + tla:lli (earth) = a:tla:lli 'irrigated land'
>> 3)  a:tl + tlapechtli (bed) = a:tlape:chtli 'slope, side of a gully'
>> Also, in examples 2 and 3, is it the presence of the long vowel "a:"
>> stem that is left after the -tl is dropped, only to be confronted
>> with a twin "absolutive suffix-looking tl-" (of course the tl- of
>> tla:lli or tlape:chtli is NOT absolutive)
>>
>> Looking at altepetl, is it the strong "a:" stem again, who this time
>> will accept a half-image or mirror-image of its former self?
>>
>> 4)  a:tl (water) + tepe:tl (hill) = a:ltepe:tl (town, pueblo)
>> What is going on here?
>> citlalin xochime
>
> (4) A town needs water for irrigation and a hill to keep out of floods.
> Thus the components have equal status and the compound is a dvandva.
> The basic meaning is "it is water (and) it is a hill", "it is water and
> a hill", originally two words, and people gradually started letting
> them run together into one; and the sequence -tlt- became -lt-.
>
> (1) na:huatl + tlahto:lli is also a dvandva: "it is something
> clear-sounding (and) it is a language", became na:huallahto:lli ; the
> sequence -tltl- became -ll-.
>
> 2)  a:tl + tla:lli (earth) = a:tla:lli 'irrigated land', as it is (a
> sort of) land, but it is not (a sort of) water: it is an ordinary
> compound, not a dvandva.
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Citltlyani
>
> Some languages have next to no assimilation of adjacent sounds;
> some langages have enough assimilation to keep a shipload of Borg busy.
>