The Great Proto-Indo-European Thread

[R.Rusanov]

If you look at the attested Thracian lexicon it's very clear that there is close lexical similarity with Balto-Slavic, including roots that are shared exclusively with Latvian or Lithuanian, per M.L. West, Duridanov, et al.

(Dacian too)

[WeepingElf]

On the discussion about /e/ and /o/ - one thing that needs to be looked into is the model how ablaut originated in stress patterns. The models I know all assume some variant of this sequence:
1) Older Accent pattern: Accented syllable e-grade, unaccented zero-grade
2) Newer Accent pattern, including some shifts by which zero-grade syllables can receive the accent, and some e-graded syllables loose it; the latter became o-grade (and then, depending on the model, analogy and other re-arrangements further divorce ablaut grade and seat of accent).
AFAIK, a part of all these models is that o-grade arose in unaccented syllables; in that case those who posit an initial value for ablaut /o/ as a long vowel (/a:/ or similar) need to explain why this unaccented vowel is long and accented /e/ is short. (Another possibility is, of course, to reject the usual theories about the origin of o-grade). I don't say it's impossible - it could be some kind of compensatory lengthening -, but it would be nice to see an explanation and possibly examples of similar developments in attested language history..

Yes. It is IMHO pretty clear that o-grade arose in unaccented syllables, and it is not particularly likely that lengthening occured there. I agree with you. Especially if the accent was pitch (as most IEists assume) rather than stress. When a pitch accent changes into vowel colour gradation, one would expect a high pitch to become a "bright" and low pitch a "dark" colour; thus, */a/ would split into something like *[æ] accented and *[ɑ] unaccented, from where it is not a long road to */e/ and */o/.

[KathTheDragon]

Yes. It is IMHO pretty clear that o-grade arose in unaccented syllables

I have to disagree there. Afaik, the main examples of unaccented *o are the amphikinetic *o, thematic *-o- in barytone nominals, and the middle 3sg in *-o. However, there are plenty of examples of stressed *o, such as acrostatic *o, and thematic *o in oxytone nominals. There are also examples of unstressed *e. My theory of the PIE vowel system, taking *o from *ə: does a much better job, IMO, of explaining what we can reconstruct.

[Salmoneus]

Yes. It is IMHO pretty clear that o-grade arose in unaccented syllables

I have to disagree there. Afaik, the main examples of unaccented *o are the amphikinetic *o, thematic *-o- in barytone nominals, and the middle 3sg in *-o. However, there are plenty of examples of stressed *o, such as acrostatic *o, and thematic *o in oxytone nominals. There are also examples of unstressed *e. My theory of the PIE vowel system, taking *o from *ə: does a much better job, IMO, of explaining what we can reconstruct.

Leaving aside that taking *o from *@ isn't incompatible with taking it from an unstressed vowel (i.e. *@)... I don't see how?
I thought everybody agreed that *o was at least in some cases the result of post-tonic unstressed vowels? E.g. how *o becomes *e when it's stressed or zero when it becomes pre-tonic?

Stressed thematic *o isn't a problem, just posit a later stress change or analogy. The problems are:
- *o in roots
- *o/*e alternations in roots
- zero-ó derivations (*-mó, etc)
- derivations with *o in the root

To a layman it looks like almost all the believed pure *o in roots comes from adjacent to labiovelars and velars, so some sort of rounding or backing is likely. If the *o/*e alternation is real and parallel to *e:/e, both it and the *o-root derivations could be explained by suggesting lengthening. Alternatively the latter could come from a later stress shift.

This would give us two vowels originally: *e and *a, say. These have long variants, *e: and *a:, which show up in certain root alternations.* Later, *a: > *o, and at the same time short *a > *o in certain environments (or short *e if you prefer). Elsewhere, short *a > *e (or vice versa). This vowel then >*@ in unstressed syllables. Stress then shifts back to the initial syllable in certain nouns, giving stressed *@ in some derived nouns. *@ > *o. Et voila.

I don't know where the -mó etc derivatives come from. *a: originally, maybe? Analogy? The adjectives in -*es etc are easily analogical restoration of the root vowel.

Then all the laryngeal business happens.


----
*why length alternation in some roots? well that's a problem the existing system also has to deal with. A wild suggestion: *aa and *ea, parallel to *Vi and *Vu. This would explain the long vowels /*o reducing to *e when the stress shifts (Narten). It wouldn't explain how it could happen in acrostatic nouns... but maybe they weren't originally acrostatic?


I know all this is very speculative, but when you're talking pre-PIE it's hard not to be.

[KathTheDragon]

When did I say the schwa was unstessed or reduced? It's simply a mid central vowel. Any, I'm pretty sure that I've written up the full sound changes earlier in this thread (but I am presently on a tablet with limited time, so I'm not looking for it right now)

[kanejam]

Kümmel touches on this in the paper Tropylium posted. He posits *e *o < **a **ā, (citing evidence such as Brugmann's Law that *o was still slightly longer than *e in PIE) and talks about unaccented *o starting from page 318. His argument is that it was originally stressed and so didn't shorten as happened in unstressed syllables. He sort of handwaves a bit and says it could also be, like, analogy or something.

PIE **dʰaǵʰā́m 'earth'
nom ~ gen : **dʰaǵʰā́m-s ~ **dʰaǵʰām-ás > **dʰaǵʰā́ms ~ **dʰaǵʰamás > dʰeǵʰóms ~ dʰǵʰmés > dʰéǵʰōm ~ dʰǵʰmés
In the last step there's some sort of accent retraction rule that happens after the e/o split (as well as Szemerenyi's Law). Although another possibility is that vowels only reduce pre-tonically, although that would probably cause problems with ablaut and I think some endings reduce anyway (unless you posit two allophonic endings with an earlier origin?). Another possibility is some form of the kʷetwóres rule.

The reason I like *e *o < **a **ā is that it should also be possible to have *ey *ew < **ī **ū via vowel breaking, and then you get a nice /a i u ā ī ū/ inventory.

@Kath, why **@ and not **a?

[KathTheDragon]

Because I believe that PIE had *a as well, giving a nice 5-vowel system /a ə e i u/ with long and short pairs for at least the non-high vowels.

I assume an evolution *dʱə́ǵʱəməs ~ *dʱəǵʱəmə́s > *dʱə́ǵʱə̄məs ~ *dʱəǵʱəmə́s > *dʱéǵʱoms ~ *dʱǵʱmés > *dʱéǵʱōm ~ *(dʱ)ǵʱmés

[KathTheDragon]

Any, I'm pretty sure that I've written up the full sound changes earlier in this thread

Ok, turns out I hadn't, but I have written up most of what I think happened (with my reasoning) here (Wákvtayas being a conlang representing my ideas)

[KathTheDragon]

Non-linguist morons keep pushing the Anatolian Hypothesis.

Good fucking grief, why does the AH keep rising from the dead like a zombie? It it's always non-linguists who keep reviving it.

Surprise, surprise...

[Nortaneous]

turkey is part of europe (^:

is there any actual consensus? last i heard, there wasn't anything more than "dunno lol, ukraine?"

[KathTheDragon]

Afaik, the Pontic steppe is widely agreed by IEists to be the Urheimat (the Kurgan hypothesis, essentially)

[WeepingElf]

I think the Anatolian hypothesis is so fashionable among non-specialists because people these days would prefer being descended from peaceful farmers rather than aggressive warriors. But what counts in science is of course not what is fashionable, but what explains the facts. And the Anatolian hypothesis just doesn't. Of course, Gimbutas' version of the Kurgan hypothesis has its problems, too. It wallows in anachronistic clichés unsupported by linguistic facts (Proto-Indo-Europeans as Mongol-like steppe warrior-nomads) and provides a convenient strawman to whack for the supporters of the Anatolian hypothesis.

But yes, most IEists place PIE somewhere north of the Black Sea (Ukraine/Southern Russia) around 4000-3000 BC. Of course, the PIE speakers weren't like Mongols. PIE has agricultural terms; PIE has architectural terms that probably didn't refer to tents or yurts. And archaeology has shown that Mongol-style steppe warrior-nomads just did not exist at the relevant time.

[Matrix]

I think the Anatolian hypothesis is so fashionable among non-specialists because people these days would prefer being descended from peaceful farmers rather than aggressive warriors.

All in all, the IE people were probably aggressive farmers.

[R.Rusanov]

I like to think they had semi-permanent settlements in the summer where they grew crops in enclosures (*greh₃dos) while packing up in the winter, possibly just the men, to bring the cattle to the uplands to fatten

or maybe the reverse of that, I forget when cattle are supposed to fatten

[CatDoom]

I like to think they had semi-permanent settlements in the summer where they grew crops in enclosures (*greh₃dos) while packing up in the winter, possibly just the men, to bring the cattle to the uplands to fatten

or maybe the reverse of that, I forget when cattle are supposed to fatten

Tranhument herders generally take their herds to the higher pastures in summer and stay at lower elevations during the winter. I *think* a community could plant the varities of wheat available at the time in spring and harvest it in fall, giving the herdsmen time to return and participate in the harvest, though you'd obviously need people there to keep an eye on the crop.

In any event, we're probably talking about mixed herds as well, not just cattle. Sheep were almost certainly very important as well, and I think there are also solidly reconstructed words for goats and pigs, not to mention horses.

[R.Rusanov]

Yeah, THTWATL described their animals pretty well.

Also, wow. Until now I thought "cattle" referred to cows, pigs, sheep, goats, camels and any other domesticated food animal. Apparently it's just cows. Who knew.

[GreenBowTie]

Yeah, THTWATL described their animals pretty well.

Also, wow. Until now I thought "cattle" referred to cows, pigs, sheep, goats, camels and any other domesticated food animal. Apparently it's just cows. Who knew.

I think the word you're looking for might be "livestock", although that doesn't refer just to animals raised for their meat

[finlay]

Yeah, THTWATL described their animals pretty well.

Also, wow. Until now I thought "cattle" referred to cows, pigs, sheep, goats, camels and any other domesticated food animal. Apparently it's just cows. Who knew.

Basically, but cows are only female, technically. Cattle is the only word that strictly refers to the whole species, while you have other words like bulls, oxen and calves for different variations on sex and age.

[R.Rusanov]

Basically, but cows are only female, technically. Cattle is the only word that strictly refers to the whole species, while you have other words like bulls, oxen and calves for different variations on sex and age.

Fucking amazing.

In my idiolect of circa a few hours ago cow referred to the species as a whole, and cattle was synonymous with livestock. And I considered myself a *fluent* english speaker :^/

[finlay]

That said, I often 'lazily' use cow to refer to the whole species, and I daresay many others do too. Cattle is a bit of a weird word because it's uncountable, and has the air of a technical term.

[CatDoom]

Using cow for individual members of the species in general is very common, since there's no commonplace gender-neutral singular term for cattle. It's an odd semantic hole, now that I think about it.

[Terra]

In my idiolect of circa a few hours ago cow referred to the species as a whole, and cattle was synonymous with livestock. And I considered myself a *fluent* english speaker :^/

You're fine; People (especially laymen) do that all the time.

and I think there are also solidly reconstructed words for goats and pigs,

Sheep, yes, pigs, yes, goats, no; Leiden's etymological Italic dictionary says that both PIE *kap-ro- (whence Latin "caper", Celtic "*gab-ro-) (Note the irregular Celtic correspondence.) and *g^haid- (whence Latin "haedus", English "goat") look like loanwords because they include /a/, and are geographically limited to Western Europe.

not to mention horses.

Aren't the IE people the prime candidates for the people that first domesticated the horse?

It's an odd semantic hole, now that I think about it.

Ket has the same oddity:

[131] Like in Russian (korova), English (cow), or German (Kuh), the female gender is taken
as the default representative of the species.

[Matrix]

Using cow for individual members of the species in general is very common, since there's no commonplace gender-neutral singular term for cattle. It's an odd semantic hole, now that I think about it.

You could say "head of cattle" for a singular.

[finlay]

Using cow for individual members of the species in general is very common, since there's no commonplace gender-neutral singular term for cattle. It's an odd semantic hole, now that I think about it.

You could say "head of cattle" for a singular.

Yeah like, maybe if you're a farmer. It's a technical term, like I said, not a "commonplace singular term".

[CatDoom]

Sheep, yes, pigs, yes, goats, no; Leiden's etymological Italic dictionary says that both PIE *kap-ro- (whence Latin "caper", Celtic "*gab-ro-) (Note the irregular Celtic correspondence.) and *g^haid- (whence Latin "haedus", English "goat") look like loanwords because they include /a/, and are geographically limited to Western Europe.

Well, it's actually kind of hard to say, since a lot of words for sheep and goat turn up all across the Indo-European speaking world, but often disagree on the specific animal they refer to. The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Indo-European World presents three words for "goat" probably reconstructable to PIE that aren't transparently derivations:

*díks Albanian dhi "she-goat," Ishkashmi dec "goatskin bag",

*h₂eiǵs Albanian edh "kid," Greek aiks "(she-)goat," Armenian ayc "(she-)goat," Avestan izaēnā- "goathide"

*bhugós English buck, Armenian buc "lamb," Avestan būza "(he-)goat," Sanskrit bukka- "(he-)goat"

Also, *Kápros, loan or not, is attested outside of Europe as kahra, "kid" in modern Persian, and seems to be related to Sanskrit kápr̥th "penis."

Aren't the IE people the prime candidates for the people that first domesticated the horse?

Possibly, but it's not entirely clear if the IE word refers to a domestic or wild animal.