The Great Proto-Indo-European Thread

[WeepingElf]

Whether you call it a topic marker or an ergative case, it's the exact same development: genitive -> intermediary -> nominative, and I still don't buy it.

I don't really buy it, either! It was just a "raw" idea of mine which I wanted to try out and bring to discussion. In fact, I doubt that there is a connection between the genitive and the nominative like this, be it via an ergative, a topic marker or whatever.