Re: Evidence for Nostratic? (was Re: Proto-Uralic?)

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rob Haden" <magwich78@...>
To: <CONLANG@...>
Sent: Tuesday, July 08, 2003 1:28 AM
Subject: Re: Evidence for Nostratic? (was Re: Proto-Uralic?)


> On Mon, 7 Jul 2003 11:24:22 +0200, =?iso-8859-1?Q?J=F6rg=20Rhiemeier?=
> <joerg_rhiemeier@...> wrote:
>
> >I don't believe in a monovocalic system at any point of PIE's prehistory.
> >While there are instances of /i/ and /u/ that arose from syllabic
> semivowels,
> >there must have been /i/ and /u/ in pre-ablaut PIE.  I also think that
> these
> >took part in ablaut, being diphthongized to /ai/ > /ei/ and /au/ > /eu/
> >in full grade.
>
> While /ai/ > /ei/ seems realistic to me, /au/ > /eu/ does not.  The
problem
> is solved if you have /aya/ > /ey/ and /awa/ > /eu/.
>
> >One moment.  Only neuters had original endingless nominatives.
> >Masculine and feminine nouns had a nominative in *-s, which was
> >lost in those forms that don't have it at a rather late stage,
> >and I think that *-s is from a suffixed animante demonstrative *-sa.
>
> PIE *kerd and *genu are inanimate nouns.  The reconstructed form for
'foot'
> is *pots, which I think may be erroneous.  Latin has pes, pedis; Greek has
> pous, podos.  These point to a problem with current reconstructed PIE:
what
> was the original genitive suffix, *-es or *-os?  Perhaps we can find the
> answer to this question.
AFAIK, the standard reconstruction for 'foot' is 'ped-', nom. sg. 'peds'.