Re: Proto-Languages Question

On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 21:55:43 -0700, Elliott Lash <erelion12@...>
wrote:

>Hello All,
>
> Well, I have 4 main related languages, as some of you
>may know: Classical Nindic, West Nindic (Hinession),
>Silindion and Essamea. The entire family is called
>Silinestic.
>
>
> Classic Nindic and Hinession form what is known as
>the Northern Nindic branch of Nindic a sub-branch of
>Silinestic. The other language is South Nindic, which
>forms the Southern Nindic branch.
>
>  Silindion and Essamea, along with two others,
>Lannelka and South Silic (which are not so defined)
>form the Silic sub-branch of Silinestic.
>
> They all use the same roots and from them derive many
>identical or similar words. The grammar of all the
>languages is derived from the common source, but tends
>to go in different directions, as you might suspect.
>The problem I'm having is...knowing the grammar of all
>the daughter's, I'm not too certain about what the
>definitive grammar of Silinestic is. I'll give an
>example, to hopefully show what I mean.
>
>"He gave sharp swords and broad shields to the hero"
I think it should be "heroes," since you gloss the word as a plural below.

>Hinession:
>Nâ v’asan n’herchein nechver ha rhesein cas penos da
>lâroeu
It seems like Hinession underwent a second shift in vocabulary.

>Cl. Nindic:
>Ethed naw herchín ethaen ‘bo rhedd cath noth i laerwy
It seems that both Cl. Nindic and Hinession actually preserve accusative *-
n.  With Cl. Nindic 'rhedd', perhaps the development was *rhredn > *rhedd.
Does 'naw'/'nâ' mean "he"?

>Silindion:
>Anelë kiréin sampi rondeimma kasta i lairohyanu
I don't see how 'rondeimma' can be from *rodnoin-naj.

>Essamea:
>Nelsi kiree sikkie nee rendee kasta sinjänu läirejä
How can -kk- arise from -pn-?

>Without giving the interlinears for the daughters,
>here is what should be reconstructed as the common
>proto-languages:
>
>Nindic:
>*anta-ti: (o:) sjarski-j itt-ani: emopod roda-j kasta
>give-pst (he) sword-pl bite-prp. and  shield-pl broad
>
>nods je la:jros-ja
>unto the hero-pl
If the original genitive was *-di, perhaps 'emopod' preserves it?  The
dative preposition 'nods' seems to be able to be analyzed as *nod-s.
Presumably, this metathesized to *nost giving Classical Nindic 'noth'.  The
word for "sword" seems to contain an additional -ski element.

>Silic:
>*a-nel-si: kira-j-n      sapni naj rodno-j-n    kasta
>AUG-give-pst sword-pl-AC sharp and shield-pl-ACC broad
>
>je   la:jros-ja=no:d
>the  hero-pl-to
>
>The problem I'm having is how to relate the two
>proto-languages into one common Silinestic. It seems
>like the main differences between Silic and Nindic in
>the stages given above are vocabulary based. So I'm
>not sure what the original Silinestic vocabulary might
>have been..at least in this case.
>
>Anyways, what do you all think?
>
> Elliott
One correspondence between Silic and Nindic seems to be S si(:) : N ti(:),
implying assibilation in Silic.  Another one is S ki : N sja, implying that
earlier *ki became palatalized with lowering and centralizing of vowel
quality, giving *kja, and then eventually became *sja (cf. Indo-Aryan from
Indo-European).  It's possible that N -ani: in 'ittani:' and S -ni (?)
in 'sapni' are related.  Perhaps the roots *itt- (source for geminate?) and
*sap- mean "bite" and "cut," respectively.  The biggest problem is actually
the verb: Nindic points to *anta-, while Silic points to *nel-.  I'm not
sure how these two can be related, besides both containing an /n/.

- Rob

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