Re: derivation help?

Nik Taylor wrote:

> > What I've been doing is taking Old irish words, deriving them in my
> > head to what I think they should be, and then backtracking to how I
> > got there.
>
> Interesting method.
    It's called analeptic thought. It;s how Einstein made his great theor=
ies, and how
inspiration works. Read david Bohm's works for more on it - it's terribly=
 exciting!!

> >     OI. odb 'knot in wood' > A. ydh
>
> Is {y} =3D /y/?
>
    yep. Though at a later time it falls/will fall/will have fallen toget=
her with /i/.

> >        -svarabhakti (OI. db pronounced /Dv/ >/Div/)
>
> What's svarabhakti?
>
    Svarabhakti is the insertion of vowels to ease pronunciation. At leas=
t, that's how I
understand it. I could be way wrong. Any better definitions out there?  a=
n example is in
the /j/ between the vowels in the English vowel cluster -ia-, as in dial =
/daij@l/.

> >     OI.salann 'salt' > A. sal
> >         - simplification of final C or cluster
> >         - loss of final C
>
> Perhaps sepecifically loss of nasals, possibly through an intermediate
> nasalization?
    Good idea. I'll note it down - thanks!

>  >     OI. dobur 'water' > A. d=FAr (u with acute accent =3D long)
> >         - b>w/V_V
> >         - simplification of vowel cluster (owu>=FA)
>
> Hmm, seems to me that /owu/ --> /ow/ --> /o:/ would be more likely?
    My thought was that -wu- fell together first as -u:- which then absor=
bed the o. I'll
look into your idea though - it does have its merit.

> >         - vocalization of /X/ (as in Old English)
> >         - diphthongization of V (a>ae) OR lengthening of V (a>aa/=E1)
> >         which makes more sense in terms of treatment of that vowel? a=
nd how come the
> > finals weren't lost? Which derivation do you like more?
>
> Personally, I'd prefer to use /ax/ --> /a:/.
    That seems to be consensus, and I'm in on that vote. /ax/>/a:/ it is.

> >     OI. scethach 'emetic' > A. syetha/sietha (same problem as above)
> >          -sc>sy/#_
> >         -loss of final C
> >     why no loss of final V?
>
> Perhaps:
>
> syethach --> syeth=E1 --> syetha?
>
    Yep - that's what it was! By the way, sy =3D /S/. Anyone think sy or =
si is better for
this? I like sy because s palatized sounds like /S/. but it's spelled si =
in Welsh. Votes?

> But, if there's a lot of homophones, you can always deal with that by
> semantic shift, i.e., another, non-homophonous word, taking over one of
> a potentially confusing pair, or just using compounding to deal with
> those confusions.  If "eye" and "ear" were homophones, say "seeing eye"
> and "hearing ear", or something like that.
    That's what I'm going to do, I think. At a late period in Aelya's dev=
elopment,
compounding such as has never been seen before!! Lots and lots!

    By the way,

    Thanks to everyone!! Finally, after 7+ years of flopping around on wh=
at Aelya
is/was/will be, I've finally found what to do and where it will go. Thank=
s for all your
patience!

    Clint