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From: svm@kozmix.xs4all.nl (Sander van Malssen)
Subject: Re: IndoEuropean 'r' and laryngeals
Message-ID: <D5wyI5.9r@kozmix.xs4all.nl>
Date: Thu, 23 Mar 1995 22:01:16 GMT
Reply-To: svm@kozmix.xs4all.nl
References: <Pine.SUN.3.91.950321210317.16136K-100000@grad>
Organization: Kozmic Egg Productions, Gouda, Netherlands
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Timothy Miller <millert@csee.usf.edu> writes:
> What was the Proto-IndoEuropean 'r'?
> 
> The American Heritage dictionary says that it could act as a vowel, and 
> as a liquid.  How was it a liquid?  Something like the American 'r' seems 
> unlikely.  What was it really?

Probably something like a dental or trill-r (akin to what you might hear
in Spanish or Italian). (If you have some trouble imagining an r as a
vowel, just go `prrrrrrrrrt!' and you'll get the idea. Same goes for
l, m, n in PIE.)

> Could someone explain how schwa is related to a laryngeal?

That depends a bit on what version of the laryngeal theory one supports,
but basically where we used to reconstruct schwa we now reconstruct one
of (usually) 3 laryngeals. Some pre-laryngeal scholars proposed a
so-called `schwa secundum' to explain some problems with the old
schwa-theory, and some present-day versions of the laryngeal theory
still provide for a schwa secundum.

Sander
-- 
Sander van Malssen
svm@kozmix.xs4all.nl
