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From: alderson@netcom.com (Richard M. Alderson III)
Subject: Re: original Nostratic word challenge
In-Reply-To: Michael J. Vokits's message of Thu, 30 Mar 1995 19:19:22 EST
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In article <95089.19192234MY2Y6@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> Michael J. Vokits
<34MY2Y6@CMUVM.CSV.CMICH.EDU> writes:

>And from an IE perspective, check out Sturtevant's _Etymological Indo-Hittite
>Grammar_. PIE was actually Indo-Hittite. The Hittite language, its close
>relatives (Luwain, etc.) and Armenian share the so-called "Germanic sound
>shift" (p>f, b>p, etc.; I'm over- simplifying a bit). Furthermore, all these
>languages, including Germanic, have *much* simpler grammars than the rest of
>the IE bunch (the Hittite group doesn't even have a feminine!), so the smart
>money says that Germanic, Hittite, and Armenian reflect the original IH state
>of affairs -- which, in turn, corresponds very well with Nostratic. Hence, the
>t/d business.

Not so.  The Anatolian languages do *not* have a Germanic/Armenian style Laut-
verschiebung.  The problem, from the perspective of a general Indo-Europeanist,
is that voicing information is generally missing from Hittite data--that is to
say, all obstruents are usually written with symbols that are voiceless in
Akkadian (from which Hittite borrowed its writing system).

And the "much simpler grammars" argument doesn't wash, either.  There is some
evidence that the verbal system of Germanic is much less elaborate than that of
the Neogrammarian reconstruction of PIE, but the nominal system is derivable
via morphological simplification (in a non-reversible sense) from that of the
19th Century.
-- 
Rich Alderson		[Tolkien quote temporarily removed in favour of
alderson@netcom.com	 proselytizing comment below --rma]

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