Questions tagged [proto-indo-european]
Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the reconstructed proto-language for the Indo-European language family
280
questions
1
vote
2
answers
74
views
How Did the Palatovelar /*ḱ/ Consonant in PIE Become a Sibilant in Satem Languages?
In Indo-Iranian and Balto-Slavic languages (which are conveniently all Satem languages), there is a sibilant or affricate sound in places where Centum languages usually have a velar consonant. It ...
- 11
2
votes
1
answer
114
views
What happened to Aham and its derivatives in Marathi?
The Sanskrit first person pronoun अहम् (Romanized: Aham) can be found in Maharashtri Prakrit as 𑀅𑀳𑀁 (ahaṃ), 𑀅𑀳𑀅𑀁 (ahaaṃ), 𑀳𑀁 (haṃ).
It is even present in some languages derivative of ...
- 21
0
votes
2
answers
104
views
proto-Indo-European root for the modern 'comma' and for 'hatchet'
I am told the proto-Indo-European root for the modern 'comma' is 'kop', and that is the root for 'hatchet' or 'axe' as well. True?
-1
votes
1
answer
133
views
Why is Ural-Altaic controversial, but Indo-European isn't?
There is no direct record of Proto-Indo-European and there's barely any non-hypothetical evidence of Proto-Indo-Europeans. Why is Indo-European considered a language family while Ural-Altaic isn't, ...
- 11
0
votes
1
answer
86
views
Is PIE weyh₁ (to hunt, persecute) somehow related to PIE weyk (to separate, to select for sacrifice)
I am amateurishly passionate about etymologies (especially of my native Romanian) but more seriously interested in the anthropological theories of René Girard and Walter Burkert, which both ...
- 454
2
votes
0
answers
84
views
Common origin of PIE feminine and collective plural and semantic implications
It is generally believed that the neuter nominative-accusative plural and feminine singular in PIE both originate in a common *-h2 suffix which originally marked collective, although recent works tend ...
3
votes
0
answers
62
views
Can you provide a cheat-sheet for turning Proto-Indo-European dictionaries from the older style into laryngeal notation?
Much of the resources I have for Proto-Indo-European itself (not etymological dictionaries for other languages) either use Laryngeal notation but are limited in scope (like Wiktionary) or are written ...
- 31
0
votes
0
answers
110
views
Have I actually found something or is this just a 100+ coincidence cognates? indo-european, sino-tibetan, austroneisian, japanese, korean
I like comparing languages on my free time and found that Eurasian languages have a lot in common and I couldn't quite place my finger on it but the languages just seemed similar. One time I compared ...
3
votes
1
answer
203
views
Why does Proto-Indo-Aryan *ẓ seem to have different outcomes despite sharing the same phonological context?
It is well known that Proto-Indo-Aryan *s had an allophone *z in voiced contexts. Due to some phonetic changes (i.e. RUKI law and the shift *śt > ṣṭ), they both could undergo retroflexion, thus ...
- 350
-1
votes
1
answer
175
views
Apparent sound crespondences between Eurasian, Trans-New-Guinean, Pama-Nyungan and Burushaski
It seems to me that there can be regular sound correspondences between Eurasian, Trans-New-Guinean, Pama-Nyungan and Burushaski. I would call the hypthetical proto-language of these "proto-mitian&...
- 6,230
-1
votes
3
answers
323
views
If Hebrew is not related to Slavic, why there are apparent sound correspondences?
We have
hebrew: šeš;
russian: šestʹ;
ukrainian: šistʹ;
latin: six;
english: six;
hebrew: yeš;
russian: yestʹ;
ukrainian: ye, isnuye;
latin: est;
english: is;
hebrew: ze;
russian: se;
ukrainian: сe [...
- 6,230
14
votes
2
answers
2k
views
Derivation of the Indo-European lemma *bʰréh₂tēr ‘brother’
According to Wiktionary, the word “brother” is traced back to the reconstructed Indo-European lemma *bʰréh₂tēr with the same meaning.
It seems to be structurally similar to other kinship terms, such ...
- 241
4
votes
1
answer
207
views
Limits of historical linguistic reconstruction
It is a well-known and widely repeated fact that the linguistic reconstruction associated with the comparative method is no longer effective for large temporal depths (informally estimated to be ...
- 451
0
votes
1
answer
66
views
Why does PIE *weydtos give PGmc wīsaz not wīssaz?
Why does PIE *weydtos give PGmc wīsaz not wīssaz?
compare Pgmc *stassiz, *gawissiz, *kwissiz
- 53
2
votes
1
answer
94
views
Why does Proto-Slavic first-person singular present form have nasalized o-sound?
Why does Proto-Slavic first-person singular present form have nasalized o-sound (ǫ) while PIE have longed o-sound?
- 53
-3
votes
1
answer
113
views
Which PIE participle corresponds to PGmc past participle?
Which PIE participle (active/middle/passive voice) corresponds to PGmc past participle?
- 53
0
votes
1
answer
161
views
Are "brat" and "frater" cognates?
Both the Slavic brat (Брат) and the Latin frater mean brother.
Are they cognates? Or is their phonetic "proximity" a red herring?
Related: How were “bratrъ/bratъ” and “sestra” formed in ...
-5
votes
1
answer
78
views
Are "comma" names in IE languages somehow related with yarn?
The Russian name of "comma" is "запятая zapjatája" which is cognate to english "to spin"(a yarn)
The Russian name of "full stop" is "точка tóčka" ...
- 19
-1
votes
1
answer
69
views
Why Does PGmc *smalaz (from PIE *(s)mal-) have "a" (not "o")?
Why Does PGmc *smalaz (from PIE *(s)mal-) have "a" (not "o")?
- 11
1
vote
1
answer
577
views
Were Iranian languages originally separated and more related to Slavic？
Iranian languages and Slavic languages have some similarities, such as the merger of aspirated sounds into unaspirated sounds, and the development of the consonant /z/. Historically, the settlements ...
- 135
5
votes
1
answer
117
views
Latin -vus/-uus and PIE -wos
What is the Proto-Indo-European reconstruction, if there is one, of the Latin suffixes -tivus (many examples) and -vus/-uus/-ivus (arvus, residuus, cadivus)?
I read in a non-reliable source once that ...
user36730
5
votes
1
answer
347
views
Phonological Development from PIE to Greek
I found the following phonological development (from PIE to Greek) patterns very interesting.
*kw>t / __ {e, i}
(e.g., *penkwe- > πέντε)
*gw>d / __ e
(*gwelbhu- > δελψύς)
*gwh>th / ...
- 125
6
votes
2
answers
532
views
What language branch of PIE does Kartvelian belong to? (Georgian language)
I know little about language, so I would like to preface that this question may appear disjointed. I have been listening to some wonderful Georgian folk music and have been trying to relate it to any ...
4
votes
1
answer
385
views
Is there a question about the number of cases in Proto-Indo-European?
I've found this quote in what appears to be the Usenet sci.lang FAQ page:
Earlier historical linguists cheerfully reconstructed eight cases for PIE, on the model of Sanskrit; but the IE languages ...
- 213
0
votes
1
answer
202
views
Besides Proto-Indoeuropean, what would be the list of the 10 most acurately reconstructed Proto-languages?
Proto-Indoeuropean language (p-IE) has been the subject of study for more than 200 years, and a great deal of work has been published has been written about p-IE reconstruction. In addition, there are ...
- 451
0
votes
2
answers
241
views
Is there a reason germanic languages are more different from other PIE languages?
I apoligize that this question is not very formalized. Maybe the assumption in the question is wrong. I am asking because looking at latin, greek and sanskrit, these languages seem quite similar to ...
- 9
2
votes
3
answers
165
views
What is the specific sound law that describes the change from Proto-Indo-European "*h₂éǵros" to Latin "ager"?
Is there a rule for the movement of the "r" to the end of the word? Or is it moreso that there was some kind of intrusive "e" that separated the "-gr-" to form "-ger&...
- 253
1
vote
2
answers
137
views
Looking up PIE roots, converting between conventions and reconstructions, e.g., h1ueld <-> gheldh
My basic goal is to look up a Greek word and be able to find cognates in other languages that will help me to memorize its meaning. A technique that often works is to look up the Greek word on English ...
- 11
0
votes
2
answers
153
views
Is there a rule which accounts for a d in PIE becoming a b in Latin?
According to Wikitionary, the Latin word verb is derived from the Proto-Indo-European word *werdʰh₁om which is the etonym of the English word word and the German wort. I am familiar with Grimm's Law ...
0
votes
1
answer
132
views
On the Epistemology of Comparative and Historical linguistics [closed]
I have asked a few questions before relating to PIE, proto-languages theory and the comparative method. As these are technical areas I am unfamiliar with but thanks to some previous answers I am ...
2
votes
0
answers
124
views
Are PIE *yóh₁r̥ "spring, summer" and Proto-Turkic *yāŕ "spring, summer" cognates?
In Turkic it seems to be related to the word for "half" (yarım in modern Turkish).
The semantic development looks more likely into the direction half->spring rather than the opposite.
- 6,230
0
votes
3
answers
267
views
Was there an [a] sound in PIE?
I have come across a controversy about the [a] vowel sound in PIE. I have noticed in most reconstructed PIE words the [a] sound is not present, even when it seems to be present in most of the daughter ...
12
votes
2
answers
4k
views
Why was India as the homeland of PIE abandoned?
I have recently become very interested in the linguistics in the problem of the Indo-Aryan migration controversy. I understand in the early 19th century India was favored as the Proto-Indo-European ...
3
votes
4
answers
221
views
In what sense are terms for "white/shining" and for "swamp/marsh" "semantically connected" in many languages?
Although a closed question, reading THIS we find a link to Wictionary with the text:
From Proto-Albanian *baltā (“marsh”), hypothetically from a
Proto-Indo-European *bʰolHto- (“white > marsh”), a ...
- 454
-1
votes
3
answers
175
views
Is the word for "brother-in-law" in Germanic languages related to the Aramaic/Syriac גיס?
Here is the word for "brother-in-law" in various modern Germanic languages: schwager (German), shvugger (Yiddish), swaer (Afrikaans), svoger (Norweigan/Danish), sogor (Croatian), zwager (...
2
votes
0
answers
94
views
How were “bratrъ/bratъ” and “sestra” formed in PSl?
The PIE r-stem words seem to have lost the final -r in PSl: OCS mati, dъšti, and how some words which had -r (and -l) in final position preserve this consonant in the middle of words in slavic?
- 67
3
votes
0
answers
92
views
Was there a tendency of Indo-European languages to avoid syntactical ambiguity by introducing more complex morphology?
In (Peškovskij, 1914, p. 246) I stumbled upon the following (Russian) assertion:
Opisannoe vytesnenie predikativnogo imenitel'nogo tvoritel'nym možno
rassmatrivat' kak častnyj slučaj obščego ...
0
votes
2
answers
153
views
What were the pronunciations of PIE velar stops?
What might be the pronunciations of PIE "plain velar" series *k *g *gʰ, the "palatovelar" series *ḱ *ǵ *ǵʰ, and the "labiovelar" series *kʷ *gʷ *gʷʰ ?
Was the *gʰ same as ...
- 141
0
votes
1
answer
119
views
questions regarding satemisation in sanskrit
I have some questions regarding satemisation in sanskrit.
why there are still k in sanskrit if pie k tunred into sanskrit s ? It seems to me that pie *kʷ turned into k in sanskrit. is that right ? If ...
- 141
1
vote
3
answers
195
views
Was so-called “early PIE” a single language without dialects or a wide continuum of dialects?
Was so-called “early PIE” a single language without dialects or a wide continuum of dialects? If it was a dialect continuum, then probably when did the “common” PIE split up into dialects?
- 39
1
vote
1
answer
125
views
When did the vocalic allophones of the consonant phonemes in PIE become independent vowel phonemes?
The sonants in PIE have consonantal and vocalic allophones, so the consonantal sonant and the vocalic sonant are regarded as one consonant phoneme. But many daughter languages of PIE (at least at some ...
- 67
2
votes
1
answer
201
views
Did h2 and h3 change the phonetic reality of an adjacent *e in PIE under any circumstances?
Did h2 and h3 change the phonetic reality of an adjacent *e in PIE under any circumstances? Can we treat *a and ā as allophones of *e in PIE?
- 67
1
vote
1
answer
224
views
How likely is a close connection between Northwest Caucasian languages and Proto-Indo-European?
How likely is a "Pontic" language family linking languages from Northwestern Caucasus with Proto-Indo-European? The Yamnaya people had a lot of Caucasus ancestry, could some tribe from the ...
- 61
0
votes
1
answer
85
views
Is Proto-Balto-Slavic zero-grade from long zero-grade i? [closed]
Is Proto-Balto-Slavic zero-grade from long zero-grade i
pílˀnas
wilkás
źírˀna
śírˀnāˀ
Is Proto-Germanic zero-grade from long zero-grade u
fullaz
wulfaz
kurną
hurną
- 313
3
votes
1
answer
222
views
Indo-European cognate calculator
There are Indo-European cognate pairs that are phonetically exact and regular in the sense that their phonematic make-up is completely explained by systematic application of the relevant sound rules ...
- 267
1
vote
1
answer
295
views
Did Proto-Indo-European have retracted /s̠/?
Was the /s/ in PIE retracted (/s̠/) as in modern Greek, standard European Spanish and most likely ancient Greek and Latin, or was it pronounced as in modern English?
1
vote
1
answer
134
views
Are infinitives in descendant languages and 3rd-preson singular forms of verbs in PIE related?
For example, why is it shown in Wiktionary that the etymology of such words like eat, есть （which means eat in Russian）comes from 3-rd person singular form *h₁édti in PIE? Are they really related or I ...
- 67
0
votes
1
answer
253
views
What is the difference in usage of the word "root" in PIE and its daughter languages?
Now I understand that the conceptions of "root" in PIE and its descendant languages don't fully overlap. However what is the exact difference between them? What confuses me is the ...
- 39
0
votes
1
answer
223
views
Paradox of PIE nomenclature
It is generally accepted that traditional Proto-Indo-European reconstructs late PIE to the exclusion of Anatolian (PS: not! see most recently Craig Melchert, "The Position of Anatolian"). We ...
- 1,435
0
votes
2
answers
121
views
pronunciation of word origins [closed]
there are many sources for indo-europian languages' etymology but I don't know where to find one which shows the pronunciation of the word's origins. for example, I can't understand how the given ...
- 107