proto-proto-indoeuro
Lionel Bonnetier
indoeuropean are actually condensates of yet more ancient roots
and affixes, and there has been such an erosion that we will
probably never find out what the earlier stages sounded like.
But I would find it an exciting challenge to reconstruct, with
a wild imagination though some scientific realism, a few more
millenia of the IE linguistic evolution. A reconlang... Has
anyone already tried that?
One difficulty is in trying to think as people thought at the
time, why they chose such or such word to derive another one,
why they used such or such periphrase to express a notion not
yet fixed into a single word. It relies heavily on everyday
work with particular techniques, social organization, religious
stories, theories to explain the world.
An example of "wild imagination" I had when I started studying
PIE:
Extracting a "n-xyz" morpheme meaning "over, cover, hide" out
of the following roots (PIE notation a bit fuzzy):
n-b-: sky, cloud (that covers the world)
n-w-: new (springtime grass covers the old one)
ni-: on, over (as in nisd-: "nest", from s-d-: sit)
n-H-: snow (that covers the ground)
Another that just came to my mind is a "t-xyz" morpheme for
"stand, right, up"
(s)t-H-: stand up
(s)tr-wH-: build up
tr-w-(?): right, faithful, true, trust
If it doesn't exist yet, I'll set up a web site for exposing
crazy reconlang projects.
Charles
> It is very likely that the supposed "basic roots" of proto-
> indoeuropean are actually condensates of yet more ancient roots
> and affixes
There are some world-class experts playing that game:
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/indo-european.html
> But I would find it an exciting challenge to reconstruct, with
> a wild imagination though some scientific realism, a few more
> millenia of the IE linguistic evolution. A reconlang... Has
> anyone already tried that?
Getting kookier:
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/nostratic.html
But here's my totally unbaked theory: PIE split off from
a branch of Proto-Semitic, which had BI-literal roots.
Vowels didn't exist except as ablauts. SOV agglutinative.
Actually I don't think genetic processes were so important
before the horse+cart, everything was a big areal continuum,
from the Urals to Spain. Disturbance causes genetic split.
(OK, I'm wrong, nobody agrees, sue me.)
Looking through a Latin dictionary, notice all the MO- words
and how they seem to branch semantically. The second consonant
forms a sort of pattern among all the old roots, FA- and HA- etc.
I've tried to systematize it, failed, but this is better:
http://www.bartleby.com/61/IEroots.html
I took these and combined them into one nice HTML page,
subtracting all the junk and adding a few errors and copyright
violations along the way. It's too big to upload, alas.
> Extracting a "n-xyz" morpheme meaning "over, cover, hide" out
> of the following roots (PIE notation a bit fuzzy):
"kel-1 To cover, conceal, save.
Oldest form *kģel-, becoming *kel- in centum languages.
Derivatives include hell, hole, holster, apocalypse, and eucalyptus."
Actually, there are many more roots ... "cover" and "turn"
seem to be among the favorite PIE concepts.
A good example of what I think ante-pre-retro-PIE looked like,
but in reverse, is the whole Austronesian family.
Lionel Bonnetier
Charles wrote:
> But here's my totally unbaked theory: PIE split off from
> a branch of Proto-Semitic, which had BI-literal roots.
Do the Nostratic theories describe the bi- to tri-literal
evolution of the semitic langs?
Maybe you'll be interested in this comparison of genders
and conjugations in PIE, AfroAs. and Khoisan:
http://www.dabis.at/Anwender.htm/Alscher/afroasia.htm
The whole thesis deals with ergative, and reconstructs a
coherent declension system for both nouns and pronouns.
> Vowels didn't exist except as ablauts. SOV agglutinative.
Why agglutinative? Because of the tendency for consonantic
assimilation?
> Actually I don't think genetic processes were so important
> before the horse+cart, everything was a big areal continuum,
> from the Urals to Spain. Disturbance causes genetic split.
> (OK, I'm wrong, nobody agrees, sue me.)
Medieval "Latinidia" was such a continuum. You could draw
a seamless shade-panel from Paris to Madrid or from Bordeaux
to Milano. Not horse, but printed press, and the french
revolution, were the cause of the splits this time.
> http://www.bartleby.com/61/IEroots.html
Do you know the "IE data base" site:
http://tied.narod.ru/index10.html
> "kel-1 To cover, conceal, save.
Yes, but I would imagine an extinct n-# root at the base
of the n-* examples I listed. It is not rare that disappeared
words survive only as part of derivations. w-y/y-w (strength)
survived only as a sub-sub-part in young or virtue or viril
or werewolf.
> Actually, there are many more roots ... "cover" and "turn"
> seem to be among the favorite PIE concepts.
The Vrt&Kl paradygm :)
> A good example of what I think ante-pre-retro-PIE looked like,
> but in reverse, is the whole Austronesian family.
In reverse? I don't see what you mean.
Charles
> Do the Nostratic theories describe the bi- to tri-literal
> evolution of the semitic langs?
I think there are theories about Proto-Semitic about that,
but relating that to PIE is a big imaginative stretch.
Except that PIE maybe had no characteristic vowels.
Even today, consonants bear most of the weight ...
> > Vowels didn't exist except as ablauts. SOV agglutinative.
>
> Why agglutinative? Because of the tendency for consonantic
> assimilation?
Just wishful thinking, actually.
> Medieval "Latinidia" was such a continuum. You could draw
> a seamless shade-panel from Paris to Madrid or from Bordeaux
> to Milano. Not horse, but printed press, and the french
> revolution, were the cause of the splits this time.
But what about Alsace-Lorraine? A Germanic-Latin mix?
Maybe after several thousand years of borrowing.
> > A good example of what I think ante-pre-retro-PIE looked like,
> > but in reverse, is the whole Austronesian family.
>
> In reverse? I don't see what you mean.
VO and prepositions instead of OV and suffixes.
(And lots more vowels.) Boats instead of horses.
A depopulated "spread" zone.
Automort
Lionel Bonnetier
> But what about Alsace-Lorraine? A Germanic-Latin mix?
> Maybe after several thousand years of borrowing.
Alsacian was/is quite Germanic, while the Lorraine
lngs, the other side of the Vosges mountains, were
Latin-syntax. But Germanic lexical borrowings were
throughout the former Roman Empire, land of
continuous immigration.
Lionel Bonnetier
> So the idea is to reconstruct Proto-Nostratic?
Hehe, why not? Even Proto-Microbish if we can :)
Well, actually my primary goal is to *invent*
a *plausible* earlier stage with a complete
grammatical and lexical description, which a
scientific reconstruction can't honestly do.
Automort
>my primary goal is to *invent*
>a *plausible* earlier stage with a complete
>grammatical and lexical description, which a
>scientific reconstruction can't honestly do.
Sounds like fun.
Lionel Bonnetier
> Sounds like fun.
You're welcome to join the fun. We can start
putting the first bricks here on this ng.
When there's enough material I'll set up a
web site for the project.
One first step I can think of is determining
what were the really important things for the
peoples of those primeval times: tribal
structures, techniques, gods, plants and
animals. This should reflect into the lexicon.
At what stage they were in sheepherding, in
making metallic tools, in food keeping and
preparing, etc.
Automort
the US Plains Indians sans horses (for a long time), but we can't extrapolate
too deterministically.
There might have been families, bands, moieties, tribes. One of these tribes
spoke Proto-nostratic and others other languages lacking descendants, though
these languages would look similar.
Ther main concern would have been food: hunting and some gardening where
practical. Food animals. Dangerous animals. Weather & seasons.
Technical argot: stone and wood for tools. Food preparation. Fire. Tracking and
hunting, trapping.
Supernatural: probably no dieties exactly as we know them, but personifications
of forces and feelings, likely an eclectic type: if they'd seen a zebra or
elephant (instead of a horse or mammoth) they'd have been interested and
perhaps slightly upset, and if they encountered a new "supernatural" force or
feeling, the same. They'd have built on previous terms to describe the new.
Contrast of steppe and forest. Rivers & mountains.
Lionel Bonnetier
[Many interesting starting points]
Is it ok that I copy your post on the future site?
I'm also asking Charles if it's ok that I copy some
of his paragraphs about the linguistic continuum
and bi-literal stage. Please tell me your real names
and actual email addresses if you want them to appear
on the site.
I will have more time as from thursday to continue the
discussion and make the first pages of the site.
Sorry but I'm in a 24h rush to finish a job :/
Meanwhile just another little deeper-root-seeking:
Could we branch down WD (wet, water) and SWD (sweat),
and maybe english "wade"?
leo attt easynet dottt fr
(I hope the spammer bots are still dumb enough and
can't reconstruct this one...)
Charles
> if it's ok that I copy some
> of his paragraphs about the linguistic continuum
> and bi-literal stage.
If you can use any of that stuff then it's all yours.
I probably stole it from somewhere anyway ...
> Meanwhile just another little deeper-root-seeking:
> Could we branch down WD (wet, water) and SWD (sweat),
> and maybe english "wade"?
With only about 500 possible C-C combinations,
you will have to be a philosopher or poet ...
and probably a thief as well (to steal all the
Esperanto-Ido-Lojban-Klingon derivational suffixes).
Automort
> Please tell me your real names
>and actual email addresses if you want them to appear
>on the site.
That is my e-mail address that appears here.
You also need persons who are hunters and fishers, and persons otherwise
acquainted with "natural" plants and animals, since they will know the
realities of hunting to which Nostratics would have applied their words.
Automort
consulted for terminology.
Lionel Bonnetier
> My guess would be that their way of life and organization might have resembled
> the US Plains Indians sans horses (for a long time), but we can't extrapolate
> too deterministically.
I have very little knowledge about nomadic and
semi-nomadic life styles. Were the proto-europeans
of the end of the latest ice age totally nomadic?
They followed the reindeers with climate warming,
but that spanned for centuries so they might have
had permanent settlements.
> There might have been families, bands, moieties, tribes. One of these tribes
> spoke Proto-nostratic and others other languages lacking descendants, though
> these languages would look similar.
It would be fun, but a hard work, to invent not
only some nostratic but those other languages and
the history of borrowings...
> Ther main concern would have been food: hunting and some gardening where
> practical. Food animals. Dangerous animals. Weather & seasons.
> Technical argot: stone and wood for tools. Food preparation. Fire. Tracking and
> hunting, trapping.
Noted down. It will be in the list of
things-to-think-about.
> Supernatural: probably no dieties exactly as we know them, but personifications
> of forces and feelings, likely an eclectic type: if they'd seen a zebra or
> elephant (instead of a horse or mammoth) they'd have been interested and
> perhaps slightly upset, and if they encountered a new "supernatural" force or
> feeling, the same. They'd have built on previous terms to describe the new.
> Contrast of steppe and forest. Rivers & mountains.
Regarding climate, fauna, flaura, we will have to be careful
to respect the actual state of those times. It was colder,
Mediterranean lands were less arid, there was lions in north
africa. Sahara was becoming the desert it is now.
It depends how far in history we want to invent. 15,000 years
ago was a totally different world. Were there any sapiens in
southern europe at that time?
Lionel Bonnetier
> > Meanwhile just another little deeper-root-seeking:
> > Could we branch down WD (wet, water) and SWD (sweat),
> > and maybe english "wade"?
>
> With only about 500 possible C-C combinations,
> you will have to be a philosopher or poet ...
> and probably a thief as well (to steal all the
> Esperanto-Ido-Lojban-Klingon derivational suffixes).
I don't necessarily want to boil everything down
to biliters. There might have been triliters which
disappeared or eroded to biliters into the PIE epoch.
PPIE was not necessarily minimalist or "hyper-
derivational". I even tend to think it was rather
poor in affixes, although several generations of
affixes have probably piled up, as in other
languages. But I will write more about that in the
list-of-questions for tomorrow :)
Lionel Bonnetier
> That is my e-mail address that appears here.
> You also need persons who are hunters and fishers, and persons otherwise
> acquainted with "natural" plants and animals, since they will know the
> realities of hunting to which Nostratics would have applied their words.
The funny thing is that we can invent secret words
used by the "shamans" which will have no descendents
in PIE...
Lionel Bonnetier
> I'd suggest if nobody knows the sports, books on archery & javelin throwing be
> consulted for terminology.
And also trying to imagine the nifty details of how they
made their hunting weapons and tools. Some artifacts are
named after the gestures or processes to make them. For
an instance of later times: the "temper" of steel comes
from the act of cooling by dipping (french verb
"tremper", latin "temperare").
Automort
>15,000 years
>ago was a totally different world. Were there any sapiens in
>southern europe at that time?
Yes. Probably nothing else but. Started coming in about 45,000 yrs ago.
Automort
>trying to imagine the nifty details of how they
>made their hunting weapons and tools.
Maybe Boy Scout & military manuals will have details in modern languages.
Charles
> I don't necessarily want to boil everything down
> to biliters. There might have been triliters which
> disappeared or eroded to biliters into the PIE epoch.
I was imagining: Take the root "T-M" and my current set
of polarity vowels, to get with some massive cheating ...
TOM ... to cut, a cut, be cut
TUM ... poked-at, prodded
TAUM ... chopped, hacked
TEM ... preserved intact, atomic
TIM ... eroded, fearful
TAIM ... persisting, eternal
TAM ... apathetic, passive
Then to TEM is added "loc = place" to make "temple",
TEMLOC or something like that. Not all the roots would
be productive, but this allows a lot of tweaking.
Anyway I'm convinced that a mechanism for opposites and
scalars is needed, more than any other derivational trick.
Every state-adjective and action verb can use at least
the reversive, and every noun can use the augmentive
and diminutive. In this scheme ...
e ... basic positive
a ... null, non-, neutral
o ... anti-, negative
i ... diminutive
u ... opposite dim.
ai ... augmentive
au ... opposite aug.
> PPIE was not necessarily minimalist or "hyper-
> derivational". I even tend to think it was rather
> poor in affixes
Could be, but being lazy I might just borrow a set
from somewhere, maybe Turkish (I mean Hittite).
Perhaps they tried several themselves.
Lionel Bonnetier
> I was imagining: Take the root "T-M" and my current set
> of polarity vowels, to get with some massive cheating ...
>
> TOM ... to cut, a cut, be cut
ok, looking at the table below I get: basic negative
> TUM ... poked-at, prodded
still negative but softly
> TAUM ... chopped, hacked
totally negative
> TEM ... preserved intact, atomic
neutral regarding the act of poking/cutting/hacking
> TIM ... eroded, fearful
slightly uncut / slightly cut? But we have passed
the -a- barrier already, there shouldn't be any
action anymore, or do i miss it totally? (i don't
see the connexion with fearful either)
> TAIM ... persisting, eternal
totally untouched/unchanged/uncut
> TAM ... apathetic, passive
not cut at all, no action?
> Then to TEM is added "loc = place" to make "temple",
> TEMLOC or something like that. Not all the roots would
> be productive, but this allows a lot of tweaking.
*temloc > *temploh > *templo- > latin templum?
> Anyway I'm convinced that a mechanism for opposites and
> scalars is needed, more than any other derivational trick.
> Every state-adjective and action verb can use at least
> the reversive, and every noun can use the augmentive
> and diminutive. In this scheme ...
>
> e ... basic positive
> a ... null, non-, neutral
> o ... anti-, negative
> i ... diminutive
> u ... opposite dim.
> ai ... augmentive
> au ... opposite aug.
The use of the inner vowels for that is interesting,
only the close sounds / close meanings is dangerous
in a spoken language for it won't tolerate unclear
communication. Maybe it would be more robust in a
CV~VC scheme ("~" meaning vocalic merger) but it
reduces the root stock.
> > PPIE was not necessarily minimalist or "hyper-
> > derivational". I even tend to think it was rather
> > poor in affixes
>
> Could be, but being lazy I might just borrow a set
> from somewhere, maybe Turkish (I mean Hittite).
> Perhaps they tried several themselves.
Tried? By conscious manipulation? It would be funny,
but considering that the vast majority of people have
almost no awareness of how they produce sentences, I
can hardly imagine the prehistoric hunters disserting
about the morphological features of their language...
"Hey, Grkh, it's funny how you postpalatalize the
geminative pseudoglide in k'nnath, but wait...
reindeer near wood, take stone quick."
Maybe we're talking of two languages: a hypothetical
linguistic artwork of primeval scientists, and a
hypothetical down-to-earth speech tool.
Lionel Bonnetier
> > TEM ... preserved intact, atomic
> neutral regarding the act of poking/cutting/hacking
oups, of course i got it wrong here
Lionel Bonnetier
"oups" is an intensitive of "oops"
(actually a french typo :)
and "eips" and "eps" and "ips" would mean...?
Charles
>
> Charles wrote:
> *temloc > *temploh > *templo- > latin templum?
That was the goal. It's easy enough that it could actually
be done for all the PIE roots. Basically, it's just doing
reverse comparative linguistics in the wrong way ...
> > e ... basic positive
> > a ... null, non-, neutral
> > o ... anti-, negative
> > i ... diminutive
> > u ... opposite dim.
> > ai ... augmentive
> > au ... opposite aug.
>
> The use of the inner vowels for that is interesting,
> only the close sounds / close meanings is dangerous
> in a spoken language for it won't tolerate unclear
> communication.
But that's what PIE did ... TEM and TOM are real
examples. It had 3 grades, -A -E -O, with closely
related meanings in the daughter languages.
Using 5 vowels and 2 diphthongs is not too many.
> > > I even tend to think it was rather poor in affixes
> > Perhaps they tried several themselves.
>
> Tried? By conscious manipulation?
Sure! Where did conlang genes come from, radioactive fallout?
> I can hardly imagine the prehistoric hunters disserting
> about the morphological features of their language...
Me neither. It was the women and children.
Charles
> and "eips" and "eps" and "ips" would mean...?
Loss of initial consonant, S > H > 0?
Hessu
Lionel Bonnetier wrote:
>
> It is very likely that the supposed "basic roots" of proto-
> indoeuropean are actually condensates of yet more ancient roots
> and affixes, and there has been such an erosion that we will
> probably never find out what the earlier stages sounded like.
>
> But I would find it an exciting challenge to reconstruct, with
> a wild imagination though some scientific realism, a few more
> millenia of the IE linguistic evolution. A reconlang... Has
> anyone already tried that?
>
> One difficulty is in trying to think as people thought at the
> time, why they chose such or such word to derive another one,
> why they used such or such periphrase to express a notion not
> yet fixed into a single word. It relies heavily on everyday
> work with particular techniques, social organization, religious
> stories, theories to explain the world.
>
> An example of "wild imagination" I had when I started studying
> PIE:
>
> Extracting a "n-xyz" morpheme meaning "over, cover, hide" out
> of the following roots (PIE notation a bit fuzzy):
>
> n-b-: sky, cloud (that covers the world)
> n-w-: new (springtime grass covers the old one)
> ni-: on, over (as in nisd-: "nest", from s-d-: sit)
> n-H-: snow (that covers the ground)
Are these roots really related or same origin. What is happening here
is very similar normal language development. Example
:
some lang has words like
lada=a heart
lakna=brain
leput=kernel
so speaker associate these l-beginning with "inside-things"
and start using it (l) in that meaning:
kupi=a house
kupil=in a house
Even pie was processed from somewhere with having several
co-existance levels or several developing processes.
> Another that just came to my mind is a "t-xyz" morpheme for
> "stand, right, up"
>
> (s)t-H-: stand up
> (s)tr-wH-: build up
> tr-w-(?): right, faithful, true, trust
>
> If it doesn't exist yet, I'll set up a web site for exposing
> crazy reconlang projects.
silv...@qnet.com
spear so there was more oomph)
Anyway, I know archery.
Automort
>What about those spear-throwing things they used?
You mean an atlatl.
>Anyway, I know archery.
>
Then you must know enough about it to know what aspects of it need to be talked
about. That's what's needed here.
Lionel Bonnetier
> > The use of the inner vowels for that is interesting,
> > only the close sounds / close meanings is dangerous
> > in a spoken language for it won't tolerate unclear
> > communication.
>
> But that's what PIE did ... TEM and TOM are real
> examples. It had 3 grades, -A -E -O, with closely
> related meanings in the daughter languages.
> Using 5 vowels and 2 diphthongs is not too many.
But it seems the vocalic grades were initially an
effect of stress and assimilation, just like
"feet" < fe:t < fö:ti < fo:ti, but they were not a
derivational process in themselves.
> > > > I even tend to think it was rather poor in affixes
> > > Perhaps they tried several themselves.
> > Tried? By conscious manipulation?
> Sure! Where did conlang genes come from, radioactive fallout?
I would say yes :) Conlanging has no impact on the
mainstream language. Even slangs take much time to
push a few words into the official language.
Lionel Bonnetier
> >From: silv...@qnet.com
>
> >What about those spear-throwing things they used?
Thanks for reminding, that was a big invention before bows.
> You mean an atlatl.
Do you know the origin of the word "atlatl"?
Maybe it is literally "thrower/launcher"?
> >Anyway, I know archery.
>
> Then you must know enough about it to know what aspects of it need to be talked
> about. That's what's needed here.
There are a few words of weaponry for which we could
start imagining an etymology: spear, spear head, arrow,
arrow head, bow, thrower...
Considering a possible chronology of invention:
1. wood spear, sharp stone
2. burnt-tip spear
3. stone-head spear
4. spear thrower
5. bow and arrow (light weight spear)
Maybe there were different words at stage 1 for
cutting stones (blades) and thrusting stones
(spikes).
PIE *sek- meant "cut" (latin secare, english
saw). Some derivate could mean "stone blade".
PIE *pel-/per- meant "strike, thrust", it could
make a derivate meaning "pointy stone". It could
as well make a word for "spear".
PIE *gwel- meant "throw, pierce" (english kill)
could also make a word for "spear".
Automort
>> You mean an atlatl.
>
>Do you know the origin of the word "atlatl"?
>Maybe it is literally "thrower/launcher"?
It is Nahuatl. I don't know what it literally means, if anything besides "spear
thrower".
Lionel Bonnetier
> Lionel Bonnetier wrote:
> >
> > An example of "wild imagination" I had when I started studying
> > PIE:
> >
> > Extracting a "n-xyz" morpheme meaning "over, cover, hide" out
> > of the following roots (PIE notation a bit fuzzy):
> >
> > n-b-: sky, cloud (that covers the world)
> > n-w-: new (springtime grass covers the old one)
> > ni-: on, over (as in nisd-: "nest", from s-d-: sit)
> > n-H-: snow (that covers the ground)
>
> Are these roots really related or same origin. What is happening here
> is very similar normal language development. Example
> :
> some lang has words like
> lada=a heart
> lakna=brain
> leput=kernel
> so speaker associate these l-beginning with "inside-things"
> and start using it (l) in that meaning:
> kupi=a house
> kupil=in a house
It sounds farfetched to derive a case marker from lexeme
comparison. It does happen sometimes that erroneous etymology
generates new meanings, but I've never seen that in morphemes
as demotivated as markers. Do you know any occurence?
As for my supposed *n-xyz lexeme, it is farfetched too (I stated
it was "wild imagination"). But etymology can be very surprising
sometimes. Whatever word you consider in whatever language, you
can be sure it's not a basic root but a derivation from an older
word, and the deriving logic can be very weird, bound to cultural
features of the time of the derivation. For instance, what is
comical in today's "comics"?
Lionel Bonnetier
> >Do you know the origin of the word "atlatl"?
> >Maybe it is literally "thrower/launcher"?
>
> It is Nahuatl. I don't know what it literally means, if anything besides "spear
> thrower".
I just looked up:
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000.
atlatl
SYLLABICATION: at·la·tl
PRONUNCIATION: ät-lät´l
NOUN : A throwing device usually consisting of a stick
fitted with a thong or socket to steady the butt of a
spear or dart and extend the length it travels.
ETYMOLOGY: Nahuatl, from atla, to throw.
Automort
>Whatever word you consider in whatever language, you
>can be sure it's not a basic root but a derivation from an older
>word, and the deriving logic can be very weird, bound to cultural
>features of the time of the derivation. For instance, what is
>comical in today's "comics"?
This is a most astute observation, one that can be applies to most languages --
and the more complex and self-conscious the culture, the more so; a primitive
culture where "recorded" history goes back to granpa and then interesting
stories blend with myth may constantly update and revise -- or preserve things
rendered utter gibberish by time -- but a literate, historically minded
civilization will preserve allusions to milenia old events and situations.
("Champing at the bit" -- how many people now have direct experience with
horses? Yet we can easily find the source of words and phrases still
meaningful.)
Automort
forgotten the device, along with everyone they were in contact with, when they
landed over here.
ANDROGENOIDE
The Americas were in transition from paleolithic culture to neolithic....I
don't know if the invention of the bow had gotten to everyone yet but the
Mexicans had certainly known it for some time. Sounds to me like the
existence of the word shows memory of a previous technology..
Automort
>I
>don't know if the invention of the bow had gotten to everyone yet but the
>Mexicans had certainly known it for some time. Sounds to me like the
>existence of the word shows memory of a previous technology..
They had corps of spearmen in their army, which was quite huge, and also
archers. Archery existed in S. America as well as Mexico & N. America, but the
idea is that it was relatively new here. They could also have revamped and
improved the use of spears; the British considered phasing out musketry &
returning to the longbow around the time of Napoleon, and the Japanese actually
did give up firearms during the late middle ages after developing them
extensively, only readopting them in the 1700s.
Automort
dessicated, well preserved remains of caucasians from Western China that date
to about 2000BC.
The author discusses their clothes, which are woven and sewn, and points out
that up to half the time of people before industrial revolution, at least of
people with little labor division, was spent making clothes.
So here's another aspect of nostratic that needs considering: the technology of
sewing and perhaps weaving. The people in this book seem to have shared traits
with the founders of the Halstadt (Celtic) culture as far as clothes and
patterns went, but there's some notion they may have spoken Altaic rather than,
say, Tocharian. Nobody knows right now, and they are much later than the
nostratics -- but the latter still doubtless made clothes, considering the
climate.
Charles
> a primitive
> culture where "recorded" history goes back to granpa and then interesting
> stories blend with myth may constantly update and revise -- or preserve things
> rendered utter gibberish by time -- but a literate, historically minded
> civilization will preserve allusions to milenia old events and situations.
Polynesians knew their ancestry for 30 generations back.
Americans have no idea what happened 3 weeks ago. This culture
is moronic, only its machines have any chance of survival.
Lionel Bonnetier
> So here's another aspect of nostratic that needs considering: the technology of
> sewing and perhaps weaving. The people in this book seem to have shared traits
> with the founders of the Halstadt (Celtic) culture as far as clothes and
> patterns went, but there's some notion they may have spoken Altaic rather than,
> say, Tocharian. Nobody knows right now, and they are much later than the
> nostratics -- but the latter still doubtless made clothes, considering the
> climate.
PIE *teks- seems to originally mean "make" in a general sense,
and drifted to mean "weave" in some IE languages, so I wonder
if it is a late invention. We'll have to check up archeo-
logical data. But there was also *webh- for "weave". There was
also *sne:- for "spin (wool)", but it might have meant "twist
(rope)" before -- I don't know if German Schnure (rope) is
related. I'm not sure if the nomadic stage allowed enough time
for cloth weaving. But *syu:- (sew) is probably very ancient,
it seems to be the next clothes-making technique after the
stage of simply cutting pelts to put on. It may date back to
Mesolithic even.
Automort
>Polynesians knew their ancestry for 30 generations back.
>Americans have no idea what happened 3 weeks ago. This culture
>is moronic, only its machines have any chance of survival.
>
Ho hum. Another pretentious self-hate thing.
I know my ancestors back to Colonial times, partly because records were kept by
some relatives and partly because I was able to find records of them -- records
that preserved information about therm which had been lost. Granted the
Polynesians (and many Africans, etc.) had long memorized genealogies, these
could not outlast the lifetimes of those having them, and if they weren't
passed on because of accident, alzheimer's, etc. they could not be recovered.
Automort
>I don't know if German Schnure (rope) is
>related.
I haven't studied German, but this looks like "snare" in English.
> But *syu:- (sew) is probably very ancient,
>it seems to be the next clothes-making technique after the
>stage of simply cutting pelts to put on. It may date back to
>Mesolithic even.
The Cro-Magnons (circa 40,000 BC) seem to have had needles for sewing.
The Central Asian caucasians the book deals with seem to have been weaving, and
to have used various devices I didn't know about before reading this to make
thread and cloth. Some are still used, at least till recently, in east Asia and
are attested archaeologically in Greece, Balkans, etc.
ANDROGENOIDE
>for cloth weaving.
was making a braided strip as he was walking. By itself it was about headband
size but someone who does enough walking could eventually produce enough small
pieces to be sewn into actual clothing.
The Keenans
>
> Automort wrote:
>
> > So here's another aspect of nostratic that needs considering: the technology of
> > sewing and perhaps weaving. The people in this book seem to have shared traits
> > with the founders of the Halstadt (Celtic) culture as far as clothes and
> > patterns went, but there's some notion they may have spoken Altaic rather than,
> > say, Tocharian. Nobody knows right now, and they are much later than the
> > nostratics -- but the latter still doubtless made clothes, considering the
> > climate.
>
> PIE *teks- seems to originally mean "make" in a general sense,
> and drifted to mean "weave" in some IE languages, so I wonder
> if it is a late invention. We'll have to check up archeo-
> logical data. But there was also *webh- for "weave". There was
> also *sne:- for "spin (wool)", but it might have meant "twist
> (rope)" before -- I don't know if German Schnure (rope) is
> related.
I don't speak German ,but, doesn't the last name Schneider mean tailor
^^^^^
-Duke Keenan
Charles
> a primitive
> culture where "recorded" history goes back to granpa
> >From: Charles ca...@spam.com
>
> >Polynesians knew their ancestry for 30 generations back.
> Granted the
> Polynesians (and many Africans, etc.) had long memorized genealogies
You should study some anthropology instead of spouting garbage.
Automort
>a documentary in which a nomadic hunter
>was making a braided strip as he was walking.
The book I'm reading mentions shepherds weaving as they watched over the
flocks. No wasted time for those people!
Automort
>Date: 4/29/01 11:15 AM Central
>> Granted the
>> Polynesians (and many Africans, etc.) had long memorized genealogies
>
>You should study some anthropology instead of spouting garbage.
OK, so they did not memorize their genealogies?
I thought I was agreeing with you on this, but you seem to want to cut it off
before I get to the vulnerable part: a nonliterate culture can't exist if too
many members die before passiong their knowledge on. One of the things that
wiped out many American and Australian cultures even in advance of white
intrusion was European diseases killing older people. Written languages can
sometimes be read again long after they passed from use (Egyptian, old Mayan).
The blot here, changing the subject to assert I should read more of what I have
read for years, is simply a defense against admitting that a literate culture
is less fragile and less given to error than a non-literate one. It is a
pretentious intellectual fad to assert otherwise.
Such nonsense has no place here, but I wanted to make my position clear.
As for the personal matter. written information enabled me to resurrect
information that my family had lost. Were it not recorded, I fail to see how I
could have recovered it. Mystical vibes from the New Age Masters perhaps?
Charles
> I thought I was agreeing with you on this, but you seem to want to cut it off
You said "primitive culture" in the old ethnocentric sense.
I objected. A real study of anthropology is liberating.
I said that we are exceptionally culture-poor and artifact-rich
You objected. I fail to see any counter-examples.
> before I get to the vulnerable part: a nonliterate culture can't exist if too
> many members die before passiong their knowledge on.
> Written languages can
> sometimes be read again long after they passed from use (Egyptian, old Mayan).
Only by a high-priesthood, to their advantage.
Culture is not what you seem to think it is.
I think it is a coherent meaningful life-support system.
It includes art and religion and language.
It's persistent, traditional, relatively stable.
> that a literate culture
> is less fragile and less given to error than a non-literate one. It is a
> pretentious intellectual fad to assert otherwise.
I'll assert otherwise.
> Mystical vibes from the New Age Masters perhaps?
Might be worth a try.
Automort
>Date: 4/29/01 1:46 PM Central
>You said "primitive culture" in the old ethnocentric sense.
You know this?
>> Mystical vibes from the New Age Masters perhaps?
>
>Might be worth a try.
>
I rest my case.
Charles
> >> Mystical vibes from the New Age Masters perhaps?
> > Might be worth a try.
> I rest my case.
(Preparing voodoo doll and Black Sabbath tape ...)
Hessu
In Finnish: sydämet-maksat(uralic frase
"hearts-livers")>sisälmykset("entrails;guts")>sisä-(inner-, inside)
>-s (postfix for inessive)
In Hungarian: -ban orig.meaning kernel of a nut, nut heart>inessive
postfix
> As for my supposed *n-xyz lexeme, it is farfetched too (I stated
> it was "wild imagination"). But etymology can be very surprising
> sometimes. Whatever word you consider in whatever language, you
> can be sure it's not a basic root but a derivation from an older
> word, and the deriving logic can be very weird, bound to cultural
> features of the time of the derivation. For instance, what is
> comical in today's "comics"?
Isn't it very human way to think, if there's accidently words similar to
each other
by their meaning so speakers "re-construct the rule". And the similarity
will have
its own meaning.
Lionel Bonnetier
> I don't speak German ,but, doesn't the last name Schneider mean tailor
It looks like I'll have to buy exhaustive dictionaries of
PIE roots with their descendance in all known IE languages.
PPIE full time job offer, anyone? :)
Lionel Bonnetier
> In Finnish: sydämet-maksat(uralic frase
> "hearts-livers")>sisälmykset("entrails;guts")>sisä-(inner-, inside)
> >-s (postfix for inessive)
> In Hungarian: -ban orig.meaning kernel of a nut, nut heart>inessive
> postfix
That case morphemes originate from lexemes, I agree
totally, but I would say sisälmykset is from sisä-,
not the other way around.
Compare with "entrails" < latin intralia, an
adjectival of inter/intra (inside) from a PIE word
derivated from PIE *en (in).
Or "strange" < old french estrange < latin extraneus
(strange(r)), adjectival of exter/extra (outside)
from a PIE word derivated from *ek(s) (out).
Hessu
Lionel Bonnetier wrote:
>
> Hessu wrote:
>
> > In Finnish: sydämet-maksat(uralic frase
> > "hearts-livers")>sisälmykset("entrails;guts")>sisä-(inner-, inside)
> > >-s (postfix for inessive)
> > In Hungarian: -ban orig.meaning kernel of a nut, nut heart>inessive
> > postfix
>
> That case morphemes originate from lexemes, I agree
> totally, but I would say sisälmykset is from sisä-,
> not the other way around.
Finno-Ugric -s had a different meaning, and compound word
in style of sydämet-maksat("hearts-livers") is very common in
the most of fu langs. Most of Finnish cases (more than half of them)
are rather new stuff.
History of word "sisälmykset" can be traced back by normal
sound changes. I think (if I'm remembering right) there's no such root
(sisä-)
in fu/uralic vocabulary. But there's also more pressure to start using
"s" as for inessive: suoli,suoni,syödä etc.
Lionel Bonnetier
> Finno-Ugric -s had a different meaning, and compound word
> in style of sydämet-maksat("hearts-livers") is very common in
> the most of fu langs.
Oops, very sorry, my mind was kind of blank this
afternoon, I overlooked the first step of the
derivation/extraction scheme you wrote.
> Most of Finnish cases (more than half of them)
> are rather new stuff.
Like the -al-ta, is-ta compound marks? Are there
online resources about Finnish etymology? I heard
the partitive is a former genitive, but then from
what does the current genitive originate?
> History of word "sisälmykset" can be traced back by normal
> sound changes. I think (if I'm remembering right) there's no such root
> (sisä-)
> in fu/uralic vocabulary. But there's also more pressure to start using
> "s" as for inessive: suoli,suoni,syödä etc.
OK, that's an aspect of linguistics I should make
myself aware of. Now I can't stop thinking of the
PIE s- roots in the words for sewing, strip/thread/
string/rope making, etc.
terve ranskasta
silv...@qnet.com
words for different tips and shapes), fletching (the feathers), nock (how the arrow
attaches to the string), the string, the handle of the bow, the tips of the bow,
bow stringers (they probably had them back then?)
Automort wrote:
> >From: silv...@qnet.com
>
> >What about those spear-throwing things they used?
>
> You mean an atlatl.
>
> >Anyway, I know archery.
> >
>
> Then you must know enough about it to know what aspects of it need to be talked
> about. That's what's needed here.
Lionel Bonnetier
> Well, there's the basic bow, and basic arrow. The arrow head (maybe different
> words for different tips and shapes), fletching (the feathers), nock (how the arrow
> attaches to the string), the string, the handle of the bow, the tips of the bow,
> bow stringers (they probably had them back then?)
Thanks for the description. I really wonder how the idea
of the bow came to the meso/neo-lithic hunters. It is a
complex technique. Maybe they first played with some
toy-catapult made with a flexible branch. Or they used
to fasten hut frames with ropes, and while playing with
a stretched rope one had the spark. Or similarly with a
primitive stringed instrument if they had any.
So, the very first arrows were probably light spears
with no fletching and they flought awry most of the
time. But how was the fletching invented? Was it first
some magical belief that birds need feathers to fly,
like Dumbo's magical feather? How to come up to put the
feathers at the arrow butt, and attached in that
particular way?
Here are a few PIE roots that might be used to coin
primeval words of archery:
bheug- (bend) produced "bow", while bhendh- (bind, tie)
produced "bend"
gwel- (throw, reach, pierce) and stegh-/steig- (stick,
prick, pointed) could make words for "spear" and
"arrow"
ghwii- (thread, tendon) could be the arrow string
both pet- (rush, fly) and pleu- (flow) produced words
about flying, wings, feathers
Hessu
Lionel Bonnetier wrote:
>
> Hessu wrote:
>
> > Finno-Ugric -s had a different meaning, and compound word
> > in style of sydämet-maksat("hearts-livers") is very common in
> > the most of fu langs.
>
> Oops, very sorry, my mind was kind of blank this
> afternoon, I overlooked the first step of the
> derivation/extraction scheme you wrote.
Well, you could be more right than me...
> > Most of Finnish cases (more than half of them)
> > are rather new stuff.
>
> Like the -al-ta, is-ta compound marks? Are there
> online resources about Finnish etymology? I heard
> the partitive is a former genitive, but then from
> what does the current genitive originate?
Do you mean -ta/-tä?It is partitive(I don't know its origin).
It could connected to words like "pää","taka/taa" (there's a strange
connection
between p- and t-). if "pää" (<päNä) was head, was taka(<?taNe) a tail
(other head)?!
takia=because,taka-back,behind
oiva was also a head, and it seems to be same root than pää was there
word like ota/etä (ete=front,before;ottaa=to take).
I think I need spesialist's help here!
-llä/lla is one of the locatives but very surely related to words like
"luona"(near, close to)
and -la/lä (place).
Genetive is from several sources: original genetive -m>-n
and m-accusative are combined and n-locative.
Partitive has used as genetive before possesive forms came
(I have<>l-locative;my/mine<>n)
-lta/-ltä = l-locative + partive
-sta/-stä = inessive + partitive
-ssa/ssä<-sna/-snä=inessive+essive
>
> > History of word "sisälmykset" can be traced back by normal
> > sound changes. I think (if I'm remembering right) there's no such root
> > (sisä-)
> > in fu/uralic vocabulary. But there's also more pressure to start using
> > "s" as for inessive: suoli,suoni,syödä etc.
-s for inessive was in fu but it seems to be clear for me (I could be
wrong;)
it is not protouralic/preprotouralic.
Automort
>Date: 5/2/01 7:23 PM Central
>Well, there's the basic bow, and basic arrow. The arrow head (maybe
>different
>words for different tips and shapes), fletching (the feathers), nock (how the
>arrow
>attaches to the string), the string, the handle of the bow, the tips of the
>bow,
>bow stringers (they probably had them back then?)
Yes, this is what we need to know and to try to reconstruct possible words for.
Automort
>I really wonder how the idea
>of the bow came to the meso/neo-lithic hunters.
It would be difficult to approximate the process, since we really don't know
what their daily lives were like. Possibly a sling was invented first, bringing
strings into it. This seems likely to me. There were possibly intermediate
devices we know nothing about.
It isn't easy to follow the steps leading to modern inventions. According to a
bio of Edison I read, he came up with an idea and a possible design, then tried
every kind of material and modification he could think of till one worked.
The record player seems an incredibly unlikely invention even in the 1800s, yet
there actually existed sound producing devices that included cords drawn
through a hole in a box and stringed instruments hung in the wind that could
approximate human and animal sounds.
An early word for the bow (or for reed instruments that likely evolved from
something like duck calls) would doubtless either incorporate its predecessor
or its purpose: only the latter is available to us.
Operator
I am also a friend of the origin of the indoeuropean languages. Is this group active? Please look my group "Indoeurosprachen". There is a big Ecxel table with 25 Indoeuropean langauges which are compared. If you have interest to work on and to finish this project, please let me know.
Best regards
Peter Zenner
Dr. Esploranto
Is your group in English or in German?
hs
It is in german. And it is not usenet, but on Google groups:
http://groups.google.com/group/Indoeurosprachen
At the moment, not much more active than this group, however...
--
Hans Straub