Ancient Greek word formation

Basel sáktum iva títaunā punánto On the Etymology of Ved. sáktu-m. 'coarsely ground meal' * 1. Ved. sáktu-m. 1.1. Attestations and meaning. 1.1.1. Hapax in the RV, cf. 10.71.2a-b (to Jn͂ āna-'Wisdom', importance of vāc-'sacred Speech'): sáktum iva títaunā punánto yátra dhīŕā mánasā vācam ákrata "Wo die Weisen mit Nachdenken die Rede gebildet haben, so wie Schrotmehl durch ein Sieb reinigend" (Geldner 1951 III: 249). 1.1.1.1. Geldner's translation 'Schrotmehl' (i.e., 'coarsely ground meal') is convincing, as meal is typically refined through sieves (Ved. títaum.).  Cf. OED on flour (s.v.): "finer portion of meal […] which is separated by bolting".

In her excellent and persuasive essay on the IE reconstruction of factitive denominal verbs in Ancient Greek,' E. Tucker divides (22-3) the-un6 verbs into three groups: (1) those derived from u-stem adjectives, e.g. ithunoithus; (2) those derived from s-stem nouns, e.g. mikrino-rnikos; in footnote 33 Tucker remarks that certain solitary or sparsely represented derivational sources have been ignored, e.g otnino-otrale6s dithuno-d&ha 'for a long time'; (3) those derived from o-stem adjectives, e.g. hapalun6hapalos leptunc?leptos. *wagros, aagks < *uH$-r&, n-ueHa&es-+ %hg-numi < *uHaj-n-u-."

A point to make first, of course, in discussing the meanings of roots, which is obviously a matter inherent in the question of "adjectival roots," is that roots are not available for examination as free forms. Their meanings are divined from the lexical family-large or small, verb-heavy or nominal-heavy-to which they give rise. Root semantics are thus constructs and products of analysis, not data to be collected. 1.1 The vast majority of roots are analyzed as having a verbal meaning. These include a large number of especially familiar examples like: *deh3 'give', *g̑heu̯ 'pour', *h1em 'take', *i̯ eug 'join', *k̑leu̯ 'hear', *leik w 'leave', *men 'think' etc. etc. 1.2 It is sometimes possible and credible, however, to attribute a noun-like meaning to a given root. Reasonable candidates for membership in such a class of roots are of two types: 1.2.1 On the one hand, there are root nouns denoting a substantive, the root of which is not found in verbs: *dʰu̯ or-/dʰur-'door', *k̑ērd-/*k̑r̥ d-'heart', *g w ou̯-/*g w eu̯-'cow', *sal-'salt' etc. 1.2.2 Another set of cases in which it is reasonable to see a root with the meaning of a noun are those in which a plausibly primary R(oot) + S(uffix) stem denotes a substantive, but where the root once again fails to surface in any verbal forms: *d h (e)g̑h-(o)m-'earth', *(h x)i̯ ē̆k w-r̥ /n-'liver' etc. 1.2.3 Neither of these nominal root types is absolutely secure, of course. For it can never be excluded that such forms are ultimately derivatives in one suffix (whether zero or something overt) of roots that are obsolete as bases of verbs or simply fail to have been preserved as such in the evidence that happens to have come down to us. 1.3 If both verbal and substantival roots are sure or possible, the further question-and one which virtually raises itself-is that of the necessity or feasibility of recognizing a class of roots with the meanings of a third type of "content word"-namely adjectives. 2. The question of the advisability of setting up such a category immediately becomes that of determining whether there are one or more objective criteria for analyzing a root as "adjectival" in meaning. 2.1 As something of an aside, it may be useful, though for less immediate purposes, to point out that one thing that is pretty clearly not such a criterion is whether a root's derivatives form a "Caland system" (CS). 2.1.1 It is, to be sure, true that such systems do often center on an adnominal, and more particularly on a "property concept" (PC) adjective. 1 These have been said to be of seven types: 2

It is argued that the PIE loc.sg. of acrostatic heteroclite neuters in *-r/n-had the shape *R(o)-én as well as *R(o)-ér, i.e. o-grade of the root and alternative suffix shapes in *-én and *-ér, e.g. *u̯ od-én, *u̯ od-ér 'in the water' belonging to the heteroclite ntr. *u̯ ód-/*u̯ éd-n-'water', and *Hi̯ ok u̯-én, *Hi̯ ok u̯-ér 'in the liver' belonging to the heteroclite ntr. *Hi̯ ḗk u̯-/*Hi̯ ék u̯-n-'liver'. These formations are based on the compositional zero-grade locative of root nouns with adverbial particle, i.e. on structures of the type *R(z)-én and *R(z)-ér, e.g. *ud-én 'in wetness, in the water', *ud-ér 'at wetness, under water' from *u̯ ed-'wetness, water', and *Hik u̯-én 'in the lobe/swelling', *Hik u̯-ér 'at the lobe/swelling' from *Hi̯ ek u̯-'lobe, swelling'. On the basis of these locative forms in *-én/*-ér, the paradigms of the aforementioned heteroclite neuters were built by internal derivation (i.e. by changing the accentual and apophonic pattern alone, without derivational suffix), with analogical adjustments to different apophonic classes.

The aim of the paper is an attempt at analysing the contracted forms of the second-person singular of athematic verbs in Greek poetry. Verbs such as dÚnamai and ™p…stamai have forms with-sai and-hi,-ai in the present indicative middle and passive. Contemporary scholars express different views on where the contracted forms appear. The paper presents the opinions of ancient grammarians and modern linguists on the mentioned subject. The critical analysis of these opinions has been contrasted with the forms present in the poetry of archaic and classical period. key words:-hi ending,-ai ending, athematic verbs, Greek poetry. In Greek language spirant s remained unchanged, disappeared or was transformed depending on its position. Sigma between vowels behaved in very different ways. In Indo-European languages intervocalic consonants tended to become weakened. This resulted in their voicing, spirantisation or disappearance. Sigma tends to disappear, and in the transition phase it is weakened and becomes h. The transition phase is evident in the Laconian, Argolic and Elean dialects. *s remained unchanged when it occurred after *-ṇ and *-ṛ (dasÚj < *dns, qrasÚj < *dhrsu), when it originated from gemination-ss-(pos…, hom. poss… < *pod-si) and from-ts-("Atlaj < *atlants). In many cases the spirant was reintroduced by analogy: in sigmatic aorist, in dative plural with-si and in athematic verb forms. 1

To lamentations that all the major discoveries in IE linguistics were made long ago and that, aside from integrating Tocharian and Anatolian, little remains to be done until the discovery of more texts, I reply that this certainly does not hold true for the morpheme-class particle. On the contrary, the reconstruction of new (i.e. previously unknown) particles can help to clarify unresolved problems of IE linguistics on all levels of grammar. To the cases of resultative *es and the opposition between inclusive *me and exclusive *∑e treated elsewhere 1 I add here a further instance which I hope will please Prof. Gren-Eklund because it builds on the ideas of one of her predecessors in Uppsala.

Delocutives are formed with an utterance (x) as a radical. Common in Greek are verbs meaning "say x" (e. g., πατερίζω); nominal formations denote for instance a person saying x or the utterance x per se. The latter type would explain the hapax ποίφυγμα in A. Th. 280, where Eteocles says, upbraiding a group of women for their hysteria: "do not pray in ποιφύγμασιν". If ποίφυγμα is taken as a delocutive nominal formation from not ποῖ φύγω (a Greek cliché), the sense would fit the context as well as Aeschylus' propensity for wordplay.

Chantraine 1933:121 "le groupe est cohérent quoique constitué tout entier dès la préhistoire du grec" De Lamberterie 1990:960 "les adjectifs en -υ-constituent une catégorie aux frontières mal délimitées; s'ils ne sont plus guère productifs à époque historique, ils ont pu l'être à une époque plus ancienne, et on ne peut en évaluer l'effectif avec précision." A closed class, but still open for discoveries: from 35 adjectives in Buck-Petersen 1945 to 60+ in De Lamberterie 1990.

Old Irish íath u, n. (later m.) ‘land, field’ from *peytu-  and Old Irish fíad u, m. ‘wild (animal); uncultivated land’ from *weydhu- have been interpreted by Paul Widmer (2004) as acrostatically inflected and internally derived possessive adjective based on *pitu- > Old Irish ith u, n. (later m.) ‘grain, corn’ and *widhu-* > Old Irish fid u, m. ‘tree; wood; forest’, respectively. Since this would constitute a quite unique derivational pattern, it is argued that one should rather follow the old view that both íath and fíad are vṛddhi formations. For the lack of the expected stem-final thematic vowel *-o-, three different strategies are proposed.

There is no compelling etymology for the Germanic word for sword (OHG swert, OE sweord). This paper argues that this word is related to Cuneiform Luvian ši(ḫ)u̯al ‘dagger’: both words are derived from a stem *seh₂u- ‘sharp’ (cf. Cuneiform Luvian šiḫwa- 'sour' < *sēh₂u̯o- 'sharp (on the tongue)', Old Irish serb, Welsh chwerw 'bitter' < *s(h₂)u̯er-u̯o- 'id.'). Gmc. *su̯erða-n goes back to a substantivized adjective *sh₂u̯er-tó- ‘sharp’ (with a loss of the laryngeal already in the protolanguage), derived from a locative *sh2u̯er (compare *ĝʰei̯m-ento- ‘wintry’ from *ĝʰei̯m-en ‘in winter’).