Could you check this over

Fragment of a discussion from User talk:Rua
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I suspect that Old Irish féith must reflect Proto-Celtic *wēitis, as a short -ei- would be reflected as é, later ía in Old Irish. So this would then have to come from *weh₁i-. On the other hand, the -th- is palatalised, which is indicated by the preceding -i- in the spelling, and it's possible that palatalisation inhibits the é > ía change. You would have to ask someone more knowledgeable like User:Angr about it.

Germanic *wiþiz can't reflect *weyh₁-, as this can't result in a short -i- in zero grade: *wih₁- would give a long ī. I'm less certain about the outcome of a zero-grade *wh₁i-, as presumably this would turn the preceding semivowel into a full vowel: *wh₁i- > *uh₁i- > *ūi-. On the other hand, it's also possible that it remained as a semivowel, in which case the expected result would be *wh₁i- > *wi-, with the laryngeal simply lost.

Lithuanian výtis has an acute accent, which must reflect either a former laryngeal or the "new long grade" of Balto-Slavic. It can't reflect *wey-, as a Lithuanian y always reflects an "old" long vowel, generally from a laryngeal. A full grade -ey- gives -ei- or -ie- in Lithuanian. This also means that it probably can't reflect *weh₁i-, which would not account for the length, although I have no idea what -eh₁i- gives in Lithuanian. Balto-Slavic developed a new type of long grade ablaut though, which could have been introduced in a zero grade form: *wh₁i- > *wi- > *wī-.

Latin ī must reflect -eyh₁-, -ih₁- or -ey-, so that rules out *weh₁i- and its zero grade *wh₁i-. The former would give *vē- if I'm not mistaken.

So while some possibilities can be ruled out, I can't say anything conclusive. It would be a good idea to take this to the ES.

CodeCat15:22, 25 February 2015

Very well. May I quote you when I make the post (as I have no idea how to link here)? Also, with this information and given that De Vaan (for some strange reason) has *wh₁itis, could we maybe maybe posit *wéh₁ytis and propose that some of the forms came from the oblique form? This would give:

  • *wéh₁ytis:
    féith (*wēitis)
  • *wh₁itéy-:
    *wiþiz
    výtis
    vītis

I'd also like to add the wrinkle that, if we assume that वेमन् (veman, loom, slay) and vīmen stem from the same form, this points towards *wéymn̥.
PS: Is there a particular Vedic dictionary that gives word accentuation or can you construct it from rules in Panini?

JohnC521:37, 25 February 2015

I don't know much about Sanskrit so I can't help you there.

I don't find *wh₁itéy- very convincing as the origin of the Balto-Slavic forms, personally. The long vowel can be explained, in general, as either from a following laryngeal or from the new length ablaut. However, such new long vowels were always used in specific derivational processes that were innovated within Balto-Slavic, and I find it very unlikely that an old formation like a ti-stem would have such a long vowel. What also needs to be considered is that ti-stems became productive as infinitives in Balto-Slavic, so if one of them happened to survive as a noun, it must be an archaism and thus can't be an innovated derivation at the same time.

CodeCat23:39, 25 February 2015
 

Hi. I'm pretty sure that *weh₁i- would become *wei- in Celtic, not #wēi-. Beekes makes the exact same point about the sequence *-eh₂i- turning (generally) into *-ai- not #-āi-; *-āi- must reflect *-eh₂ei- or similar.

Benwing (talk)05:48, 2 March 2015

Ok, but ei generally becomes ē in Celtic, so does a former eh₁i also become ē or does it remain separate?

Also, the shortening of long diphthongs is because of w:Osthoff's law.

CodeCat12:28, 2 March 2015

Presumably eh₁i becomes ē just like ei. Loss of laryngeals between vowels occurred early in most (all?) daughters, followed (usually) by early vowel contraction.

Benwing (talk)13:36, 2 March 2015