Winter Werner (Еd.). Evidence for Laryngeals

Mouton, 1965. — 274 p. — (Janua Linguarum. Series Maior 11).In 1879, Ferdinand de Saussure proposed an important improvement in the theory of Indo-European ablaut: by assuming the prior existence of certain consonants lost in all Indo-European languages then known, he was able to account for the ablaut of long vowels in the same way as for the ablaut of short vowel plus consonant. Albert Cuny showed in 1912 that de Saussure’s as- sumptions provided the only sensible explanation for various reflexes of the so-called long sonantic liquids and nasals of Proto-Indo-European. In 1927, Jerzy Kurylowicz demonstrated that unitary reflexes of the ‘laryngeals’, the consonants posited by de Saussure and his followers, had been preserved in Hittite. What beforehand might have been viewed as theoretical constructs applicable to a remote and obscure past now had to be recognized as no more hypothetical than such generally accepted reconstructed features of the Proto-Indo-European sound system as the voiced aspirates or the labiovelars. It took a long time for this realization to be widely shared; many workers in the Indo-European field were content with continuing to operate with Brug- mann’s assumptions about the sounds of Proto-Indo-European, often con- fusing these assumptions with actual data. The fact that outside the Anatolian languages the reflexes of laryngeals had merged with reflexes of other Proto-Indo-European phonemes or had dis- appeared altogether, contributed strongly to the averse reactions of the skeptics. On the other hand, those who were impressed with the logic and coherence of the Saussurian analysis found the difficulties to be faced in work on the reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European laryngeals highly challenging: much patience and great skill in the use of widely varying approaches was needed.
In the present volume, an attempt is made to describe critically — with the addition of a comprehensive bibliography — the history of work on laryngeals and their reflexes in Proto-Indo-European and the languages of the Indo-European group. A detailed survey examines for every established sub- group of Indo-European the evidence that can be used as a basis for reconstruction. Some chapters contain concise restatements of well-known materials (e.g., Indo-Iranian, Germanic); some present relevant evidence for the first time in extenso (Albanian, Tocharian); still others offer a detailed critique of earlier attempts to evaluate facts from a language or a group of languages (Greek, Balto-Slavic, Armenian). The individual authors — specialists in the fields they review — often disagree on minor or major points of detail in the assessment of the data, and no attempt has been made editorially to eliminate such differences of scholarly opinion. However, in spite of conflicting theses and antitheses, there can be no question that all contributors, from the most daring to the most cautious, agree on the basic usefulness of the laryngeal theory for an adequate reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European phonological and morphological structures.