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Pre-Indo-Hittite uw > um: A Suggested Restatement
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 22 April 2026
Extract
In a recent article I attempted to show that on the basis of Hittite evidence and the laryngeal hypothesis alone assumption of the existence of ъ is unnecessary if we assume the laryngeals to have been sonants obeying Sievers-Edgerton's law. In so doing, I dealt with the comparison of Hitt. tum-me-ni, da-a-u-e-ni ‘we take’, 2d pl. da-at-te-ni, 3d sg. da-a-i : Lat. dās, Skt. dádāsi ‘you give’. Concerning the variation between m and w in the Hittite forms I said: ‘The questions of the stage of these processes in which the uw/um problem arose and of whether variant forms of the endings already existed are outside the province of this discussion.‘ The purpose of the present article is to take up these questions and to show how the problem of uw/um alternation in Hittite may be answered more simply and satisfactorily by a restatement of phonological law consistent with the assumption of laryngeal sonants.
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- Copyright © 1958 Linguistic Society of America
References
1 Paul W. Brosman, Lg. 33.1–18 (1957).
2 Edgar H. Sturtevant, AJP 50.360–9 (1929).
3 Among the causatives in nu, which supply the vast majority of verbs with u as stem final, the only w-forms attested are of the verbal noun -war. This is the only ending attested for two verbs, ḫatuganu- ‘frighten’ and kinu- ‘open’. -mar alone is attested for fifteen verbs, while three—asnu- ‘prepare’, waḫnau- ‘turn’, and warnu- 'burn'—show forms with both endings. The only other verbs which might be considered to have stems in u and for which pertinent forms are attested are eku- 'drink' (both first person plural endings in w), au(s)-‘see’ (the same two forms in m), unuwai- ‘adorn’ (infinitive in m), laḫ(ḫ)uwai- ‘pour’ and watku- ‘jump’ (both with verbal noun in w), and duddu- ‘lead (?)‘ (with verbal noun in m).
4 The only verbs which show forms in m but do not clearly belong at least in part to the u-stems or to one of the two groups constituting the two exceptions are kwen- ‘strike, kill’ (all four forms in m, first plural preterit also in w) and ispar- ‘stretch, spread out’ (infinitive in m, verbal noun in w). Actually both verbs might be held to belong partially to the a-stems of the ḫi-conjugation, but it seems the safer course to set them apart.
5 The variant tarnwen occurs beside regular tarnummen in the preterit of tarna-, but has been excluded from the present discussion. It cannot be treated on the basis of laryngeal sonants, since it would contain four consecutive sonants, for which the allophonic variation is unknown.
6 Sturtevant, The Indo-Hittite laryngeals 26 (Baltimore, 1942).
7 Sturtevant, A comparative grammar of the Hittite language2 (CG) 1.74–5 (New Haven, 1951); Sturtevant, AJP 50.366–8 (1929).
8 For a more detailed statement of these views and supporting evidence see Brosman, op.cit.
9 William D. Whitney, Sanskrit grammar 2 473–6 (Cambridge, Mass., 1889).
10 CG 1.155–6.
11 Johannes Friedrich, Hethitisches Elementarbuch (HE) 1.43 (Heidelberg, 1940).
12 CG 1.117, 121.
13 CG 1.23.
14 Karl Brugmann, Gdr. 2 2.2.222 (Strassburg, 1911).
15 Emile Benveniste, Lg. 29.259 (1953).
16 HE 1.18–9.
17 This case of final n is ambiguous.
18 CG 1.23.
19 Friedrich, Hethitisches Wörterbuch 43 (Heidelberg, 1952).
20 CG 1.129 fn. 39.