Talk:Athematic stem

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As is, this page appears little different from the article "vowel stems" and could be merged. However, if the page was to discuss Indo-European theme vowels as sometimes having lexical influence (e.g., IE thematic stems with ĕ or ŏ sometimes indicating action), the page might become more distinct. I do not know enough yet to write that myself; I only know that such might be written. Delvebelow 16:55, 3 July 2007 (UTC)

Example?

This article could really use an example of a word which is athematic. I think I understand what "thematic" means from the Latin example "rosa" given in the article (I suppose the phenomenon is either the same as, or related somehow to, the way verbs in Spanish fall into -ar, -er, -ir classes?) — but given that this article is about "athematic", it really ought to provide an example of an athematic word, preferably also in Latin, for comparison. --Quuxplusone (talk) 21:14, 9 November 2008 (UTC)

Athematic stem or ending?

In Greek (and Proto-Indo-European) thematic verbs, the theme vowel is in the endings, not the stem, and is always e/o, as in the thematic verb endings in the article. Perhaps nouns (like the example given of rosa) have theme vowels in the stem and not the endings, but then "thematic" is different depending on if it applies to a verb or a noun, and each should have its own section. Can someone clarify this issue? Erutuon (talk) 02:46, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

PIE stems (usually) consist of a root plus a suffix, so the complete word (verb or noun) is root + suffix + ending. The thematic vowel is part of the suffix: *b^hér-e-ti "carries", *bhér-o-nti "[they] carry", *leh₂p-sḱe-ti "shines" etc. Same with nouns: *g^whér-mo-s "heat" (Greek thermos) is thematic, but *h₂éus-(s)-ōs "dawn" is athematic. I don't know much about Greek, but Latin re-analysed the thematic vowel as belonging to the ending. As far as I know, the three-way distinction root + suffix + ending is not helpful neither in Latin nor in Greek; the verbs and nouns are usually analysed as stem ( < PIE root + part of the suffix) plus ending ( < PIE thematic vowel + ending).

I agree that the way the article puts it (as well as the tables in PIE verbs and PIE nouns) is rather confusing. I'll clarify the tables a bit, but this article needs more work. Cheers --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 18:59, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm creating a possible replacement for this article and thematic stem under my user page: Thematic vowel. Erutuon (talk) 21:34, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

That's a good idea! Tell me if you need help. --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 20:18, 2 November 2009 (UTC)