3 ms·
That doesn't seem plausible to me when you consider that opera is the plural of opus. Afaik in early latin, /s/ often went to /r/ when it fell between vowels. T
by asveikau 5y ago
That doesn't seem plausible to me when you consider that opera is the plural of opus. Afaik in early latin, /s/ often went to /r/ when it fell between vowels. That is why it has /s/ in the nominative but /r/ when you start to inflect it with suffices.
This happens a lot for third declension nouns where nominative ends in -s (opus is one such example)
Other examples of this pattern:
Corpus -> corporem (not *corpusem)
Venus -> Venerem (not *Venusem)
Flos -> florem (not *flosem)
Colos -> colorem (not *colosem)
Or more simply, we can look at opus and see it comes from a different PIE root from cyber. (When i look it up, the former has a root meaning "work", and the latter has a root meaning "turn")
- thaumasiotes 5y agoI was under the impression that the underlying /r/ became [s] in the nominative case where it was followed by an /s/, rather than -- as you seem to suggest -- an underlying /s/ becoming [r] when intervocalic.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- stevula 5y agoIntervocalic s > r (rhotacism [1]) is a well known phenomenon in early Latin. Any Latin grammar from the last 150 years should mention it. The comparative method proves the original phoneme was /s/ in many cases: generis - compare Greek gene(s)os, Sanskrit janasas jus, juris - compare justitia where the /s/ was not intervocalic robur (archaic robos), roboris - compare robustus The 3rd declension has many s-stems like these though there are some original r-stems also like jecur (< PIE jekwor, compare Greek hepar). 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhotacism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhotacism