In your theory, what is the prehistoric root, and what are the sound changes that yielded leg, log, lignin? What other evidence can you cite to support this theory? Under what circumstances do Greek /g/ and Latin /g/ correspond to Germanic /g/?
Greek legein means "pick up, count, say, speak", doesn't it?
The root deducibly consisted simply of an *l followed by a vowel and a velar stop, which wordsmiths in various languages voiced or didn’t voice to nuance the root.
The only sound changes that appear in these derivatives were the same, differential vowelizations/vocalizations that (1) historical linguists postulated to explain the existence of the so-called *o-grade, *i-grade, a-grade and *e-grade variants of Proto-Indo-European roots, and (2) wordsmiths in every language used later to nuance the words they derived from that root.
Although Greek
legein does mean to ‘pick up, count, say, or speak, to understand why it also clearly reveals it is cognate with the foregoing words for legs, logs and lignin, you have to recognize that wordsmiths have traditionally used figurative associations to form words, and prehistoric wordsmiths were deducibly far more figuratively minded than their modern counterparts. Hence, many words for speaking clearly reveal they are cognate with words for the feet or using the feet. For instance, the Gk word
logos, which is transparently cognate with
legein, referred to a discourse; and
discourse was derived from the L. word
discurrere for running around — evidently for the same reason we often refer to speaking as “running off at the mouth.”
It is deducibly for the same reason that
gad(e)rian, the OE ancestor of
gather, is synonymous with
legein, and clearly reveals it is further cognate with (1) the ON ancestor
gata of our word
gait for a way of walking and (2)
gate for a path. As I explained above, however, historical linguistics could not cognate these words for the same reason they could not cognate Gc words for the foot with the words' L. and Gk relatives; doing so would have prevented them from formally recognizing that Gc
*d can correspond to Gc
*t, and, thus, that PIE
*d or
*t can correspond to either or both.
It sounds, however, like someone has convinced you that cognating words in different languages requires proving the existence of regular consonant changes, even though the available evidence does not support that conclusion one bit — in my opinion or Rosenman’s opinion based on his 40-year study. To recognize the irregularity that existed in word formation, all one has to do is look at the vast number of irregular verbs that exist in every language.
As to how much evidence I can supply to support these assertions, suffice it to say I can supply far more evidence than this forum and time limitations will permit. But before one can recognize the validity of that evidence and the arguments supporting it, he or she has to understand the difference between evidence and coincidences, as well as the difference between coincidences and counter-examples -- especially of the kind that led to the overthrow of other purportedly scientifically derived laws and theories.
OP
