Reconstruction:Proto-Celtic/eti

This Proto-Celtic entry contains reconstructed words and roots. As such, the term(s) in this entry are not directly attested, but are hypothesized to have existed based on comparative evidence.

Proto-Celtic

Etymology

From Proto-Indo-European *éti.

Particle

*eti

affirmative clause particle

Usage notes

This particle suffered severe transphonologization in Insular Celtic, after being contracted to *(e)s or possibly *eθ. It was placed as the second element of a sentence as an enclitic to the preceding word. The independent forms of Insular Celtic verbs arose from when *eti came after them, while the dependent forms arose whenever *eti did not do so.

In Old Irish, simple verbs folowed by this particle got to keep an extra syllable away from later apocope compared to the "plain" conjunct forms; contrast beirid and its conjunct form ·beir from *bereti.

Descendants

Gaulish: eti, t-ic
Old Irish: formed absolute and deuterotonic verb forms
Brythonic: formed absolute verbal forms