s-preformative
IEG, VISW, SIG: s-preformative pre-IndoEuropean-AfroAsiatic originally corresponding in its usage to the Assyrian, Syrian, Minaeic and Egyptian s-preformative Parallel intransitive and transitive or primary and causative verbs have a tendency to be merged (as i.a. clearly seen in the Germanic dialects, some more, some less); as the original sense of the s- was forgotten and the new common IE-Semitic causative of the form (s)moldéye-ti appeared instead of the old s-causative, analogisations occurred, in which the types m-ld- and sm-ld- established themselves in different dialects, eg. originally intransive m-ld- Proto-IndoEuropean melde-ti “melts” (intr.) méldo: “melt” Greek *miltan “melt” Gothic ga-malteins “melted” Gothic meltan “melt” Anglo-Saxon originally transitive sm-ld- Proto-IndoEuropean smelde-ti “melts” (tr.) smelzan “melt” Old High German primary *p-l- “fall” Proto-IndoEuropean with n-preformative n-p-l- “fall” Semitic causative sphal- “cause to fall” Proto-IndoEuropean spallo: id. Greek in the verbs as in the corresponding nouns. TP: I would derive it from the Austronesian instrumental-mood prefix Si-. Borrowed verb pairs Ř-verb/Si-verb (> s-verb) would contrast semantically either as verb/causative verb or not at all. Back