Oswald Szemerényi

Oswald John Louis Szemerényi GBR FBA (hu ˈsɛmɛreːɲi; 7 September 1913 – 29 December 1996) was a Hungarian-British historical linguist and Indo-Europeanist. He is best known as the namesake of Szemerényi's law, a potential early sound law in the Proto-Indo-European language. Quotes O. Szemerényi admits that reconstructions are used to facilitate comparisons, using one word instead of many IE variants, and cites Hermann’s statement that “complete forms (e.g. *deiwos [=S deva-s]) cannot be reconstructed at all, only single sounds, and even these are meant as approximation only”. Hermann goes even further: complete forms (e.g. *deiwos) cannot be reconstructed at all, only single sounds, and even these are meant as approximations only, not as phonetically completely correct reconstructions. (Szemerényi 1996: 33) Szemerényi O. 1996 Introduction to Indo-European Linguistics (transl from German 1990, with additional notes and references) Oxford, OUP. Quoted from Kazanas, N. (2009). Indo-Aryan origins and other Vedic issues. Chapter 9 Eduard Hermann Szemerényi O. 1996 Introduction to Indo-European Linguistics (translated from German 1990, with additional notes and references) Oxford, OUP. page 33. External links Category:1913 births Category:1996 deaths Category:Academics from Hungary Category:Linguists from Hungary