Unterscungen zur nominalen stammbildung des hethitischen.

• Author: Melchert, H. Craig
• Position: Review

Unterscungen zur nominalen Stammbildung des Hethitischen. By ELISABETH RIEKEN. Studien zu den Bogazkoy-Texten, vol. 44. Wiesbaden: HARRASSOWITZ VERLAG, 1999. Pp. xxix + 608. DM 198 (paper).

The present work, a revised version of the author's 1996 Bochum dissertation, offers a systematic diachronic analysis of the derivation and inflection of all Hittite nominal consonant stems except those with suffixes in -n- and -nt-. The latter had to be omitted due to limitations of time and space. The text itself is followed by an extensive bibliography and very helpful indices.

Rieken's book is a great advance in the study of the history of the Hittite (and Anatolian) nominal system, and it will form the foundation of all future investigations of the topics covered. Her study is the first to combine a full mastery of Hittite philology with an adequately sophisticated control of the latest developments in the analysis of the PIE noun. She also pays full attention to the relative chronology of Hittite texts and manuscripts.

The book is well organized, and the argumentation is clear and uncluttered. (1) One may disagree with a given analysis, but one is in no doubt about the basis for Rieken's judgment, and one will need to respond with counterarguments. Her own treatment of other viewpoints is thorough and generally quite fair. Only rarely do assertions stand in for genuine arguments. I can cite no major weaknesses. Rieken does on rare occasions ignore her own evidence regarding text chronology, and in a few cases fails to motivate her particular view of the PIE starting point as fully as one would wish, but these are mere cavils. Given the scope and nature of the material, I inevitably cannot agree with every one of her analyses. A review is not the place to debate each individual case. The following summary tries to capture what I consider the most significant strengths and weaknesses of Rieken's approach to each of the major stem classes treated.

In her treatment of Hittite root nouns, Rieken ably defends the status of several standard examples and offers minor but important improvements in their historical analysis (e.g. hant- "front," hass- "ash; soap," siu(n)- "god"). She also makes a good case for the existence of several new examples, especially neuters ([blank.sup.GIS]elz(i)- "sales," mal- "mental strength," men- "cheek," yuk- "yoke"). She goes ton far, however, in trying to use the evidence of the poorly understood collective plural marker -i...