Paper

An Artificial i-Stem in Non-Primary Derivation: The Morphology of Mycenaean te-mi-dwe and Homeric τερμιόεις

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Abstract

This paper clarifies the morphological development of Homeric τερμιόεις ‘fringed, hemmed, edged’ and re-examines its relationship with
Mycenaean te-mi-dwe ‘wedged’. Earlier accounts, notably Meier (1975:75), interpret τερμιόεις as preserving an archaic i-stem base, with the once-attested Linear B form ṭẹ-mi-we-te (neuter nominative dual) taken as direct evidence for such a formation in Mycenaean. Through a reassessment of the Linear B dossier, I argue that this form is more plausibly explained as a scribal error for te-mi-de-we-te, consistent with the id-stem base attested elsewhere in the corpus. I further show that only the id-stem variant yields metrically acceptable forms in hexametric poetry, whereas a Proto-Greek i-stem-based *termi-went- would not scan without the addition of linking -o-, a feature absent in Mycenaean and demonstrably secondary in Homeric *-went-adjectives. I therefore argue for a reversal of the trajectory described by Meier. Rather than preserving an older form, Homeric τερμιόεις is best viewed as an innovative reshaping influenced by poetic constraints and contamination with other -ιόεις adjectives. This proposal aligns with recent findings in the study of artificial i-stems in the Homeric Kunstsprache, chiefly van Beek 2022a and Lundquist 2023.

Keywords: Homeric, Mycenaean, archaic, i-stem, scribal error, Kunstsprache

How to Cite:

Sabattini, P., (2026) “An Artificial i-Stem in Non-Primary Derivation: The Morphology of Mycenaean te-mi-dwe and Homeric τερμιόεις”, Proceedings of the Annual UCLA Indo-European Conference 35(1): 9, 165-186. doi: https://doi.org/10.5070/J5.62155