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Illyrian prefix an-

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Abdullah Konushevci

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Nov 20, 2007, 7:35:17 PM11/20/07
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Andetrion, Dalmatia (Strabo)
Anausaro, road station (TP Miller IR col. 571-573. Rav. IV 15).
Andarva/Anderba, road station Miller IR col. 462-471. IA Cuntz 338, 7.
Rav. IV 16)
Andizetes, Panonian tribe (Strab. VII 314. Ptol. II 15,2)
Andautonion (Ptol. II, 14,4), city in Panonia.
Bulentum/Bolentum, if identical with Bulet close to Dubrovnik and if
from Alb appellative bulim 'spring' (Jokl, Skok), I think that
testifies for its high frequency in many place names with it prefixed
form: Ombula/Jambula, Ubla/Obla, Bul-ofçe/Bolec in Dardania etc. Forms
Ombula/Jambula are from prefixed form *H1en + bul- with characteristic
assimilation -nb- > -mb-, later reduced on -b-/-m-.
From last example we could suppose that place names Andetrion,
Anausaro, Andizetes, Andarva, Andautonion are indeed prefixed forms of
-detrion, -ausaro, -dizetes, -darva, because H1en is treated in PAlb.
as -ân in Gheg dialect and -ën in Tosk one.
So except aus- and ar- as a first element on many Illyrian place
names, exists also as prefix an- attested in many other place names.

Because I haven't access to the Cybalist for ours, I am forced to
reply to Sciarreta Antonio that I am aware of the variant form
Sanderua in the Tabula Peutingeriana, but we must be aware also that
exists Illyrian tribe name Dervanes (Appiani Alexandrini, Historia
Romana, Illyrica, paragraph 28), so An-darva/An-derba seems to back up
attested forms Andarva and Anderba as primary one.

Konushevci

Dušan Vukotic

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Nov 21, 2007, 9:37:46 AM11/21/07
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Yes, ANdetrium - ANderlecht municipality - ANdorra - San ANtonio,
ANgola, ANdalusia, ANdes, Los ANgelos and AN ANGEL on the ANTARCTIC -
all were named thanks to the Shqip-Illyrian anabolic-angiotonic and
anamnestic anagoge.

What AN anachronous analgesia of Anapurna!

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Nov 21, 2007, 1:47:19 PM11/21/07
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On Nov 21, 1:35 am, Abdullah Konushevci <akonushe...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Andetrion, Dalmatia (Strabo)

In fact, Andetrion is "hanterion" (Gon_Hor-Gon basis); related to
Skadar (Skender; Skodra); Serbian surname Škundrić; Serb. zagrada
(brace, fence, hedge, bracket; there are many Serbian villages with
the name Zagradje; hence Serb. zgrada building cf. Serb. kotar
district); all related to the Serbian noun 'udar' (from hundar; Serb.
verb handriti/udarati beat, pound); Serb. tvrđava, utvrđenje fortress;
clearly from Serb. udar/h/anje => utrhenje => utrđenje => utvrđenje
(prosthetic "v"). As explained above: Andetrion is nothing else but a
Serbo-Slavic ut/v/rdjnje; i.e. a nasalized form uNt/v/rditi/
uNtvrdjenje "adjusted" for the Roman ear.

> Anausaro, road station (TP Miller IR col. 571-573. Rav. IV 15).

Anausaro is a present Serbian village of Staro Nagoričane (Старо
Нагоричане) near Kumanovo (similar as above Andetrion; derived from
Gon-Hor-Gon ur-basis (nagraditi, ograditi fence, brace, nadgraditi;
Serb. nadgradje superstructure

> Andarva/Anderba, road station Miller IR col. 462-471. IA Cuntz 338, 7.
> Rav. IV 16)

Again the same, but this time from Gon.Hor-Bel basis (Serbian tvrđava;
from hundarba = utrdba => utvrdba (known in Serbian also as utvrda or
tvrđava /fortress/); from the above analyses we can see that Serbo-
Slavic word drvo (tree) acqired its name from the name of the fence
(Serb. taraba /palisade/; related to tvrđava!)

> Andizetes, Panonian tribe (Strab. VII 314. Ptol. II 15,2); Kandići, Antići; Anti (from Hanti); Lat. anti- is equal to Serbian goniti (drive, chase, hunt) and English hunt (Serb. goniti neprijatelja hunt the enemy); Serb. ganjati (hunt), gonić (hunter).

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Nov 21, 2007, 2:34:12 PM11/21/07
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These three Roman fortresses: Andetrion, Anausaro, Andarva/Anderba
were in reality a distorted Serbo-Slavic noun 'tvrđava' (fortress;
from utvrda, tvrdina, utvrditi, udariti, handriti, nadgrađe etc...);
there are a great number of similar examples which are telling us that
Serbo-Slavic people were NATIVE to Balkan (exactly as Ana Komnena
stated in her work "The Alexiad") a long time before the VI century
and alleged "The great-migration of Slavs". Actually, the Slavs
inhabited the Balkan Peninsula even in neolithic times (Lepenski vir,
later Vinča) and they were called the Illyrians by Romans.

Albanians are SO-CALLED (as Ana Komnena referred to them) and they
were brought to Balkan during the 11th century AD.

DV


Trond Engen

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Nov 21, 2007, 6:36:23 PM11/21/07
to
Abdullah Konushevci skreiv:

> Andetrion, Dalmatia (Strabo)
> Anausaro, road station (TP Miller IR col. 571-573. Rav. IV 15).
> Andarva/Anderba, road station Miller IR col. 462-471. IA Cuntz 338,
> 7. Rav. IV 16)
> Andizetes, Panonian tribe (Strab. VII 314. Ptol. II 15,2)
> Andautonion (Ptol. II, 14,4), city in Panonia.
> Bulentum/Bolentum, if identical with Bulet close to Dubrovnik and if
> from Alb appellative bulim 'spring' (Jokl, Skok), I think that
> testifies for its high frequency in many place names with it prefixed
> form: Ombula/Jambula, Ubla/Obla, Bul-ofçe/Bolec in Dardania etc.
> Forms Ombula/Jambula are from prefixed form *H1en + bul- with
> characteristic assimilation -nb- > -mb-, later reduced on -b-/-m-.
> From last example we could suppose that place names Andetrion,
> Anausaro, Andizetes, Andarva, Andautonion are indeed prefixed forms
> of -detrion, -ausaro, -dizetes, -darva, because H1en is treated in
> PAlb. as -ân in Gheg dialect and -ën in Tosk one.
> So except aus- and ar- as a first element on many Illyrian place
> names, exists also as prefix an- attested in many other place names.
>

> [...] we must be aware also that exists Illyrian tribe name Dervanes


> (Appiani Alexandrini, Historia Romana, Illyrica, paragraph 28), so
> An-darva/An-derba seems to back up attested forms Andarva and Anderba
> as primary one.

The PIE particle */H1en-/ meant "in". Assuming the same meaning in
Illyrian, is it likely as a prefix in placenames if not contrasted with
an "out" version of the same name? And even then, a suffixed version
like e.g. */H1(e)n-téro-/ would seem more fit.

Could it be a preposition? "The road station _in Derba_". That would
suggest *Derva as the name of a region and Dervanes as the name of the
inhabitants.

--
Trond Engen
- without a clue, pretending to know

Dušan Vukotic

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Nov 22, 2007, 3:12:46 AM11/22/07
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> - without a clue, pretending to know- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Phonetic laws could sometimes be a big obstacle in a right
understanding of the process of language development.
In this specific case we have to deal with Gon-Hor basis or with the
compounded PIE root gon/ter-; it means that we do not need any rools
(all we need is a sound mind) to see that German jagen, Eng. hunt,
Czech honit and Serb. goniti /drive, chase, hunt/ were derived from
the same ur-basis.
It is quite the same if we talk about "in" or "out" because the both
phonemes sprang from the same Gon-Hor source. For instance, the
Serbian word 'unutar' (inside, indoors) is an equivalent to the
English words 'enter', 'under' and 'inter' (cf. Eng. entrails and
Serb. unutrica /entrails/ or Serb. 'jetra' /liver/). Serbian verbs
'oterati' (drive off, drive away; from honterati) is comparable to
English "outer" world; while Serbian 'uterati' (force in, beat into,
corral; from hunterati) is "concordant" to English "in".
"Laryngeals" could be helpful here only if we understood that their
"vowelization" was determined by the need of "notion distinction" and
that it has gone differently in different languages.

DV

Douglas G. Kilday

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Nov 23, 2007, 1:28:48 AM11/23/07
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Placenames with 'in' would be much more common. Noteworthy are <In
Alpe> and <In Alpe Julia> on Roman itineraries in Noricum: calques on
Illyrian placenames, perhaps?

Interamna Praetutiana in Picenum apparently does have the Illyrian
reflex of *H1(e)n-téro-. The modern Téramo shows that the
accentuation was Intéramna (as opposed to ordinary Latin). The second
element *ab-no- is found also in the Illyrian river Isamnus.

Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element as
Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several other
rivers of eastern Italy. Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms, Epídamnos,
Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix Pi- to Epi-.

> Could it be a preposition? "The road station _in Derba_". That would
> suggest *Derva as the name of a region and Dervanes as the name of the
> inhabitants.

Yes. But Andarva/Anderba (or whatever it was in Illyrian) probably
functioned as an ordinary noun, not a prepositional phrase.

Trond Engen

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Nov 23, 2007, 9:04:58 AM11/23/07
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Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:

> Trond Engen wrote:
>
>> Abdullah Konushevci skreiv:
>>

>>> [...}


>>> So except aus- and ar- as a first element on many Illyrian place
>>> names, exists also as prefix an- attested in many other place names.
>>> [...] we must be aware also that exists Illyrian tribe name
>>> Dervanes (Appiani Alexandrini, Historia Romana, Illyrica, paragraph
>>> 28), so An-darva/An-derba seems to back up attested forms Andarva
>>> and Anderba as primary one.
>>
>> The PIE particle */H1en-/ meant "in". Assuming the same meaning in
>> Illyrian, is it likely as a prefix in placenames if not contrasted
>> with an "out" version of the same name? And even then, a suffixed
>> version like e.g. */H1(e)n-téro-/ would seem more fit.
>
> Placenames with 'in' would be much more common.

I'll concede to that. Thinking of it, this model of name formation is
also known from Slavic names like Po-more and U-krajina. I somehow
imagined that Abdullah saw it as a modifyer (like in Nieder-sachsen or
Akró-polis) and argued from there.

> Noteworthy are <In Alpe> and <In Alpe Julia> on Roman itineraries in
> Noricum: calques on Illyrian placenames, perhaps?

How far north and east are there Illyrian toponyms? Would there have
been direct contact -- or gradual transition -- between Illyrians and
neighbouring Germans and Slavs before the Celtic intrusion?

> Interamna Praetutiana in Picenum apparently does have the Illyrian
> reflex of *H1(e)n-téro-. The modern Téramo shows that the
> accentuation was Intéramna (as opposed to ordinary Latin). The
> second element *ab-no- is found also in the Illyrian river Isamnus.
>
> Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
> against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
> Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element
> as Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several
> other rivers of eastern Italy. Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms,
> Epídamnos, Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix Pi-
> to Epi-.

I was thinking of writing a second message and ask if any of the other
Illyrian prefixes are of the same type. Is there a clear divide between
languages using "modifying" and "prepositional" prefixes? Is that a
useful one?

>> Could it be a preposition? "The road station _in Derba_". That would
>> suggest *Derva as the name of a region and Dervanes as the name of
>> the inhabitants.
>
> Yes. But Andarva/Anderba (or whatever it was in Illyrian) probably
> functioned as an ordinary noun, not a prepositional phrase.

Of course. I should have written something like "cliticized
preposition". But then again, since I apparently ended up proposing the
standard explanation, maybe not.

--
Trond Engen
- unless it turns out as a criticized supposition

Douglas G. Kilday

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Nov 30, 2007, 7:40:52 PM11/30/07
to

As far as the Danube, if Krahe is correct in regarding Aquincum (near
modern Buda, across from Pest) as an Illyrian toponym containing *akw-
'water'. (I find this plausible, and note that Gaulish had a parallel
formation *abinko- using Celtic *ab- instead, reflected in Catalan and
South French dialects as <avenc> etc. 'sumpfiges Land; Wasserfall;
Quelle; Loch; Abgrund, wo das Wasser versichert' (J. Hubschmid,
_Praeromanica_ 53-55).)

My working hypothesis is that the transition between Illyrians and
other IE-speakers was fairly abrupt. I think more along the lines of
Dacians, Thracians, and Albanians rather than Germans and Slavs at
that time. I cannot agree with Hamp that Illyrian was a satem
language ancestral to Albanian. I consider it a centum language from
which ancient Albanian, a satem language, borrowed some words. The
evidence is frustratingly sparse, since we have no Illyrian texts
(with the possible exception of the stele of Novilara, but to my
knowledge nobody has produced an acceptable translation, and I have
butted heads with it myself). I agree with Hamp that Messapic (in
which we do have short texts) should not be blithely lumped with
Illyrian, but even without Messapic, we can argue phonology from the
forms of toponyms preserved on both sides of the northern Adriatic. I
suspect that Latin <acupe:(n)ser> (also acci-, aqui-) 'sturgeon of the
Po' is an Illyrian loanword containing *akw- as in Aquincum. The
modern dialects of Venice and Padua have <kópeze>, pointing to an
ancient accentuation <acúpe:(n)ser>, against the Latin penultimate law
(like Písaurum and Intéramna, and for that matter Ísamnus, now Ishm in
Albania). If my hunch is correct, the second element of <acupe:
(n)ser> is probably the name of a large land-animal, but so far I have
no guess as to what.

> > Interamna Praetutiana in Picenum apparently does have the Illyrian
> > reflex of *H1(e)n-téro-. The modern Téramo shows that the
> > accentuation was Intéramna (as opposed to ordinary Latin). The
> > second element *ab-no- is found also in the Illyrian river Isamnus.
>
> > Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
> > against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
> > Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element
> > as Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several
> > other rivers of eastern Italy. Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms,
> > Epídamnos, Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix Pi-
> > to Epi-.
>
> I was thinking of writing a second message and ask if any of the other
> Illyrian prefixes are of the same type. Is there a clear divide between
> languages using "modifying" and "prepositional" prefixes? Is that a
> useful one?

The older IE languages seem to use both. Italic is rather less
productive in both than Celtic and Greek. Illyrian seems comparable
to Celtic in this regard, at least on the basis of the scanty
evidence.

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 1, 2007, 1:23:07 AM12/1/07
to
On Dec 1, 1:40 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:

> > How far north and east are there Illyrian toponyms? Would there have
> > been direct contact -- or gradual transition -- between Illyrians and
> > neighbouring Germans and Slavs before the Celtic intrusion?
>
> As far as the Danube,

Does it mean that the Roman Province of Illyria were reaching as far
to the North as Southwestern Germany?

> if Krahe is correct in regarding Aquincum (near
> modern Buda,

If Aquincum was an Illyrian toponym then the ancient town of Aquinum
must also be an Illyrian place name? It is supposed that the so-called
Illyrians had some of their colonies on the east coast of Italy.
Aquinum could be an undeniable "proof" that "Illyrians" were spread
across the western Italian coast too. In addition, who were the Celtic
Boii (the founders of the town Aquinum) - an Illyrian tribe?

Let us take another example, the town of Acumincum (Kamenica) was
situated on the Danube in the Roman province of Illyria but we also
could find the ancient place Acamantium (the name of Acamantium is
composed in the same way as Acumincum) a town of Phrygia Magna, built
by Acamas - Theseus' son). Could we say that Anatolia was also
inhabited by the Illyrian tribes? Finally, could we drow a conclusion
(from all the above "evidences") that the Ancient Greeks were not the
Greeks (because Theseus, according to his son's name - Acam, was the
fucking Illyrian) but just one of the numerous Illyrian tribes?

Using such a twisted syllogism we are beginning to understand that the
Ancent Greeks are in fact the Illyrians and that Albanians are the
descendants of both, the Illyrians and the Greeks? :-)

DV

Trond Engen

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Dec 4, 2007, 9:21:04 PM12/4/07
to
Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:

> Trond Engen wrote:
>
>> How far north and east are there Illyrian toponyms?
>

> [moving for clarity:]


>
> As far as the Danube, if Krahe is correct in regarding Aquincum (near
> modern Buda, across from Pest) as an Illyrian toponym containing
> *akw- 'water'. (I find this plausible, and note that Gaulish had a
> parallel formation *abinko- using Celtic *ab- instead, reflected in
> Catalan and South French dialects as <avenc> etc. 'sumpfiges Land;
> Wasserfall; Quelle; Loch; Abgrund, wo das Wasser versichert' (J.
> Hubschmid, _Praeromanica_ 53-55).)

The suffix */-ink-/ looks awfully similar to the Germanic suffix -ing-,
known from all over Northern Europe. If I'm not mistaken, that's
essentially an adjectival suffix of, er, affinity. If Aquincum was an
Illyrian outpost, the name could simply mean "river-ish" (not to rule
out any other meaning suggested from the Gaulish example). -um is the
neuter ending, I suppose.

>> Would there have been direct contact -- or gradual transition --
>> between Illyrians and neighbouring Germans and Slavs before the
>> Celtic intrusion?
>

> My working hypothesis is that the transition between Illyrians and
> other IE-speakers was fairly abrupt. I think more along the lines of
> Dacians, Thracians, and Albanians rather than Germans and Slavs at
> that time.

I'm not sure if I understand this. Do you mean that the neighbours of
the Illyrians were the Balkan peoples you list, although they were not
closely related, and that Illyrians were not in close contact with
Germanic and Slavic speakers?

> I cannot agree with Hamp that Illyrian was a satem language ancestral
> to Albanian. I consider it a centum language from which ancient
> Albanian, a satem language, borrowed some words.

Which is quite different from what Abdullah's been arguing. Now, here's
a debate that could make me wiser.

> The evidence is frustratingly sparse, since we have no Illyrian texts
> (with the possible exception of the stele of Novilara, but to my
> knowledge nobody has produced an acceptable translation, and I have
> butted heads with it myself). I agree with Hamp that Messapic (in
> which we do have short texts) should not be blithely lumped with
> Illyrian, but even without Messapic, we can argue phonology from the
> forms of toponyms preserved on both sides of the northern Adriatic.
> I suspect that Latin <acupe:(n)ser> (also acci-, aqui-) 'sturgeon of
> the Po' is an Illyrian loanword containing *akw- as in Aquincum. The
> modern dialects of Venice and Padua have <kópeze>, pointing to an
> ancient accentuation <acúpe:(n)ser>, against the Latin penultimate
> law (like Písaurum and Intéramna, and for that matter Ísamnus, now
> Ishm in Albania). If my hunch is correct, the second element of
> <acupe:(n)ser> is probably the name of a large land-animal, but so
> far I have no guess as to what.

If */akw-/ meant river, it could possibly be the name of an Adriatic
fish or sea mammal.

--
Trond Engen
- an der schönen blauen Don-akw

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 5, 2007, 3:10:31 AM12/5/07
to

Compare Latin aquos-us -a -um (watery) and Serbian ukvash-en (imbued,
wet), ukvas-iti (soak; kvasim I soak) and maybe you will be able to
understand that the town of Aquincum is "Illyrian" as much as it is
Romance, Germanic (/k/vaskan, waschen) or Slavic (kvashenje, ukvasiti,
ukvasim).

Is there anyone on sci.lang who is intelligent enough to grasp that
Illirian is a product of an exuberant imagination and that a language
under Illyrian name never existed in reality?

This funny guy, D.G. Kilday is trying to define that a so-called
Illyrian is a centum language without giving any evidence for such a
claim. In fact, we can talk about the characteristics of Illyrian only
if we are able to prove that Illyrian ever existed as a real
language.

DV

Douglas G. Kilday

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Dec 15, 2007, 4:16:48 PM12/15/07
to
Trond Engen wrote:
> Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:
> > Trond Engen wrote:
>
> >> How far north and east are there Illyrian toponyms?
>
> > [moving for clarity:]
>
> > As far as the Danube, if Krahe is correct in regarding Aquincum (near
> > modern Buda, across from Pest) as an Illyrian toponym containing
> > *akw- 'water'. (I find this plausible, and note that Gaulish had a
> > parallel formation *abinko- using Celtic *ab- instead, reflected in
> > Catalan and South French dialects as <avenc> etc. 'sumpfiges Land;
> > Wasserfall; Quelle; Loch; Abgrund, wo das Wasser versichert' (J.
> > Hubschmid, _Praeromanica_ 53-55).)
>
> The suffix */-ink-/ looks awfully similar to the Germanic suffix -ing-,
> known from all over Northern Europe. If I'm not mistaken, that's
> essentially an adjectival suffix of, er, affinity. If Aquincum was an
> Illyrian outpost, the name could simply mean "river-ish" (not to rule
> out any other meaning suggested from the Gaulish example). -um is the
> neuter ending, I suppose.

Yes, the suffix is generic, and I have no evidence that Aquincum
actually meant 'Place of Stagnant Water' as suggested by the Gaulish
parallel.

> >> Would there have been direct contact -- or gradual transition --
> >> between Illyrians and neighbouring Germans and Slavs before the
> >> Celtic intrusion?
>
> > My working hypothesis is that the transition between Illyrians and
> > other IE-speakers was fairly abrupt. I think more along the lines of
> > Dacians, Thracians, and Albanians rather than Germans and Slavs at
> > that time.
>
> I'm not sure if I understand this. Do you mean that the neighbours of
> the Illyrians were the Balkan peoples you list, although they were not
> closely related, and that Illyrians were not in close contact with
> Germanic and Slavic speakers?

That is what I mean. I don't think Slavs and Germans got this far
until the great migrations of the 5th century, by which time the
Illyrians had been Romanized. Bersovia (river and town) looks like a
Slavic formation 'Birchy', but must be taken as Dacian, and indicates
that the latter was a satem language.

> > I cannot agree with Hamp that Illyrian was a satem language ancestral
> > to Albanian. I consider it a centum language from which ancient
> > Albanian, a satem language, borrowed some words.
>
> Which is quite different from what Abdullah's been arguing. Now, here's
> a debate that could make me wiser.
>
> > The evidence is frustratingly sparse, since we have no Illyrian texts
> > (with the possible exception of the stele of Novilara, but to my
> > knowledge nobody has produced an acceptable translation, and I have
> > butted heads with it myself). I agree with Hamp that Messapic (in
> > which we do have short texts) should not be blithely lumped with
> > Illyrian, but even without Messapic, we can argue phonology from the
> > forms of toponyms preserved on both sides of the northern Adriatic.
> > I suspect that Latin <acupe:(n)ser> (also acci-, aqui-) 'sturgeon of
> > the Po' is an Illyrian loanword containing *akw- as in Aquincum. The
> > modern dialects of Venice and Padua have <kópeze>, pointing to an
> > ancient accentuation <acúpe:(n)ser>, against the Latin penultimate
> > law (like Písaurum and Intéramna, and for that matter Ísamnus, now
> > Ishm in Albania). If my hunch is correct, the second element of
> > <acupe:(n)ser> is probably the name of a large land-animal, but so
> > far I have no guess as to what.
>
> If */akw-/ meant river, it could possibly be the name of an Adriatic
> fish or sea mammal.

Possibly, yes. The only Slavic reflexes given for this root are
indeed river-names, Russ. <Oká> (one on either side of the Urals) and
Pol. <Kwa>. I prefer to think that Illyrian used *ab-no- for
'river' (as in Ísamnus from *Ís-ab-no-, Intéramna from *Entér-ab-no-
vel sim.), but like everything else here, it is only a working
hypothesis.

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 15, 2007, 4:31:22 PM12/15/07
to
"Dušan Vukotic" wrote:
>
> [...]

>
> Compare Latin aquos-us -a -um (watery) and Serbian ukvash-en (imbued,
> wet), ukvas-iti (soak; kvasim I soak) and maybe you will be able to
> understand that the town of Aquincum is "Illyrian" as much as it is
> Romance, Germanic (/k/vaskan, waschen) or Slavic (kvashenje, ukvasiti,
> ukvasim).
>
> Is there anyone on sci.lang who is intelligent enough to grasp that
> Illirian is a product of an exuberant imagination and that a language
> under Illyrian name never existed in reality?
>
> This funny guy, D.G. Kilday is trying to define that a so-called
> Illyrian is a centum language without giving any evidence for such a
> claim. In fact, we can talk about the characteristics of Illyrian only
> if we are able to prove that Illyrian ever existed as a real
> language.

Harsh words indeed, coming from an even funnier guy who has been
trying to sell us his XUR-BEL-GON Ursilbentheorie for years, without
so much as a gnat's piss of evidence!

Pokorny, by the way, regards your Acumincum as an Illyrian derivative
of *ak^- 'scharf, spitz, kantig; Stein', since the place is also known
as Szlankamen 'Salzstein'; obviously P. takes Ill. as a centum
language.

Italo

unread,
Dec 15, 2007, 8:07:27 PM12/15/07
to
Douglas G. Kilday wrote:

<snip>

Why suppose *ab-no- when <amnis> already means stream,
water, river. Inter-amna may be named from a crossing point
in the river or from its watery surroundings or so. Is there
reason to suppose that the name is pre-Latin?

There's an Interamna in Latium, an Interamna-Nahars (now
Terni) in Umbria, and Interamnia in Picenum. Illyrians were
not reported in these areas, afaik.

btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or can it
be explained from I.E.?

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 15, 2007, 9:02:52 PM12/15/07
to
> language.- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

Slan-kamen is a Serbian compound word and it really means Salt-Stone.
In Hungarian that village is named Szalán-Kemén (again Serbian Slan-
Kamen/Salty-Stone). Using your upside-down logic, why wouldn't we try
to solve the problem of Acumincum with the help of Hungarian language:
szál (spear) + kemény (austere, sharp, harsh, hard, rocky); As you
see, Hungarian makes your meanings (scharf, spitz, kantig) more
plausable and even doubles your "sharpness" (sharp spear!).

There is a Serbian word 'kama' (stylet, knife), related to
'kamen' (stone) and to 'ugao' (angle); I hope you are able to perceive
that words 'kama, nož, chakija' (knife) are derived from the same
reduplicated Gon syllable and that only angular (Lat. angulatus)
things can be sharp (Serb. igla needle; Lat. acus needle; Greek ακμή/
acme; Serb. okomito vertical, upright); cf. O.Fr. couteau (knife) and
Serbian kut (angle).

Now, I hope, you are able to see that the Serbo-Slavic word 'kamen'
also includes in itself a hidden meaning 'sharp'.

DV

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 16, 2007, 3:59:41 AM12/16/07
to
On Dec 4, 6:21 pm, Trond Engen <trond...@engen.priv.no> wrote:
> Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:
>
> > Trond Engen wrote:
>
> >> How far north and east are there Illyrian toponyms?
>
> > [moving for clarity:]
>
> > As far as the Danube, if Krahe is correct in regarding Aquincum (near
> > modern Buda, across from Pest) as an Illyrian toponym containing
> > *akw- 'water'. (I find this plausible, and note that Gaulish had a
> > parallel formation *abinko- using Celtic *ab- instead, reflected in
> > Catalan and South French dialects as <avenc> etc. 'sumpfiges Land;
> > Wasserfall; Quelle; Loch; Abgrund, wo das Wasser versichert' (J.
> > Hubschmid, _Praeromanica_ 53-55).)
>
> The suffix */-ink-/ looks awfully similar to the Germanic suffix -ing-,
> known from all over Northern Europe.

Found in the older Baltic too.. as a suffix denoting a diminutive
form.

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 16, 2007, 7:09:21 AM12/16/07
to

Let us see what Pokorny says:
[..."Npers. ās (dehnstufig) `Mühlstein'; gr. ἀκή `Spitze', dehnstufig
ion. ἠκή ακωκη, επιδορατις, ηκμη Hes., redupl. ακωκη `Spitze,
Schneide' (wie αγωγη : αγω); nach Kretschmer KZ. 33, 567 und Schwyzer
Gr. Gr. I 348 gehört ακοω `höre' als *ακ-ους- `das Ohr scharf habend'
hierher, s. aber 1. keu-; alb. athëtë `herb, sauer'; lat. acēre
`sauer sein', acidus `sauer', acētum `Essig';"...]

If Pokorny had known my Xur-Bel-Gon speech formula he would not have
mixed two quite separate notions: Spitze (tip. point, pinnacle) and
hören (hear). His conclusion that ακ-ους- has the meaning `das Ohr
scharf habend' is totaly unacceptable and even ridiculous. Of course,
he was partly right when he said that above words were derived from
the reduplicated basis (unfortunately, he didn't specify which one and
I would add that it was the Gon paleo-basis).

Greek ακούω (hear, hearken, give ear, obey, to be a pupil of) is a
cognate of Serbian uho (ear) and oko (eye); cf. Gr. ουατόεις (long-
eared), Serb. uveta (ears); εσσα = Serb. uši; Of course, all these
words should be compared to those which are signifying first and
foremost "noise" (Lat. clamo = Serb. galama /noise/ = Eng. claim), Gr.
ηχώ = Serb. jeka; huk = Eng. echo; Gr. εκκαλέω = Eng. call = Serb.
glas /voice/; cf. Gr. εκκλησιάζω debate therein, Gr. εκκλησία
(church; in Gr. church offical had a name derived from the noun οικοσ /
Serb. kuća house/ => οικονόμισσα female official in the church; Serb.
kućenje economizing, kućanica hostess); i.e. εκκλησία is equal to
Serbian glas (voice), oglas (advertisement) and glasanje (voting);
hence also Gr. άγγελος (angel); Serb. glasnik (mouthpiece, messenger,
forerunner).

All the above words were derived from the agglutinated primeval Gon-
Gon-Bel-Gon basis: Serb. oganj (fire), ognjilo/oknilo (a visible
area), okno (window), okolina (environment, surrounding), okolo
(arround), oko (eye), uho (ear); cf. Serb. osluhnuti (hear; from ho-h-
lu-hnu-ti; related to the above mentioned Serb. 'okolina'
surrounding), sluh (hearing).

It is said above that Pokorny was "partly" right because (I hope it is
absolutely clear now) the words αγωγη and ακούω came out of a
different milieu (although it may look otherwise at first sight); i.e.
αγωγη is a clear Gon-Gon derivation while ακούω (like Serb. jeka, huk
noise) originally appeared from a simple reduplicated Gon basis, just
as it happened to the "sharp-angular" words γωνία (Eng. angle; Serb
ugao), κινητός (movable; Serb. goniti drive, hunt; Eng. hunt), but
with different connotations: one could be expressed through the
Serbian syntagm "ugoniti u ugao" (driving/forcing into the corner) and
the other through "osluhnuti okolinu" (listen to the environment);
therefore there are Latin angulus (angle) and akumen (sharp point),
Serb. "ugaoni kamen" (a corner stone) and kama (knife); Gr. γωνία
(angle) and ακωκη (a point).

I could continue similar analysis for hours, but I think that the
above explanation is enough for any (sound) human being, at least as
an incite to begin to understand that (as Italo put his_sharp_question
in this thread) we need no Pre-Latin vocabulary, especially not one
imagined by alleged lingua-scientists who manufactured the so-called
Illyrian nation and Illyrian language on a scanty basis of a dozen of
words written (wrongly of course) by the Latin and Greek writers.


DV


Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 16, 2007, 7:35:30 AM12/16/07
to
On Dec 16, 9:59 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:

>
> > The suffix */-ink-/ looks awfully similar to the Germanic suffix -ing-,
> > known from all over Northern Europe.
>
> Found in the older Baltic too.. as a suffix denoting a diminutive
> form.

Sufixes -ink, -ing, -nik, -kin, -chen etc., are the derivatives of the
ancient Gon syllable, which denotes motion (physical or mental)
Serbian rad (work), rad-nik (worker)
Lithuanian darbas (work), darbin-inkė (worker).
Latvian darbs (work) darbi-nieks, strādnieks (worker)
All the IE languages have that sufix and it is nothing unusual.

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 16, 2007, 9:25:03 AM12/16/07
to
On Dec 15, 10:16 pm, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:

> Possibly, yes. The only Slavic reflexes given for this root are
> indeed river-names, Russ. <Oká> (one on either side of the Urals) and
> Pol. <Kwa>. I prefer to think that Illyrian used *ab-no- for
> 'river' (as in Ísamnus from *Ís-ab-no-, Intéramna from *Entér-ab-no-
> vel sim.), but like everything else here, it is only a working
> hypothesis

And you are not able to see that yor "working hypothesis is wrong? Let
us take an example: Lat in-somnia (sleeplessness, loss of sleep) is a
cognate of Serb. ne-sanica (sleeplessness, loss of sleep). According
to your "working hypotheses" Latin insomnia must be a borrowing from
the imaginary Illyrian, this time probably from ins-ab-no. I would not
be surprised if one day some profligate "scientist" (of the G.
Starostin's and A. Lubotsky's kind) came out with a "hypothesis" that
Slavic 'spavati, spati', German 'schlafen', Latin 'sopio -ire' and
Sanskrit 'svapati' are the loan-words from an intergalactic
Illyro_Albanian.

Another digression: is Celtic afanc (sea-monster) related to Eng.
whale? Old Irish abann and Welsh afon are clear evidences that Celtic
"water" has been derived from the Bel-Gon basis, the same one where
the Serbian noun 'voda' (from bol-da => vol-da => voda) originated
from. Serbian River Bojana (Buna; stream, river) is another example
that IE words as abban, affon, amnis, buna, bojana have the meaning
river or stream; cf. Serb. bujica (stream), bujanje (flooding).

River Bojana (Buna) flows also through the teritory of today's
Albania, but, as we can see, its name is Serbo-Slavic (not Albanian!)
and the great majority of Albanian toponyms are still wearing the
Slavic names. As a matter of fact, there is none of the so-called
Illyrian place names that can be explained with the help of the
Shqiperian language. On the other side, almost all the ancient
toponyms in the Balkan can be sufficiently explicated with the use of
Slavic vocabulary.

DV

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 17, 2007, 6:10:05 PM12/17/07
to

The accent of Téramo and Térni is not what we would expect from Latin
names. This has already been discussed.

> There's an Interamna in Latium, an Interamna-Nahars (now
> Terni) in Umbria, and Interamnia in Picenum. Illyrians were
> not reported in these areas, afaik.

See P. Kretschmer, "Der Götterbeiname Grabovius auf den Tafeln von
Iguvium", FS Bezzenberger [Göttingen 1921] 89-96, for evidence that
the Umbrian divine epithet 'Grabovius' is of Illyrian origin, and that
the <iapuzkum numem> banished from the Iguvine rites was an Illyrian
group living to the north or northeast of Iguvium.

> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or can it
> be explained from I.E.?

Resemblance to Heb. <nahar>, Arab. <nahr> 'river' is certainly
fortuitous. The name itself is P-Italic and apparently means
'sulphurous', but the base *nagh- is obscure. Servius (ad Aen. 7:517)
says "Sabini lingua sua nar dicunt sulphur; ergo hunc fluvium ideo
dicunt esse Nar appellatum, quod odore sulphureo nares contingat";
this connection with <na:re:s> 'nostrils' is obviously false, but we
have no reason to doubt that the Sabine for 'sulphur' was indeed
<na:r>, and identical in form with the name of the river. The
formation appears to be parallel to Oscan <casnar> 'senex' (pace H.
Krahe, Glotta 26:95-97 [1938], who regarded the -ar specifically as a
river-name suffix, as in <Isara> and the like). But as for *nagh-,
whence it came, and what it originally meant, I have no clue.

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 18, 2007, 12:03:57 AM12/18/07
to

Jupiter Grabovius is a "wooden" god (oak-tree God); do net forget the
Carpinus trees; Slavic grab;
Also there is a huge number of Slavic surnames Grabovic, Grabovski,
Grabov
Interesting, you cannot find neither that surname (Grabov) nor the
tree 'grab' in the so-called Illyrian "descendant" language
(Albanian).

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 18, 2007, 3:37:34 AM12/18/07
to
On Dec 16, 2:07 am, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Why suppose *ab-no- when <amnis> already means stream,
> water, river. Inter-amna may be named from a crossing point
> in the river or from its watery surroundings or so. Is there
> reason to suppose that the name is pre-Latin?

It is supposed that Latin amnis came from abnis (from a/m/bno-;
nasalized abno-; cf. Serb. 'opiti' get drunk, from 'obliti' suffuse
and 'umiti' lave, wash - from nasalised 'o/m/bliti') and it is not a
problem at all. The problem is that some of the self-appointed
"experts" are trying to prove that this *ab-/ *ap- is of a certain
Ilyrian origin (see my message below concerning Old Irish abann).

As you see, only stupid people or charlatans of Douglas G. Kilday's
kind could claim that the basic IE roots started as an "invention" of
an imaginary Illyrian "super-language". Douglas also is avoiding to
give a strait answer to the question on what grounds he claims that
Illyrian were occupying central and western parts of the Apennine
peninsula.


> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or can it

> be explained from I.E.?- Hide quoted text -

Nahar (extremely difficult word) could be related to the words as
Latin mare (sea), Serbo-Slavic more (sea), Serb. adjective mokar
(wet); mokrenje (pissing); probably from na-krenuti (n => m sound
change); cf. Nereus (a sea god); nahar also could be related to nadar
(Serb. 'nadiranje' a sudden flow, gush of water);

The Latin word naratio (telling) can also be helpful in this case,
but, of course, this demands a long and more profound explanation.
Finally, there is the Semitic root BHR (Arabic bahar sea) that could
be modified into nahar through the (b => m) nasalisation (bahar sea;
nahar river).

DV

Italo

unread,
Dec 18, 2007, 12:00:45 PM12/18/07
to

Interesting.

Didn't know about this 'iapuzkum'. How is established that
these were to the north or northeast of Iguvium?

I wondered before if there could be a connection between the
Iapydes and the Iapyges (and maybe compare 'Peucetii' to
'Fecusses'?), not just because of the similar names but
because Strabo says that (Pelasgian/Cretan) Iapyges
_walked around_ the Adriatic to Bottiaeis.

But the stories about the Iapyges and Peuketioi don't say
they were of the same origin as the Illyrian Messapians.
Messapia was earlier called Peucetia. Greek colonies such as
Taras and Kroton were originally also held by the Iapyges.
The Bottiaioi lived at Pella/Phacus before the
Macedonians invaded and drove them out to Olynthos, where
most of them were later finished of, first by the
Macedonians and then by the Persians.
They are the "Tyrsenoi" of Herodotus 1.57.

>> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or
>> can it be explained from I.E.?
>
>
> Resemblance to Heb. <nahar>, Arab. <nahr> 'river' is
> certainly fortuitous. The name itself is P-Italic and
> apparently means 'sulphurous', but the base *nagh- is
> obscure. Servius (ad Aen. 7:517) says "Sabini lingua sua
> nar dicunt sulphur; ergo hunc fluvium ideo dicunt esse
> Nar appellatum, quod odore sulphureo nares contingat";
> this connection with <na:re:s> 'nostrils' is obviously
> false, but we have no reason to doubt that the Sabine for
> 'sulphur' was indeed <na:r>, and identical in form with
> the name of the river.

That the Sabine word for sulphur is identical doesn't imply
that the river's name is neccesary derived from it. Sounds
no less as a folketymological explanation to me as the link
with nares.
'Brentesion' may mean "head of a stag" in Messapic, but
obviously the town didn't take its name from that either.

> The formation appears to be parallel to Oscan <casnar>
> 'senex' (pace H. Krahe, Glotta 26:95-97 [1938], who
> regarded the -ar specifically as a river-name suffix, as
> in <Isara> and the like). But as for *nagh-, whence it
> came, and what it originally meant, I have no clue.

Could there be a connection to the name of the Nereides?
Though these belong to the sea, not rivers.

http://etruscans1.tripod.com/Language/EtruscanN.html also
mentions an Etruscan <neri>. Too bad Zavaroni's site no
longer exists or I would've checked the context.

Italo

unread,
Dec 18, 2007, 12:37:08 PM12/18/07
to
Dušan Vukotic wrote:

> On Dec 16, 2:07 am, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>> Why suppose *ab-no- when <amnis> already means stream,
>> water, river. Inter-amna may be named from a crossing
>> point in the river or from its watery surroundings or
>> so. Is there reason to suppose that the name is
>> pre-Latin?
>
>
> It is supposed that Latin amnis came from abnis (from
> a/m/bno-; nasalized abno-; cf. Serb. 'opiti' get drunk,
> from 'obliti' suffuse and 'umiti' lave, wash - from
> nasalised 'o/m/bliti') and it is not a problem at all.
> The problem is that some of the self-appointed "experts"
> are trying to prove that this *ab-/ *ap- is of a certain
> Ilyrian origin (see my message below concerning Old Irish
> abann).

The Aventine hill in Rome takes its name probably also from
the river.

> As you see, only stupid people or charlatans of Douglas
> G. Kilday's kind could claim that the basic IE roots
> started as an "invention" of an imaginary Illyrian
> "super-language". Douglas also is avoiding to give a
> strait answer to the question on what grounds he claims
> that Illyrian were occupying central and western parts of
> the Apennine peninsula.

Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
(Illyrian) language.

>
>
>> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or
>> can it be explained from I.E.?- Hide quoted text -
>
>
> Nahar (extremely difficult word) could be related to the
> words as Latin mare (sea), Serbo-Slavic more (sea), Serb.
> adjective mokar (wet); mokrenje (pissing); probably from
> na-krenuti (n => m sound change); cf. Nereus (a sea god);
>

'Nereus' also came to my mind.

Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I notice
that there is another river Nar, with the town Narona, in
Dalmatia..

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 18, 2007, 5:31:24 PM12/18/07
to
On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:

> Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> (Illyrian) language.

There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
and historical delusion of the modern era.

> Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I notice
> that there is another river Nar, with the town Narona, in
> Dalmatia..

Naro river in Dalmatia (Narenta) is Neretva in Serbo-Slavic. In
Serbian Neretva could mean Nerodiva (fruitless, barren) similar to the
village Nerodimlje (also fruitless, barren) in the Serbian province of
Kosovo, which is now renamed to Albanian Nerodime (of course, Nerodime
means nothing in Albanian).

In fact, the most part of the Balkan toponyms are of the Slavic
origin, but no one is yet ready to tackle that problem and change the
whole (well-known!) history of this part of the Mediterranean Basin.
For instance, we can find that Slovenian town Ljubljana (or Serbian
Lipljan) has nothing to do with the Slavic verb 'ljubiti' (kiss,
love); i.e. a certain renowned "scientists" are saying "it is a folk
etymology"! In other words, some influential circles decided Ljubljana
must be accepted as an Illyrian place name. If it were true, then the
Polish town of Lublin shold be also considered as Illyrian toponym.

Now, let us consider the Polish village Mokra, Mogren - the beach in
Montenegro, mountain Mokra Gora in Serbia, the river Mura in Slovenia,
Morava in Serbia, Marica in Bulgaria... All these toponyms (I would
say) could be connected to the words 'more' (sea, mare) and the Serbo-
Slavic adjective 'mokar' (wet). The question is, could one hypothetic
'mahar' (mokar, mohre, more, mare) be related to Semitic nahar (and if
it could can we see how it could have happened). There are Serbian
words reka (river), roniti (shed /rain, tears/), rosa (dew) derived
from Hor-Gon basis (according to my Xur-Bel-Gon speech formula), but
in case of Nahar or Slavic mokar (wet) the basis is Gon-Hor (Serbian
mokrenje /wetting/ from Gon-Hor-Gon basis). If we take the German past
participle of the verb regnen (rain) - geregnet - we will get the form
that is close to Semitic nahar; similar to the Serbian verb
'gnjuranje' (diving) also known in a dialectal form as 'šmuranje' what
is an equivalent to another Serbian verb - smokriti, iz-mokriti se (to
get wet /in the rain/). In this moment it became clearer why the
Serbian verb na-kre-nuti has the meening "to push into a slant
position" and as a jargon it means "to drink"; hence the other two
Serbian verbs: nagrnuti "to push forward as an avalanche" and
"nadirati" (advance; "nadiranje" advancing /as if of water-
flooding/).

DV

Abdullah Konushevci

unread,
Dec 18, 2007, 8:55:13 PM12/18/07
to
On Dec 18, 11:31 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> > the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> > (Illyrian) language.
>
> There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
> Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
> and historical delusion of the modern era.
>
> > Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I notice
> > that there is another river Nar, with the town Narona, in
> > Dalmatia..
>
> Naro river in Dalmatia (Narenta) is Neretva in Serbo-Slavic. In
> Serbian Neretva could mean Nerodiva (fruitless, barren) similar to the
> village Nerodimlje (also fruitless, barren) in the Serbian province of
> Kosovo, which is now renamed to Albanian Nerodime (of course, Nerodime
> means nothing in Albanian).

It's really fantastic thing to be completely ignorant like you. If we
accept your folk etymology Nerodimlje as 'fruitless, barren' what we
will say about Neropolis? Nerodimja is a village motivated by river
Nero-dim-ja as are many other place-names that you will never
understoo. With same pattern are formed in Dardania, known as such
till the second part of XIX century, also: Niko-dim ((cf. also Niko-
polis), Shte-dim, Su-dim-je, Bu-dim-je, where everyone that knows
basics of onomastics will notice the presence of root -dim, voiced
variant of Alb tim 'house, smoke'. But, first elements of those place-
names I saw as Greek one, especially nero-, niko-.

Konushevci

Message has been deleted
Message has been deleted

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 19, 2007, 5:52:57 AM12/19/07
to

I am surprised that you maneged to gather your courage and dared to
restart a debate with me. I believed I shut your mouth for ever. :-)

Nerodimlje is situated on the river Nerodimka, nown for its
bifurcation which is dried out (desiccated) and nonexistent today. It
is the reason why that river has been named Nerodimka (fruitless,
barren, sterile). As you can see, Nerodimka and Nerodimlje are derived
from the Serbian verb 'roditi, rodim' (bore, cause to be born;
adjectives 'rodno, rodan' fruitfull), Antonym of the Serbian adjective
'rodan' (fruitfull) is 'nerodan' (not-fruitfull); hence Serbian
toponyms Nerodinka => Nerodimka => Nerodimlje. Didn't you know that
'dried out' and 'barren' are synonymous words?

In fact, how did you expect to explain any toponym in Kosovo by using
Albanian language when you must be well aware of the fact that
Albanians have not named a single one geographical place in Kosovo.

Of course, today you are trying to calque Serbian place names:

Gnjilane (Serb. gnjilo rotten) is now Gjilane (means nothing in
Alb.);
Serb. Priština (from Serb. prišt blister; priština augmentative of
blister; comes from the Serb. verb pri¹tinuti pinch), Alb. Prishtinë
(no meaning in Albanian);
Serb. Orahovac (from Serb. orah walnut), Alb. Rahoveci (means nothing
in Albanian);
Serb. Prizren (from Serb. verb prizoriti (to dawn); hence Serb. prozor
(window), prizor (sight); Alb Prizren (has no meaning in Albanian);
Serb. Peć (from the Serb. verb peći bake, Serb. peæ stove, furnice);
Alb. Peja (no meaning in Albanian);
Serb. Glogovac (from Serbian glog hawthorn); Alb. Glogovac (no meaning
in Albanian);
Vučitrn (Serb. wolf-thorn; vuk, vučji wolf, trn thorn); Albanian
Vushtrria (no meaning in Albanian)
Drenica (from Serb dren cornel, dogwood); no meaning in Albanian
Is there any need to explain the river names as Toplica (Serb, toplo
warm); Bistrica (from Serb. bistro clear; clear water); Sitnica (Serb,
sitno small)
Serb. Kosovo Polje (Serb, the Field of Blackbirds; Serb. kos
blackbird; polje field); Albanian Kosova (has no meaning in
Albanian);
Should we explan other toponyms as Požaranje (from Serb. požar
conflagration, fire), Vrbeštica (from Serb. vrba willow); Dobroševac
(Serb. dobar good; Serb. personal name Dobrosav), Belo Polje (Serb.
White Field), Brod (Serb. ship), Suva Reka (Dry River), Vrela (Serb.
vrelo source, fountain; plural vrela), Poljance (Serb. Small Field),
Rogovo (Serb. rog horn), Dragaš (Serb, drag dear; Serb. surname Dragaš
- the last Byzantine Emperor), Istok (Serb. istok east) etc.
According to Abdullah twisted logic, the Slovenian town of Grosuplje
is not a Slavic place name (although it is well known that Grosuplje
is Grezopolje (Grazed/Scraped Field);
The name of the Serbian town Prokuplje (the town of traders; Serb,
prekupac, prekupljanje middleman; wholesaling; during the XVI and XVII
the Dubrovnik traders had their colony stationed in Prokuplje) is
composed in accordance with the Slavic -le or lje sufixed words (slav-
lje celebration; zdrav-lje health; grm-lje bushes; živ-alj/živ-lje
population, inhabitatnts...).

In fact, this suffix -lje is a reduced form of -ljenje (Bel-Gon
basis): slavlje - slavljenje; življe - življenje; zdravlje -
zdravljenje.
I suppose that Albanians have "re-baptised" the Serbian Nevoljane into
Nevojane (close to Albanian nevoja /needs/; BTW the Albanians borrowed
Serbian nevolja /exigency/) and they would probably going to say that
Nevojane was an original Albanian name. Unfortunate for them, it is
impossible to explain the history of the Albanian word nevoia without
Serbian nevolja (nevolja, nevolnost is a clear-cut Slavic word).

Italo

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 10:30:40 AM12/19/07
to
Dušan Vukotic wrote:
> On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>> Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure
>> that the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all
>> represent the same (Illyrian) language.
>
>
> There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian
> nation and Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of
> the greatest linguistic and historical delusion of the
> modern era.

>> Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I
>> notice that there is another river Nar, with the town
>> Narona, in Dalmatia..
>
>
> Naro river in Dalmatia (Narenta) is Neretva in
> Serbo-Slavic. In Serbian Neretva could mean Nerodiva
> (fruitless, barren) similar to the village Nerodimlje
> (also fruitless, barren) in the Serbian province of
> Kosovo, which is now renamed to Albanian Nerodime (of
> course, Nerodime means nothing in Albanian).

Another is the Neris river in Lithuania. Checking wikipedia,
there seem a few more in that general area;

Quote:
"Neris is the primeval name of the river, while name Vilija
(Vialla) is of a secondary extraction, which formed in
Slavic languages from word Velija (meaning big). Primeval
name Neris also remain and in the riverside names like
Paneriai. The name Neris is of Baltic origin, from
Lithuanian nerti meaning to dive, swim downstream; likely
name had more general meaning of flow in early times.[1]
Etymologically, the name is one of a class of water names,
including Lithuanian Narotis, Narasa (rivers), Narutis
(lake), Old Prussian Narus (the Narew), the Nara (near
Moscow) and many others over the prehistoric Baltic range.
These are related to Lithuanian narus, "deep", and nerti,
"to dive". More remote connections are obscure, although the
root is believed to be Indo-European. There are a number of
possibilities; perhaps Pokorny's 2nd *ner-, "under"
(Indogermanisches Etymologisches Woerterbuch, pp765-766),
perhaps Derksen's *nerH-, o-grade *norH- (Slavic Inherited
Lexicon), perhaps a relation to the Greek god Nereus, which
may be from *snau-, "to give milk to", in the sense of
"flow" (Partridge, Origins (1983))."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neris#Etymology

Italo

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 10:31:12 AM12/19/07
to

Do you know of a Greek example with this first element nero-
? I could only find one village named Neris (but without
similar named river).

>
> Konushevci

Italo

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 10:31:35 AM12/19/07
to
Douglas G. Kilday wrote:

> Italo wrote:

>> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or
>> can it be explained from I.E.?
>
>
> Resemblance to Heb. <nahar>, Arab. <nahr> 'river' is
> certainly fortuitous. The name itself is P-Italic and
> apparently means 'sulphurous', but the base *nagh- is
> obscure. Servius (ad Aen. 7:517) says "Sabini lingua sua
> nar dicunt sulphur; ergo hunc fluvium ideo dicunt esse
> Nar appellatum, quod odore sulphureo nares contingat";
> this connection with <na:re:s> 'nostrils' is obviously
> false, but we have no reason to doubt that the Sabine for
> 'sulphur' was indeed <na:r>, and identical in form with
> the name of the river. The formation appears to be
> parallel to Oscan <casnar> 'senex' (pace H. Krahe, Glotta
> 26:95-97 [1938], who regarded the -ar specifically as a
> river-name suffix, as in <Isara> and the like). But as
> for *nagh-, whence it came, and what it originally meant,
> I have no clue.

In the Baltic and Russia there are the rivers Neris,
Narotis, Narasa, Narus(Narew), Nara, a lake Narutis (acc. to
wikipedia). Is it theoretically possible these are also
derived from such a root *nagh-, or should these be
explained different?

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 11:13:57 AM12/19/07
to

You are right. As you sea, Lituanian naras (diver) and nerti (dive)
completely fits into my earlier presumption (Serb. gnjurac (diver), g-
njurati (dive); Pokorny and Derksen are both right here because their
*ner- ("under"), and *nerH- (*norH-) are also derived from the
primeval Gon-Hor basis.

DV

> > DV- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

Italo

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 11:21:14 AM12/19/07
to
Italo wrote:

Then there is also the Neckar (Med.Lat. Nicer, Nicrus) river
in Germany.

lora...@cs.com

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 11:08:28 PM12/19/07
to
On Dec 18, 2:31 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> > the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> > (Illyrian) language.
>
> There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
> Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
> and historical delusion of the modern era.

??? There are many historic Roman and Greeks references to the
Illyrians and Illyria that you cannot discount.

> > Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I notice
> > that there is another river Nar, with the town Narona, in
> > Dalmatia..
>
> Naro river in Dalmatia (Narenta) is Neretva in Serbo-Slavic. In
> Serbian Neretva could mean Nerodiva (fruitless, barren) similar to the
> village Nerodimlje (also fruitless, barren) in the Serbian province of
> Kosovo, which is now renamed to Albanian Nerodime (of course, Nerodime
> means nothing in Albanian).

Maybe.. but aren't your 'Serbo-Slavic' examples more likely to
illustrate compounds of ne+rod/zh - rather than anything to do with
'narenta'?

> In fact, the most part of the Balkan toponyms are of the Slavic
> origin, but no one is yet ready to tackle that problem and change the
> whole (well-known!) history of this part of the Mediterranean Basin.

Try 'Rhodope'. Explanation please.

And also try six century AD as the time of arrival in Illyria of
Slavic speakers.

lora...@cs.com

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 11:32:46 PM12/19/07
to
On Dec 19, 7:30 am, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Another is the Neris river in Lithuania. Checking wikipedia,
> there seem a few more in that general area;
>
> Quote:
> "Neris is the primeval name of the river, while name Vilija
> (Vialla) is of a secondary extraction, which formed in
> Slavic languages from word Velija (meaning big).

Vilnis = 'wave' , 'vilinaja' = 'water undulated (rapids)' in Baltic
Latv.

> Primeval
> name Neris also remain and in the riverside names like
> Paneriai. The name Neris is of Baltic origin, from
> Lithuanian nerti meaning to dive, swim downstream; likely
> name had more general meaning of flow in early times.[1]
> Etymologically, the name is one of a class of water names,
> including Lithuanian Narotis, Narasa (rivers), Narutis
> (lake), Old Prussian Narus (the Narew), the Nara (near
> Moscow) and many others over the prehistoric Baltic range.
> These are related to Lithuanian narus, "deep", and nerti,
> "to dive". More remote connections are obscure, although the
> root is believed to be Indo-European. There are a number of
> possibilities; perhaps Pokorny's 2nd *ner-, "under"
> (Indogermanisches Etymologisches Woerterbuch, pp765-766),
> perhaps Derksen's *nerH-, o-grade *norH- (Slavic Inherited
> Lexicon), perhaps a relation to the Greek god Nereus, which
> may be from *snau-, "to give milk to", in the sense of
> "flow" (Partridge, Origins (1983))."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neris#Etymology

Baltic Latv. 'nara' = 'mermaid'.
(close to the Greek nereid, isn't it?)

"Nereid: Sea-nymphs of Greek mythology. They were the 50 daughters of
Nereus.

Features They would frolic on the surface of the water, and they had
golden hair and lived in their father's (Nereus) underwater palace.
They would often ride on dolphins, and were friendly- dancing and
playing for sailors, or helping them if they were in trouble."

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 11:52:51 PM12/19/07
to
On Dec 19, 2:55 am, Abdullah Konushevci <akonushe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> It's really fantastic thing to be completely ignorant like you. If we
> accept your folk etymology Nerodimlje as 'fruitless, barren' what we
> will say about Neropolis? Nerodimja is a village motivated by river
> Nero-dim-ja as are many other place-names that you will never
> understoo. With same pattern are formed in Dardania, known as such
> till the second part of XIX century, also: Niko-dim ((cf. also Niko-
> polis), Shte-dim, Su-dim-je, Bu-dim-je, where everyone that knows
> basics of onomastics will notice the presence of root -dim, voiced
> variant of Alb tim 'house, smoke'. But, first elements of those place-
> names I saw as Greek one, especially nero-, niko-.
>

> Konushevci- Hide quoted text -


>
> - Show quoted text -

You must have been drunk while you were posting the above message and
I thought it would be nice of me to wait until time made you sober
again.

Now I understand why the great linguists (the Illyrian galactic minds)
A Lubotsky and G.Starostin are ashamed to be seen (publicly) in your
company. They were paid to strip their pants off on the main city
square and now they are hoping no one has recognized them after that
ignominious act. Only thing they are (A. Lubotsky and G. Starostin)
afraid of [at this moment] is Abdullah's stupid, unrestrained tongue.
Those two new-branded Shqip-Illyrians ordered Abdullah not to appear
anywere in public, especially not at sci. lang, believing that their
self-inflicted Soros-type wounds may heal by itself with time.

DV

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 12:04:16 AM12/20/07
to
On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
> On Dec 18, 2:31 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> > > the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> > > (Illyrian) language.
>
> > There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
> > Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
> > and historical delusion of the modern era.
>
> ??? There are many historic Roman and Greeks references to the
> Illyrians and Illyria that you cannot discount.

Would you mind mentioning at least one of your "references", please?

DV

lora...@cs.com

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 1:49:01 AM12/20/07
to
On Dec 19, 9:04 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
> > On Dec 18, 2:31 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> > > > the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> > > > (Illyrian) language.
>
> > > There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
> > > Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
> > > and historical delusion of the modern era.
>
> > ??? There are many historic Roman and Greeks references to the
> > Illyrians and Illyria that you cannot discount.
>
> Would you mind mentioning at least one of your "references", please?
>
> DV

Try these:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Apollod.+2.5.11
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Apollod.+2.1.3
Illyrian war, B. C. 219.
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0234%3Aid%3Db3c16
Death of Agron of Illyria (and 'TAUTA')
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0234%3Aid%3Db2c4
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0234%3Aid%3Db8c15
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0230%3Ahead%3D%2375

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 2:57:39 AM12/20/07
to
On Dec 20, 7:49 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
> On Dec 19, 9:04 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 18, 2:31 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > On Dec 18, 6:37 pm, Italo <ola...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > Maybe it was so, who knows for sure. I'm not even sure that
> > > > > the Apulian inscriptions ("Messapic") all represent the same
> > > > > (Illyrian) language.
>
> > > > There is no way that anyone can prove that Illyrian nation and
> > > > Illyrian language ever existed. It is one of the greatest linguistic
> > > > and historical delusion of the modern era.
>
> > > ??? There are many historic Roman and Greeks references to the
> > > Illyrians and Illyria that you cannot discount.
>
> > Would you mind mentioning at least one of your "references", please?
>
> > DV
>
> Try these:http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Apollod.+2.5.11http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Apollod.+2.1.3
> Illyrian war, B. C. 219.http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999....
> Death of Agron of Illyria (and 'TAUTA')http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999....http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999....http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999....

>
>
>
> > > > > Don't know if it is already mentioned, but just now I notice
> > > > > that there is another river Nar, with the town Narona, in
> > > > > Dalmatia..
>
> > > > Naro river in Dalmatia (Narenta) is Neretva in Serbo-Slavic. In
> > > > Serbian Neretva could mean Nerodiva (fruitless, barren) similar to the
> > > > village Nerodimlje (also fruitless, barren) in the Serbian province of
> > > > Kosovo, which is now renamed to Albanian Nerodime (of course, Nerodime
> > > > means nothing in Albanian).
>
> > > Maybe.. but aren't your 'Serbo-Slavic' examples more likely to
> > > illustrate compounds of ne+rod/zh - rather than anything to do with
> > > 'narenta'?
>
> > > > In fact, the most part of the Balkan toponyms are of the Slavic
> > > > origin, but no one is yet ready to tackle that problem and change the
> > > > whole (well-known!) history of this part of the Mediterranean Basin.
>
> > > Try 'Rhodope'. Explanation please.
>
> > > And also try six century AD as the time of arrival in Illyria of
> > > Slavic speakers.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

Illyria was a Roman province and the people living in that province
were called Illyrians by Romans. Nobody knows the native name of that
people.

DV

António Marques

unread,
Dec 19, 2007, 3:50:38 PM12/19/07
to
Dušan Vukotic wrote:

> nahar also could be related to nadar (Serb. 'nadiranje' a sudden
> flow, gush of water);

Hey, and portuguese _nadar_ 'to swim'. It's all connected!

--
Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 11:00:00 AM12/20/07
to
On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:

> Try 'Rhodope'. Explanation please.

The easiest answer to this question would be if we said that Rhodope
is an "Illyrian topnym". Doesn't matter if we don't know what the
notion "Illyrian" bears in itself.

In case of Rhodope another fiction language appeared to be
"responsible" - Thracian. Some of the serious scientists believe that
Rhodope is a compound word composed of rod + api (red + water); i.e.
from an imaginary Thracian rudas red/reddish + apa water, river,
stream. In Serbian it could be "calqued" as Rudo-potok (from Serbian
rudan, rudeti, rujan /reddish/ and potok /brook, creek/; cf. Bulgarian
Rodo-pite/ Родопите. If Dospatska Reka had an earlier name Rodopite or
Rudi Potok (red creek) and that name had been later extended for the
mountain name, we could say that the history of the name of mountain
Rhodopi is completely resolved.

The other possibilities is that the name Rhodopi/RODOPITE originated
from the Bulgarian/Serbian word RODOVIT (fertile, fruitful,
proliferous; Serb. rodovit, rodan; similar to the Kosovo toponyms
Rodimlje (fruitfull) and Nerodimlje /fruitless, barren/ that I have
already discussed in this thred earlier).

Nevertheless, it doesn't matter which one of the etymologies we are
going to accept because the name Rodopi is of the clear Serbo-Slavic
origin. The micro-region RADJEVINA in Western Serbia has a similar
name to Rhodopi; one of the Rhodopian mountains in Serbia is called
RADAN; there is a mountain RUJAN (across the Bulgaro-Serbian border);
PN Rudo in Bosnia

DV

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 12:11:25 PM12/20/07
to
On Dec 19, 9:50 pm, António Marques <m...@sapo.pt> wrote:
> Dušan Vukotic wrote:
> > nahar also could be related to nadar (Serb. 'nadiranje' a sudden
> > flow, gush of water);
>
> Hey, and portuguese _nadar_ 'to swim'. It's all connected!

Of course... It is!

DV

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 20, 2007, 12:59:23 PM12/20/07
to

Serb. sirena (mermaid), English Siren; from Hor-Gon/Sar-Gon basis; cf.
Serb. shoranje (deluge, a torrential rain; pissing); curenje (leaking)

> "Nereid: Sea-nymphs of Greek mythology. They were the 50 daughters of
> Nereus.

Yes... Nereus (diver; Serbian g/njurac; Lithuanian naras)! Latin urino
-are (dive) could also be related to the primeval Gon-Hor-Gon basis (g/
nu/h/ra/g/ne; g/nuranje; gn-urino; apheresis)

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 20, 2007, 2:32:06 PM12/20/07
to
On Dec 20, 5:32 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:

> > "Neris is the primeval name of the river, while name Vilija
> > (Vialla) is of a secondary extraction, which formed in
> > Slavic languages from word Velija (meaning big).
>
> Vilnis = 'wave' , 'vilinaja' = 'water undulated (rapids)' in Baltic
> Latv.

Rusian волна/volna (wave), Serbian val (wave), velik, veli (big);
velebitan (important); cf. Czech velebit (glorify, praise, extol);
Velebit, the mountain in Dalmatia

Now, you will find a certain wise guys who are going to tell you that
Velebit is a toponym of an ancient and extinct Balkan people known by
the name of the Roman province "Illyricum"

DV

Paul J Kriha

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Dec 21, 2007, 4:20:43 AM12/21/07
to
"Dusan Vukotic" <dusan....@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:a1e3c297-8c53-40bf...@i12g2000prf.googlegroups.com...

>On Dec 20, 5:32 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
>> > "Neris is the primeval name of the river, while name Vilija
>> > (Vialla) is of a secondary extraction, which formed in
>> > Slavic languages from word Velija (meaning big).
>>
>> Vilnis = 'wave' , 'vilinaja' = 'water undulated (rapids)' in Baltic
>> Latv.
>
>Rusian волна/volna (wave), Serbian val (wave), velik, veli (big);
>velebitan (important); cf. Czech velebit (glorify, praise, extol);

Bugger me with a rusty nail!
So the Czech "velebit" (praise) is the cognate of Czech "vlna" (wave)?

Muj ty smutku.
pjk

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 21, 2007, 8:19:32 AM12/21/07
to
On Dec 21, 10:20 am, "Paul J Kriha"
<paul.nospam.kr...@paradise.net.nz> wrote:

> >Rusian волна/volna (wave), Serbian val (wave), velik, veli (big);
> >velebitan (important); cf. Czech velebit (glorify, praise, extol);
>

> | me with a rusty nail!
> So the Czech "velebit" (praise) is the cognate of Czech "vlna" (wave)?
>
> Muj ty smutku.
> pjk

Please, beze smutku, Kriha.
Of course, Czech 'velebit' is not the cognate of 'vlna' (Russ. volna
Serbian val; from Bel-Gon ur-basis); velebit (from Bel-Bel-Gon basis)
is a compound word (vele big + biti be); I just continued the above
discussion:

>>> "Neris is the primeval name of the river, while name Vilija
>> > (Vialla) is of a secondary extraction, which formed in
>> > Slavic languages from word Velija (meaning big).
>> Vilnis = 'wave' , 'vilinaja' = 'water undulated (rapids)' in Baltic
>> Latv.

However, I forgot to separate it (volna/velebit) clearly.

DV


Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 21, 2007, 1:41:45 PM12/21/07
to
The name of the village Budimlje is derived from the Serbo-Slavic word
budan (awake); cf. Serbian personal names Budo, Budimir, Budisav,
surnames Budimlić, Budić, Budimlija;

Sudimlje is the Serbian toponym derived from the Serbian word sud
(court; sudjenje judging; sudim I judge; sudilishte the place where
justice is being delivered);

Štedim is also called Shtedin, Shtedini, Shtedim and Gjakja in
Albanian.
In order to understand correctly the history of the PN Štetin/Štedim
we must first see the etymology of other Serbo-Slavic words as štit
(shield), šteta (nuisance, determent, disservice, harm, loss), štednja
(saving), štedeti (spare, save), štititi (protect). In the heart of
the above words is the Slavic verb stati (stop, stand; Greek σταδιος
standing firm); if one Serb says "stojim iza toga" (I stand for it) it
means he is going to defend his own standpoint; Serbian syntagn "stati
iza nekoga" (to stand in someone's defense, protect);

Serbian word šteta (harm, damage; verb. štetiti/škoditi to harm; Czech
škoda harm, damage), German Schade (harm, damage; OHG scado; Danish
skade /harm/) is derived from the same secondary ur-basis S-Gon as
the Serbian werb škoditi (to harm), skinuti (take off or away,
subtract), za-ginuti, iz-ginuti (perish); Although these words
(štetiti, škoditi)appeared from the same secondary S-Gon basis (from
primary Sur/Hor-Gon basis; Serb. cr-knuti perish) like words štititi
(protect) and štedeti (to save, economize) they are different in a
philosophical sense of their development.

If we had been following the twisted Abdullah's logic we would have
been able to "prove" that Shtedim acquired its name from the Albanian
word shtegtim (migration, peregrination); Abdullah just had to say,
"it is a well-known Illyrian-Albanian gt => d sound change!", and all
problems concerning the PN Shtedim would be resolved immediately. :-)

In a real world the name Štedim must be compared to the other Slavic
toponyms: Štitnjak (village near Požega in Slavonia/Croatia), Štitari
(village in Mačva/Serbia), Szczecin, Štetin (Poland), Serbo-Slavic
family name Štetin. In addition, we will sea that Serbian verbs
štititi (protect) and štedeti (spare, save) are semantically very
close (almost the same) to each other. It means that the village of
Štedim can have only one meaning (as all the other, above-mentioned
Slavic places) - and that meaning is ŠTIT (shield) or more precise "a
protective place", harbour, shelter.

DV

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 21, 2007, 2:45:41 PM12/21/07
to
On Dec 19, 11:57 pm, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Illyria was a Roman province and the people living in that province
> were called Illyrians by Romans. Nobody knows the native name of that
> people.

What do you think of these?:
"http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/54/IllyriaPreRome.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/75/EpirusEduMap.jpg

List of Illyrian tribes
(Illyrian tribes or possibly or partly Illyrian tribes.)

Distribution of Illyrian tribes in antiquity in the borders with
Greeks and Thracians
Illyrian tribes in antiquity
Abri
Albanoi
Amandes
Andizetes
Ardiaei (Vardaei)
Ardian
Autariatae
Azali
Breuci
Bylliones
Carni (Illyrian origin uncertain)
Catari
Celegari
Ceraunii
Chelidones
Colapani
Cornacatan
Daesitiates
Dalmatae
Daors
Dardan (Illyrian origin uncertain)
Dassaretae (Illyrian origin uncertain)
Dauni
Daversi
Deraemestae
Deuri
Dindari
Ditiones
Docleatae
Enchelaeae
Enotri
Glintidiones
Grabaei
Histri (Illyrian origin uncertain)
Japodes
Iasi
Illyri
Lopsi
Maezaei
Messapii
Meslcumani
Narensii
Ortoplini
Oseriates
Pannoni
Parentini
Parthini
Penestae
Peucetii
Pirustae
Plearaei
Sardeati
Scirtari
Scirtones
Seleitani
Taulanti
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Illyrian_tribes"

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 21, 2007, 3:15:38 PM12/21/07
to
On Dec 20, 8:00 am, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
> > Try 'Rhodope'. Explanation please.
>
> The easiest answer to this question would be if we said that Rhodope
> is an "Illyrian topnym". Doesn't matter if we don't know what the
> notion "Illyrian" bears in itself.
>
> In case of Rhodope another fiction language appeared to be
> "responsible" - Thracian. Some of the serious scientists believe that
> Rhodope is a compound word composed of rod + api (red + water); i.e.
> from an imaginary Thracian rudas red/reddish + apa water, river,
> stream.

That's my *general* view as well..
Except that such a view is too non-specific as to the language source
of such roots.
Proximal classical Greek provides 'rhousizô' (reddish) and
'aporreô' (stream) as best matches.
Do you have any other closer corresponding roots?
Serb? Any Slavic?

> In Serbian it could be "calqued" as Rudo-potok (from Serbian
> rudan, rudeti, rujan /reddish/ and potok /brook, creek/; cf. Bulgarian

> Rodo-pite/ òÏÄÏÐÉÔÅ. If Dospatska Reka had an earlier name Rodopite or


> Rudi Potok (red creek) and that name had been later extended for the
> mountain name, we could say that the history of the name of mountain
> Rhodopi is completely resolved.

Nice.. But 'potok' (which can be understood as 'pateka' or
'pieteka' (stream) in Baltic Latv.) is not the root involved.
'Ope' is.
And so I offer as the closest apparent source of 'ope' and your above
'api' ... 'upe' (river) which is Baltic.

(Baltic Latv. 'rud' = 'red'. synth. 'rudupe' means 'red river')
If anyone has a closer pair, please let me know.

> The other possibilities is that the name Rhodopi/RODOPITE originated
> from the Bulgarian/Serbian word RODOVIT (fertile, fruitful,
> proliferous; Serb. rodovit, rodan; similar to the Kosovo toponyms
> Rodimlje (fruitfull) and Nerodimlje /fruitless, barren/ that I have
> already discussed in this thred earlier).

No. Geology reveals that the karst region of the area is very poor in
topsoil.
Additionally the thin layers of soil that do remain are *reddish*.
Very likely any river runoff would also be reddish.

> Nevertheless, it doesn't matter which one of the etymologies we are
> going to accept because the name Rodopi is of the clear Serbo-Slavic
> origin.  

If the classical Greeks named the area 'Rhodope' in 400BC, how is it
possible that Slavic speakers named the area when they only arrived
one thousand years later? It seems impossible, doesn't it?

> The micro-region RADJEVINA in Western Serbia has a similar
> name to Rhodopi; one of the Rhodopian mountains in Serbia is called
> RADAN; there is a mountain RUJAN (across the Bulgaro-Serbian border);
> PN Rudo in Bosnia
> DV

No. It's not similar at all.

Abdullah Konushevci

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Dec 21, 2007, 5:29:14 PM12/21/07
to
> If we had been following the twistedAbdullah'slogic we would have

> been able to "prove" that Shtedim acquired its name from the Albanian
> word shtegtim (migration, peregrination);Abdullahjust had to say,

> "it is a well-known Illyrian-Albanian gt => d sound change!", and all
> problems concerning the PN Shtedim would be resolved immediately. :-)
>
> In a real world the name Štedim must be compared to the other Slavic
> toponyms: Štitnjak (village near Požega in Slavonia/Croatia), Štitari
> (village in Mačva/Serbia), Szczecin, Štetin (Poland), Serbo-Slavic
> family name Štetin. In addition, we will sea that Serbian verbs
> štititi (protect) and štedeti (spare, save) are semantically very
> close (almost the same) to each other. It means that the village of
> Štedim can have only one meaning (as all the other, above-mentioned
> Slavic places) - and that meaning is ŠTIT (shield) or more precise "a
> protective place", harbour, shelter.
>
> DV

What do you think about Dim-ce, as well as Ga-dim-je, probably from
Serbian Gad - Dušsan or maybe Gadura?!

Konushevci

Douglas G. Kilday

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Dec 21, 2007, 6:19:04 PM12/21/07
to
Italo wrote:
> Douglas G. Kilday wrote:
> > Italo wrote:
> >> Douglas G. Kilday wrote:
>
> >> <snip>
>
> >>> Possibly, yes.  The only Slavic reflexes given for
> >>> this root are indeed river-names, Russ. <Oká> (one on
> >>> either side of the Urals) and Pol. <Kwa>.  I prefer
> >>> to think that Illyrian used *ab-no- for 'river' (as
> >>> in Ísamnus from *Ís-ab-no-, Intéramna from
> >>> *Entér-ab-no- vel sim.), but like everything else
> >>> here, it is only a working hypothesis.
>
> >> Why suppose *ab-no- when <amnis> already means stream,
> >> water, river. Inter-amna may be named from a crossing
> >> point in the river or from its watery surroundings or
> >> so. Is there reason to suppose that the name is
> >> pre-Latin?
>
> > The accent of Téramo and Térni is not what we would
> > expect from Latin names.  This has already been
> > discussed.
> >> There's an Interamna in Latium, an Interamna-Nahars
> >> (now Terni) in Umbria, and Interamnia in Picenum.
> >> Illyrians were not reported in these areas, afaik.
>
> > See P. Kretschmer, "Der Götterbeiname Grabovius auf den
> > Tafeln von Iguvium", FS Bezzenberger [Göttingen 1921]
> > 89-96, for evidence that the Umbrian divine epithet
> > 'Grabovius' is of Illyrian origin, and that the <iapuzkum
> > numem> banished from the Iguvine rites was an Illyrian
> > group living to the north or northeast of Iguvium.
>
> Interesting.
>
> Didn't know about this 'iapuzkum'. How is established that
> these were to the north or northeast of Iguvium?

The relevant passages in the Iguvine Tables mention this people along
with several others as foreigners who may not participate in the
Iguvine rites.

Tab. Ig. Ib:15-18. ... pune menes aker^uniamem enumek etur^stamu tuta
tar^inate trifu tar^inate turskum naharkum numem iapuzkum numem.
svepis habe purtatulu pue mer^s est feitu uru per^e mer^s est.

'When you come to Acedonia, then pronounce banishment on the Tadinate
state, the Tadinate tribe, the Tuscan (name), the Naharcan name, (and)
the Japudic name. If anyone (of the banished peoples) remains, bring
him to that place to which the law is, (and) do with him that which
the law is.'

VIb:52-55. ... ape acesoniame hebetafe benust enom termnuco stahituto
poi percam arsmatia habiest etursta. eso eturstahmu. pisest totar
tarsinater trifor tarsinater tuscer naharcer iabuscer nomner eetu
ehesu poplu. nosue ier ehe esu poplu sopir habe esme pople portatu ulo
pue mersest fetu uru pirse mersest. ...

'When (the augur) has come to Acedonia, to the exits, then (the two
prinuati) shall stand at the boundary. He who holds the ritual wand
shall pronounce banishment. Thus shall he pronounce banishment.
Whoever is of the Tadinate people, of the Tadinate tribe, of the
Tuscan, the Naharcan, (or) the Japudic name, he shall go out from this
people. If no going out from this people takes place, if anyone
remains among this people, bring him to that place to which the law
is, (and) do with him that which the law is.'

Following comes a curse against the alien peoples mentioned, but you
get the idea. These peoples evidently surrounded the territory of the
Iguvine state.

Kretschmer argued that the Tadinate people and tribe lived to the east
of Iguvium; their city *Tadinum or *Tadina is represented today by the
toponyms Gualdo Tadino and Santa Maria Tadina about 20 km SE of
Gubbio. The Tuscans/Etruscans lived to the west; the nearest large
Etruscan city was Perusia, about 40 km to the SW. The Naharcans,
dwellers along the Nahar/Nar/Nera, lived to the south, where the river
flows. That leaves the north as the general direction from Iguvium
where the Japudes lived. Arguing from inscriptions and a historical
mention by Firmus, Kretschmer identifies Monte Petrara to the NE of
Gubbio as the site of an important shrine to Juppiter Appenninus, and
suggests that this shrine, long being in the territory of Illyrian
Japudes, would have given rise to the epithet Grabovius 'zur Eiche
gehörig, Eichengott'. This epithet, of Illyrian origin, would have
been extended by the Umbrians to Mars and Vofionus as well; these
three gods constituted their principal triad, like the archaic Roman
triad of Juppiter, Mars, and Quirinus.

As for the specifically Illyrian nature of 'Grabovius', K. cites
Illyrian personal names <Grâbos> and <Grábo:n>. The Epirote dialect
of Modern Greek has <grábos> 'oak' (formerly written <grâbos>),
evidently continuing a loanword from Illyrian to ancient Epirote
Greek. A fragment of Sophocles has the dat. pl. <graphíois> 'oaken',
so the root was evidently *gra:bh-, which would have become *gra:f- if
inherited into P-Italic, but *gra:b- in Illyrian and *grab- in
Slavic. The latter can be ruled out for borrowings during antiquity.

> I wondered before if there could be a connection between the
> Iapydes and the Iapyges (and maybe compare 'Peucetii' to
> 'Fecusses'?), not just because of the similar names but
> because Strabo says that (Pelasgian/Cretan) Iapyges
> _walked around_ the Adriatic to Bottiaeis.
>
> But the stories about the Iapyges and Peuketioi don't say
> they were of the same origin as the Illyrian Messapians.
> Messapia was earlier called Peucetia. Greek colonies such as
> Taras and Kroton were originally also held by the Iapyges.
> The Bottiaioi lived at Pella/Phacus before the
> Macedonians invaded and drove them out to Olynthos, where
> most of them were later finished of, first by the
> Macedonians and then by the Persians.
> They are the "Tyrsenoi" of Herodotus 1.57.


>
> >> btw - that Umbrian rivername Nahar seems Semitic, or
> >> can it be explained from I.E.?
>
> > Resemblance to Heb. <nahar>, Arab. <nahr> 'river' is
> > certainly fortuitous.  The name itself is P-Italic and
> > apparently means 'sulphurous', but the base *nagh- is
> > obscure.  Servius (ad Aen. 7:517) says "Sabini lingua sua
> > nar dicunt sulphur; ergo hunc fluvium ideo dicunt esse
> > Nar appellatum, quod odore sulphureo nares contingat";
> > this connection with <na:re:s> 'nostrils' is obviously
> > false, but we have no reason to doubt that the Sabine for
> > 'sulphur' was indeed <na:r>, and identical in form with
> > the name of the river.
>

> That the Sabine word for sulphur is identical doesn't imply
> that the river's name is neccesary derived from it. Sounds
> no less as a folketymological explanation to me as the link
> with nares.

No, because Vergil's phrase is "sulphurea Nar albus aqua"; the river
was known for being white with sulphur. Further, it formed the
boundary between Umbria and Sabinum; the 'Naharcans' of the Iguvine
Tables were most likely Sabines. While there is no way to prove the
connection between <na:r> 'sulphur' and <Nahar>, at least it has no
phonological objection. The business with <na:re:s> is purely folk-
etymological, as it is not possible to connect *nagh-ar- with *na:s-.

> 'Brentesion' may mean "head of a stag" in Messapic, but
> obviously the town didn't take its name from that either.

The harbor was said to resemble the horns of a stag. You don't need a
flying saucer to form a bird's-eye view of a place.

> > The formation appears to be parallel to Oscan <casnar>
> > 'senex' (pace H. Krahe, Glotta 26:95-97 [1938], who
> > regarded the -ar specifically as a river-name suffix, as
> > in <Isara> and the like).  But as for *nagh-, whence it
> > came, and what it originally meant, I have no clue.
>

> Could there be a connection to the name of the Nereides?
> Though these belong to the sea, not rivers.

I doubt it. The fact that <naharkom> appears in the earlier Iguvine
Tables (in a modified Etruscan alphabet), whose orthography does not
otherwise indicate /a:/ by <aha>, indicates that the -h- was
pronounced. If the root goes back to Proto-Italic and further to PIE,
it must be *nagh-. We would then expect *nakh- in Greek, not *ne:r-
or *na:r-. If the root is from Mediterranean substratum, I do not
know what the -h- would correspond to in Pre-Greek. I have no other
usable examples.

> http://etruscans1.tripod.com/Language/EtruscanN.htmlalso
> mentions an Etruscan <neri>. Too bad Zavaroni's site no
> longer exists or I would've checked the context.

An Etruscan noun <neri> occurs thrice in the zero-case and once in the
genitive <neris'> on page X of the Liber Linteus (incorporating the
Herbig fragment under Roncalli's line-numbering). Here is the
"context", then:

20 ara.ratum.ai6'na.leitrum.zutheva.zal
21 es'ic.ci.halchza.thu.es'ic.zal.mula.6'antic
22 thapna.thapnzac.lena.etera.thec.pei6'na
23 hau6'ti.fanus'e.neris'.[c]ave.[vea].thui.neri
--(lines 24-28 missing)--
29 6'antic.vinum.thui.thapna[--------mucum]
30 halchze.thui.thi.vacl.ce6'a6'in.thum6'a.cilva
31 neri.canva.car6'i.putnam.thu.calatnam
32 tei.lena.hau6'tis'.enac.es'i.catni6'.heci
33 6'purta.6'ul6'le.napti.thui.lai6'cla.hechz.ner/i/
34 [---------------um.-----].une.m[lac--nthi]

The copyist was rather sloppy about the sibilants. On page XI we can
deduce that <vinum> 'wine' was poured <s'antis'ts'> 'from the ewer',
and <thi> 'water' was poured <thapnes'ts'> 'from the pitcher'. From
the passages above we might guess that <hau6'ti> and <neri>, like
<6'anti> and <thapna>, are names of vessels. Cortsen's suggestion
that <neri> = Sabine <na:r> 'sulphur' is groundless, as is Pfiffig's
that <neri> means 'water'. We can be reasonably sure that <thi> means
'water' in Etruscan. Whether <neri> was originally a nominalized
necessitative, like <zeri> 'to-be-sworn' = 'oath', I know not.

Douglas G. Kilday

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Dec 21, 2007, 6:36:33 PM12/21/07
to

They must be explained differently from the Nahar. A root *nagh-
would have produced *nag-, *naz^-, or *naz- in the Baltic and Slavic
languages in question, and there is no principled way to lose the
consonantal reflex of the -gh-.

Douglas G. Kilday

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Dec 21, 2007, 7:02:48 PM12/21/07
to

Different, as already explained.

> Then there is also the Neckar (Med.Lat. Nicer, Nicrus) river
> in Germany.

The definitive paper is by Hans Krahe, "Die germanische
Lautverschiebung und der Neckar", _Beiträge zur Namenforschung_
11:144-7 [1960]. Krahe noted that some other toponyms and hydronyms
in this area have unshifted -g- of Celtic origin, hence Germans did
not move in until their consonant-shift was done, hence the -c- of
<Nicer> (first attested in a panegyric to Constantine) is also
unshifted, and we can refer the river-name to PIE *nikro- 'violent,
fierce', referring to its strong current; presumably the name was
applied by Celts.

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 22, 2007, 1:39:15 AM12/22/07
to
On Dec 21, 9:15 pm, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
> On Dec 20, 8:00 am, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > On Dec 20, 5:08 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
> > > Try 'Rhodope'. Explanation please.
>
> > The easiest answer to this question would be if we said that Rhodope
> > is an "Illyrian topnym". Doesn't matter if we don't know what the
> > notion "Illyrian" bears in itself.
>
> > In case of Rhodope another fiction language appeared to be
> > "responsible" - Thracian. Some of the serious scientists believe that
> > Rhodope is a compound word composed of rod + api (red + water); i.e.
> > from an imaginary Thracian rudas red/reddish + apa water, river,
> > stream.
>
> That's my *general* view as well..
> Except that such a view is too non-specific as to the language source
> of such roots.
> Proximal classical Greek provides 'rhousizô' (reddish) and
> 'aporreô' (stream) as best matches.
> Do you have any other closer corresponding roots?
> Serb? Any Slavic?

Greek aporreô has the meaning "falling (of a river) and it is a
counterpart of the Serbian verb obrušiti se, obrušio "falling as
water"; Serb. obo-rina (precipitation) borrowed by Albanians as a word
for snow (borë); cf. Ibar river in Serbia known in Bulgaria as Obar;
Greek prefix apa- means "from, away from" and it has nothing to do
with "water".

> > In Serbian it could be "calqued" as Rudo-potok (from Serbian
> > rudan, rudeti, rujan /reddish/ and potok /brook, creek/; cf. Bulgarian
> > Rodo-pite/ òÏÄÏÐÉÔÅ. If Dospatska Reka had an earlier name Rodopite or
> > Rudi Potok (red creek) and that name had been later extended for the
> > mountain name, we could say that the history of the name of mountain
> > Rhodopi is completely resolved.
>
> Nice.. But 'potok' (which can be understood as 'pateka' or
> 'pieteka' (stream) in Baltic Latv.) is not the root involved.
> 'Ope' is.
> And so I offer as the closest apparent source of 'ope' and your above
> 'api' ... 'upe' (river) which is Baltic.

Baltic upe comes from the adjective aplis (Serb. oblo round); hence
Latvian peldēt (swim), similar to Serbian plutati, English float or
ploviti (sail), but it is a long story (Serb. oblo /round/, obliti /
suffuse/, oplivati, plivati /swim/, plutati /float/, o-ploviti (sail
around); Serbian upliv (stream, influnce)...

Maybe Europe is Ebr-ope or Latvian e-Bura-ope (electronic navigable
river)? :-)


> (Baltic Latv. 'rud' = 'red'. synth. 'rudupe' means 'red river')
> If anyone has a closer pair, please let me know.

I am rather sceptic about "red river" etymology (Rom. raul rosu). I
traveled a great part of Rhodope and I hadn't seen anything "reddish"
as a Rhodopian specific characteristic. I see. you have consulted
Duridanov's "Thracian etymology", where he (under influence of an
ignoramus - a charlatan called Harwey Mayer) explains so-called
Thracian/Dacian words with the help of Baltic languages.

> > The other possibilities is that the name Rhodopi/RODOPITE originated
> > from the Bulgarian/Serbian word RODOVIT (fertile, fruitful,
> > proliferous; Serb. rodovit, rodan; similar to the Kosovo toponyms
> > Rodimlje (fruitfull) and Nerodimlje /fruitless, barren/ that I have
> > already discussed in this thred earlier).
>
> No. Geology reveals that the karst region of the area is very poor in
> topsoil.
> Additionally the thin layers of soil that do remain are *reddish*.
> Very likely any river runoff would also be reddish.
>
> > Nevertheless, it doesn't matter which one of the etymologies we are
> > going to accept because the name Rodopi is of the clear Serbo-Slavic
> > origin.  
>
> If the classical Greeks named the area 'Rhodope' in 400BC, how is it
> possible that Slavic speakers named the area when they only arrived
> one thousand years later? It seems impossible, doesn't it?
>
> > The micro-region RADJEVINA in Western Serbia has a similar
> > name to Rhodopi; one of the Rhodopian mountains in Serbia is called
> > RADAN; there is a mountain RUJAN (across the Bulgaro-Serbian border);
> > PN Rudo in Bosnia
> > DV
>
> No. It's not similar at all.

Do not be silly!
Radjevina <= Rodbina (relatives); radjati (procreate, bear,
reproduce); Rodbina => Rodovina; Rodobito => Rodovito (fertile); Rodan
(fruitful);
Radan => Rodan (fruitful);
Rujan (reddish); Serbian "rujno vino" (red wine);
Now I'll tell you a secret: Serb. "radjanje zore" (dawning; literally:
the birth of a dawn; rudjenje appearing of a red color) connects both
Serbian words - rujan, rudeti (red, reddish) and radjanje
(procreation), because the dawn is usually reddish (a small ablaut in
Serbian: rod (genus, kin, kind), radjati (bear, procreate), rudeti
(getting red); cf. Latvian sarkans (red; directly from the Sur-Gon
basis wherefrom Serb zharko (hot), sunce (sun) and zora (dawn) ; Latv.
parādīties dawn (Serb. poroditi procreate); Latv. radit procreate
(Serb. roditi).

DV

Franz Gnaedinger

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Dec 22, 2007, 3:05:43 AM12/22/07
to
On Nov 23, 7:28 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
>
> Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
> against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
> Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element as
> Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several other
> rivers of eastern Italy.  Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms, Epídamnos,
> Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix Pi- to Epi-.

Can Isaurus be a rump form of Pisaurus? My historical
maps give Pisaurus. On top of the Appeninnus was the
Pitinum Pisaurense, spring area of many rivers, most of
them flowing to the Adriatic sea, among them Pisaurus,
with the village Pisaurense on the upper course, and
the village or town Pisaurum on the mouthing, also the
river Sapis. Flowing to the east we have the river Arnus,
with Pisae on the mouthing, Pistoriae on a side arm,
then Faesulae and Florentia on the Arnus. I explain these
names via Magdalenian PAD for the activity of feet,
comparative form PAS for everywhere, PID for a container
of liquids (lateral association of pad) and PIS for water
in motion, also bodies moving in water, also movement
caused by water (lateral association of pas). Pitinum
may then be a derivative of PAD, interpreting the origin
of so many rivers as a subterranean basin, and Pis-
may then mean water in motion, together with -aurus
'golden river'. Faes- in Faesulae might be one more
derivative of hypothetical PIS, and so might be Flo- in
Florentina, with a labial infix as in Latin fluxus German
fliessen Fluss Floss Flut, English to flow flood. My
question again: can Isaurus Isaar Isère be a rump form
of Pisaurus? if so, all these were originally _golden rivers_.

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 22, 2007, 3:07:35 AM12/22/07
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On Dec 21, 11:29 pm, Abdullah Konushevci <akonushe...@gmail.com>
wrote:
> Konushevci- Hide quoted text -

Have you ever heard for a herb called in Serbian kadulja (Common
sage)? What about tamjan (frankincense); both herbs (kadulja, tamjan)
are known for their fragrant odor when burned (Serbian dimiti,
zadimiti, dim "smoke"; dimljenje "fuming", kadjenje fumigation;
kadionica/kadilnica - kandilo censer; dimilica; hence English candle;
from Latin candela);
Now compare Serbian dim (smoke), tamjan (incense), kadjenje
(fumigation), kadulja (sage), kandilo (censer), dimljenje (fuming);
Originally, Serbian word dim (smoke) comes from Serbian tama
(darkness); cf. Serbian zadimljeno (smoky) <= zatamnjeno <= zatamljeno
(dark); related to the Serbian verb udaljiti (pull back, move
backward); i.e. when the sun goes down (Serbian suton /twilight/) it
means that the sun is sinking bellow horizon (utanja, tone, udaljuje
se; related to English deep; Serbian dublje /deeper/; dubiti /deepen/;
topiti, utopiti /merge, drown, disappear/; all from Go-Bel basis;
Serbian dubina/dublje; Russian glubina - metathesis of Gu-blina => du-
blina.

I hope I have been clear enough. The village of Dimce is an deminutive
of the Serbo-Slavic noun dim (smoke); Serbian surnames Dimic, Dimchev.
Gadimlje bears the similar connotation Ka-dimlje, Za-dimlje; from
kandilo (censer; Eng. candle) and kadulja (Salvia officinalis).

Albanian tym is just another loan word, this time from Serbo-Slavic
dim (smoke)

DV

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 22, 2007, 4:20:45 AM12/22/07
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Do you have any idea upon which linguistic examples the PIE construct
" "*nikro- 'violent, fierce' " has been based?

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 22, 2007, 5:19:26 AM12/22/07
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To sum it up, we both seem to agree that the Greek 'aporreô' does not
seem to be best fit for 'ope' of Rhodope.
Good.

> > > In Serbian it could be "calqued" as Rudo-potok (from Serbian
> > > rudan, rudeti, rujan /reddish/ and potok /brook, creek/; cf. Bulgarian
> > > Rodo-pite/ òÏÄÏÐÉÔÅ. If Dospatska Reka had an earlier name Rodopite or
> > > Rudi Potok (red creek) and that name had been later extended for the
> > > mountain name, we could say that the history of the name of mountain
> > > Rhodopi is completely resolved.
>
> > Nice.. But 'potok' (which can be understood as 'pateka' or
> > 'pieteka' (stream) in Baltic Latv.) is not the root involved.
> > 'Ope' is.
> > And so I offer as the closest apparent source of 'ope' and your above
> > 'api' ... 'upe' (river) which is Baltic.
>
> Baltic upe comes from the adjective aplis (Serb. oblo round); hence
> Latvian peldēt (swim), similar to Serbian plutati, English float or
> ploviti (sail), but it is a long story (Serb. oblo /round/, obliti /
> suffuse/, oplivati, plivati /swim/, plutati /float/, o-ploviti (sail
> around); Serbian upliv (stream, influnce)...

???
Wrong.
Nice miscellaneous list... But a river is not round.
Latvian 'upe' does not come from 'round'.
(I suspect its orgin lies in 'laying down')

An 'Apple' (Latv. 'abola') are round (Latv.'apalja')..
'Apollo' is round ('apalja').
But not rivers.

> Maybe Europe is Ebr-ope or Latvian e-Bura-ope (electronic navigable
> river)? :-)

Somehow, I don't think so.

> > (Baltic Latv. 'rud' = 'red'. synth. 'rudupe' means 'red river')
> > If anyone has a closer pair, please let me know.
>
> I am rather sceptic about "red river" etymology (Rom. raul rosu). I
> traveled a great part of Rhodope and I hadn't seen anything "reddish"
> as a Rhodopian specific characteristic. I see. you have consulted
> Duridanov's "Thracian etymology", where he (under influence of an
> ignoramus - a charlatan called Harwey Mayer) explains so-called
> Thracian/Dacian words with the help of Baltic languages.

No. I just compared available best roots and then read geological
descriptions of the area.

> > > The other possibilities is that the name Rhodopi/RODOPITE originated
> > > from the Bulgarian/Serbian word RODOVIT (fertile, fruitful,
> > > proliferous; Serb. rodovit, rodan; similar to the Kosovo toponyms
> > > Rodimlje (fruitfull) and Nerodimlje /fruitless, barren/ that I have
> > > already discussed in this thred earlier).
>
> > No. Geology reveals that the karst region of the area is very poor in
> > topsoil.
> > Additionally the thin layers of soil that do remain are *reddish*.
> > Very likely any river runoff would also be reddish.
>
> > > Nevertheless, it doesn't matter which one of the etymologies we are
> > > going to accept because the name Rodopi is of the clear Serbo-Slavic
> > > origin.  

Just like round rivers are, eh?

> > If the classical Greeks named the area 'Rhodope' in 400BC, how is it
> > possible that Slavic speakers named the area when they only arrived
> > one thousand years later? It seems impossible, doesn't it?
>
> > > The micro-region RADJEVINA in Western Serbia has a similar
> > > name to Rhodopi; one of the Rhodopian mountains in Serbia is called
> > > RADAN; there is a mountain RUJAN (across the Bulgaro-Serbian border);
> > > PN Rudo in Bosnia
> > > DV
>
> > No. It's not similar at all.
>
> Do not be silly!
> Radjevina <= Rodbina (relatives); radjati (procreate, bear,
> reproduce); Rodbina => Rodovina; Rodobito => Rodovito (fertile); Rodan
> (fruitful);
> Radan => Rodan (fruitful);
> Rujan (reddish); Serbian "rujno vino" (red wine);
> Now I'll tell you a secret: Serb. "radjanje zore" (dawning; literally:
> the birth of a dawn; rudjenje appearing of a red color) connects both
> Serbian words - rujan, rudeti (red, reddish) and radjanje
> (procreation), because the dawn is usually reddish (a small ablaut in
> Serbian: rod (genus, kin, kind), radjati (bear, procreate), rudeti
> (getting red); cf. Latvian sarkans (red; directly from the Sur-Gon
> basis wherefrom Serb zharko (hot), sunce (sun) and zora (dawn) ; Latv.
> parādīties dawn (Serb. poroditi procreate); Latv. radit procreate
> (Serb. roditi).
>

> DV- Hide quoted text

Throwing a slug of disjointed words at people does not solve the
problem of how Serbs named districts for Greeks 1000 years before they
even existed.

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 22, 2007, 7:54:27 AM12/22/07
to

I told you everything, but simply you are not intelligent enough to
understand the relation among all those words I enumerated above. I
have not heard a more ridiculous answer for a long time, "river is not
round". :-)
Who ever told you that river was round?

DV

> Throwing a slug of disjointed words at people does not solve the
> problem of how Serbs named districts for Greeks 1000 years before they
> even existed

For Haeven's sake,
If you do not understand what I am talking about and if you are unable
to see the clear-cut relation among the words I mentioned above not
even God can help you. The name Rhodope has no meaning in Greek...
didn't you know that? Greeks only noted that name in a way they heard
it from the native people of the Thracian region (the Roman province
of Thrace). The problem is we do not know exactly who that people was
and what language they were speaking. What I am trying to say is
(according to the Balkan geographical names) that a sort of Serbo-
Slavic language had been spoken there for many millenniums, long
before Christ's era.

DV

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 22, 2007, 9:26:58 AM12/22/07
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Italo

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Dec 22, 2007, 10:59:21 PM12/22/07
to

r^ stands for d?

> the Tuscan (name), the Naharcan name, (and) the Japudic
> name. If anyone (of the banished peoples) remains, bring
> him to that place to which the law is, (and) do with him
> that which the law is.'
>
> VIb:52-55. ... ape acesoniame hebetafe benust enom
> termnuco stahituto poi percam arsmatia habiest etursta.
> eso eturstahmu. pisest totar tarsinater trifor tarsinater
> tuscer naharcer iabuscer nomner eetu ehesu poplu. nosue
> ier ehe esu poplu sopir habe esme pople portatu ulo pue
> mersest fetu uru pirse mersest. ...

'tarsinater' has not the same r^?

> 'When (the augur) has come to Acedonia, to the exits,
> then (the two prinuati) shall stand at the boundary. He
> who holds the ritual wand shall pronounce banishment.
> Thus shall he pronounce banishment. Whoever is of the
> Tadinate people, of the Tadinate tribe, of the Tuscan,
> the Naharcan, (or) the Japudic name, he shall go out from
> this people. If no going out from this people takes
> place, if anyone remains among this people, bring him to
> that place to which the law is, (and) do with him that
> which the law is.'

So VIb says the same as Ib, but in a different dialect of
Umbrian?

> Following comes a curse against the alien peoples
> mentioned, but you get the idea. These peoples evidently
> surrounded the territory of the Iguvine state.
>
> Kretschmer argued that the Tadinate people and tribe
> lived to the east of Iguvium; their city *Tadinum or
> *Tadina is represented today by the toponyms Gualdo
> Tadino and Santa Maria Tadina about 20 km SE of Gubbio.
> The Tuscans/Etruscans lived to the west; the nearest
> large Etruscan city was Perusia, about 40 km to the SW.
> The Naharcans, dwellers along the Nahar/Nar/Nera, lived
> to the south, where the river flows.

> That leaves the north as the general direction from
> Iguvium where the Japudes lived.

What period do the Iguvine texts describe, the 3rd c BC?

Pliny says that in his time the last remnant of the
Liburnians on Picene coast lived at Truentum, more to the south:
"Truentum, with its river of the same name, which place is
the only remnant of the Liburni in Italy;"
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Plin.+Nat.+3.18

(I don't know the broader conections of the archaeological
"culture of Novilara", which IIRC starts in the final-bronze
or early iron, but it stretches on the Adriatic from
Novilara south to Molise..)

"..the sixth region, which includes Umbria and the Gallic
territory in the vicinity of Ariminum. At Ancona begins the
coast of that part of Gaul known as Gallia Togata. The
Siculi and the Liburni possessed the greater part of this
district, and more particularly the territories of Palma, of
Prætutia, and of Adria. These were expelled by the Umbri,
these again by the Etrurians, and these in their turn by the
Gauls." -Pliny 3.19
3.19 also mentions Sallentini in that area..


And in the north-east Adriatic:
"The nation of the Liburni adjoins the river Arsia, and
extends as far as the river Titus. The Mentores, the Hymani,
the Encheleæ, the Buni, and the people whom Callimachus
calls the Peucetiæ, formerly formed part of it; but now the
whole in general are comprised under the one name of
Illyricum. But few of the names of these nations are worthy
of mention, or indeed very easy of pronunciation. To the
jurisdiction of Scardona resort the Iapydes and fourteen
cities of the Liburni" -Pliny 3.25
In my interpretation of the above the Iapydes and Peucetiae
(probably the same as the Fecusses in Istria) ethnically
belonged to the Liburni, but their territory was later
counted part of the province Illyricum..

Also in Venetia/Histria:
"[the country] of the Iapydes, the river Timavus, the
fortress of Pucinum.." -Pliny 3.22


'Illyrian' to me is just as unclear as 'Cretan', in that it
can refer to a geographic area, not just ethnicity.
'Cretans' may stand for Kuretes, Eteocretans, Dorians,
Achaeans, Pelasgians, Teucrians, or whatever people were
said to've lived there.

On the other hand, while the later Piceni/Picentini belonged
to the same group as the Sabines it may be that the names
'Picenia' and 'Picentia', are in fact pre-Italic, and from
the same origin as the name of the Peucetii.

The Peucetians who once attacked Rome (Callimachus) may've
belonged to Picetia, a town in Latium, somewhere near
Fidenae. Maybe then the eponymic Picus does not refer to the
Sabines..

> Arguing from inscriptions and a historical mention by
> Firmus, Kretschmer identifies Monte Petrara to the NE of
> Gubbio as the site of an important shrine to Juppiter
> Appenninus, and suggests that this shrine, long being in
> the territory of Illyrian Japudes,

Illyria became just a generalizing name for all of the land
on the eastern Adriatic.

> would have given rise to the epithet Grabovius 'zur Eiche
> gehörig, Eichengott'.

also Wosigrabis (old-Prussian).

> This epithet, of Illyrian origin,

> would have been extended by the Umbrians to Mars and
> Vofionus as well; these three gods constituted their
> principal triad, like the archaic Roman triad of
> Juppiter, Mars, and Quirinus.
>
> As for the specifically Illyrian nature of 'Grabovius',
> K. cites Illyrian personal names <Grâbos> and <Grábo:n>.
> The Epirote dialect of Modern Greek has <grábos> 'oak'
> (formerly written <grâbos>), evidently continuing a
> loanword from Illyrian to ancient Epirote Greek.

> A fragment of Sophocles has the dat. pl. <graphíois>
> 'oaken', so the root was evidently *gra:bh-, which would
> have become *gra:f- if inherited into P-Italic, but
> *gra:b- in Illyrian and *grab- in Slavic. The latter can
> be ruled out for borrowings during antiquity.

While that may be so, there were other languages we don't
know anything about, such as Siculian:
"Upon the coast we have Cluana, Potentia, Numana, founded by
the Siculi, and Ancona, a colony founded by the same people
on the Promontory of Cumerus" -Pliny 3.18

If the founders of Brentesion came by ship (be it from
Illyria, or from/via Crete as Strabo and others say) then it
isn't unlikely that their first foothold was the isle in
front of the harbor. Which was called Barra (Gr.Pharos).
http://www.telemaco.unibo.it/rom/italia/img05/brundisium2.gif

And, rather as suppose that the islet got its name later
from a lighttower, it may belong to 'burion' (house,
dwellingplace) and 'baris' (tower, palace).
IMO, the name Brentesion is just an extension of this root.

The same for Barium, and Brundulum (near Atria, the one by
the Fossa Philistina), and Paros/Pharos in Liburnia. Even
Parion/Baris on the Hellespont.


(I wonder if 'Astyanax' (son of Paris) can then be a literal
translation of the name/title 'Paris'/'Priamos' "(lord) of
the city", which may also explain 'Boreas', and even the
Kassite deity Buriash.)

(And - as I believe that Homer's Phaiakes were from Peucetia
(formerly incl. Messapia), I place their town at either
Taranto or Brindisi. Homer gives a clue by stating that a
returning Phaiakian ship was turned into a rock by Poseidon
within sight of the harbor. Now since a baris is also a type
of boat, this may link it to Brindisi, IMO.)

>>> The formation appears to be parallel to Oscan
>>> <casnar> 'senex' (pace H. Krahe, Glotta 26:95-97
>>> [1938], who regarded the -ar specifically as a
>>> river-name suffix, as in <Isara> and the like). But
>>> as for *nagh-, whence it came, and what it originally
>>> meant, I have no clue.
>>
>> Could there be a connection to the name of the
>> Nereides? Though these belong to the sea, not rivers.
>
>
> I doubt it. The fact that <naharkom> appears in the
> earlier Iguvine Tables (in a modified Etruscan alphabet),
> whose orthography does not otherwise indicate /a:/ by
> <aha>,

O.K. I was unsure about that.. (if <aha> wasn't just the
result of the local orthograpic convention..)

> indicates that the -h- was pronounced. If the root goes
> back to Proto-Italic and further to PIE, it must be
> *nagh-. We would then expect *nakh- in Greek, not *ne:r-
> or *na:r-. If the root is from Mediterranean
> substratum, I do not know what the -h- would correspond
> to in Pre-Greek. I have no other usable examples.
>
>
>> http://etruscans1.tripod.com/Language/EtruscanN.htmlalso
>> mentions an Etruscan <neri>. Too bad Zavaroni's site
>> no longer exists or I would've checked the context.
>
>
> An Etruscan noun <neri> occurs thrice in the zero-case
> and once in the genitive <neris'> on page X of the Liber
> Linteus (incorporating the Herbig fragment under
> Roncalli's line-numbering). Here is the "context", then:
>
>
> 20 ara.ratum.ai6'na.leitrum.zutheva.zal 21
> es'ic.ci.halchza.thu.es'ic.zal.mula.6'antic 22
> thapna.thapnzac.lena.etera.thec.pei6'na 23
> hau6'ti.fanus'e.neris'.[c]ave.[vea].thui.neri --(lines
> 24-28 missing)-- 29
> 6'antic.vinum.thui.thapna[--------mucum] 30
> halchze.thui.thi.vacl.ce6'a6'in.thum6'a.cilva 31
> neri.canva.car6'i.putnam.thu.calatnam

reminds of 'kalatne' on the Novilara stele.

> 32 tei.lena.hau6'tis'.enac.es'i.catni6'.heci 33
> 6'purta.6'ul6'le.napti.thui.lai6'cla.hechz.ner/i/ 34
> [---------------um.-----].une.m[lac--nthi]
>
> The copyist was rather sloppy about the sibilants. On
> page XI we can deduce that <vinum> 'wine' was poured
> <s'antis'ts'> 'from the ewer', and <thi> 'water' was
> poured <thapnes'ts'> 'from the pitcher'. From the
> passages above we might guess that <hau6'ti> and <neri>,
> like <6'anti> and <thapna>, are names of vessels.
> Cortsen's suggestion that <neri> = Sabine <na:r>
> 'sulphur' is groundless, as is Pfiffig's that <neri>
> means 'water'. We can be reasonably sure that <thi>
> means 'water' in Etruscan. Whether <neri> was originally
> a nominalized necessitative, like <zeri> 'to-be-sworn' =
> 'oath', I know not.

Thanks. All very interesting.

lora...@cs.com

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Dec 24, 2007, 6:17:08 AM12/24/07
to

I don't want to put anyone on the spot, but an answer (or Celtic
example) would be most helpful in arriving at a more clear resolution
of origin and perhaps even indicate some more applicable comparative
methodology.

.


lora...@cs.com

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Dec 24, 2007, 7:10:48 AM12/24/07
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On Dec 22, 4:54 am, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Dec 22, 11:19 am, lorad...@cs.com wrote:
>
> > > > Nice.. But 'potok' (which can be understood as 'pateka' or
> > > > 'pieteka' (stream) in Baltic Latv.) is not the root involved.
> > > > 'Ope' is.
> > > > And so I offer as the closest apparent source of 'ope' and your above
> > > > 'api' ... 'upe' (river) which is Baltic.
>
> > > Baltic upe comes from the adjective aplis (Serb. oblo round); hence
> > > Latvian peldēt (swim), similar to Serbian plutati, English float or
> > > ploviti (sail), but it is a long story (Serb. oblo /round/, obliti /
> > > suffuse/, oplivati, plivati /swim/, plutati /float/, o-ploviti (sail
> > > around); Serbian upliv (stream, influnce)...
> > ???
> > Wrong.
> > Nice miscellaneous list... But a river is not round.
> > Latvian 'upe' does not come from 'round'.
> > (I suspect its orgin lies in 'laying down')
>
> I told you everything, but simply you are not intelligent enough to
> understand the relation among all those words I enumerated above.

It's the other way around.. Your above 'obo' is not the source for
'upe/ope'
You've latched onto the wrong root again.

> have not heard a more ridiculous answer for a long time, "river is not
> round". :-)
> Who ever told you that river was round?
> DV

You did, of course.. "but it is a long story (Serb. oblo /round/,


obliti / suffuse/, oplivati, plivati /swim/, plutati /float/, o-
ploviti (sail around); Serbian upliv (stream, influnce)..."

If you don't mean what you say, then don't say it.

Anyone can post rambling lists of words.. the idea is to explain what
you mean by posting such.. rather than pointing at that gaggle of
words and saying 'voila'.

> The name Rhodope has no meaning in Greek...
> didn't you know that?

Umm.. yes. That was the point of discussion as per my closest Greek
examples.

> Greeks only noted that name in a way they heard
> it from the native people of the Thracian region (the Roman province
> of Thrace). The problem is we do not know exactly who that people was
> and what language they were speaking.

Well.. now we know that the Thracian name sounded a lot like Baltic.
In fact 'rudupe' -IS- a Baltic place name:
"Location of Rudupe, Latvia (Latitude: 57° 2' 60 N, Longitude: 21° 55'
0 E) displayed on world map, coordinates and short location facts.
www.traveljournals.net/explore/latvia/map/m4549279/rudupe.html "

..and so 'rhodope' appears to refer to an area in ancient Thrace that
had an identical place name.

> What I am trying to say is
> (according to the Balkan geographical names) that a sort of Serbo-
> Slavic language had been spoken there for many millenniums, long
> before Christ's era.
> DV

Yes... key terminology here is "a sort of Serbo- Slavic language"...
For which the Baltic 'rudupe' provided the best solution.

Dušan Vukotic

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Dec 24, 2007, 9:18:23 AM12/24/07
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On Dec 24, 1:10 pm, lorad...@cs.com wrote:

> > have not heard a more ridiculous answer for a long time, "river is not
> > round". :-)
> > Who ever told you that river was round?
> > DV
>
> You did, of course.. "but it is a long story (Serb. oblo /round/,
> obliti / suffuse/, oplivati, plivati /swim/, plutati /float/, o-
> ploviti (sail around); Serbian upliv (stream, influnce)..."
>
> If you don't mean what you say, then don't say it.

No I didn't! Go back and read again what I really wrote and try to
understand it properly.

> > > An 'Apple' (Latv. 'abola') are round (Latv.'apalja')..
> > > 'Apollo' is round ('apalja').
> > > But not rivers.

Serb oblo (round), obliti (suffuse), upliv (stream); Baltic upe
(river); water splashes a/round objects; also Serbian oblak (cloud)


> > For Haeven's sake,
> > If you do not understand what I am talking about and if you are unable
> > to see the clear-cut relation among the words I mentioned above not
> > even God can help you.

> Anyone can post rambling lists of words.. the idea is to explain what
> you mean by posting such.. rather than pointing at that gaggle of
> words and saying 'voila'.

You seem to be unable to grasp the magnitude of your own mental (self-
imposed) confinement!

> Yes... key terminology here is "a sort of Serbo- Slavic language"...

> For which the Baltic 'rudupe' provided the best solution.

"Rudupe" is not "Rhodope"... or more exact: it has nothing to do with
Bulgarian Rodopite (Родопите ). I do not believe that anyone would
have named the Queen Rhodope as "The Red River". That Greek-Thracian
myth is very old, and certainly much older than Baltic Rudupe (а
simple compound word).

DV

Douglas G. Kilday

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Dec 25, 2007, 5:42:08 PM12/25/07
to
Italo wrote:
> Douglas G. Kilday wrote:
> > Italo wrote:
> >> Douglas G. Kilday wrote:
> >>> Italo wrote:
>
> >> [...]

>
> >> Didn't know about this 'iapuzkum'. How is established
> >> that these were to the north or northeast of Iguvium?
>
> > The relevant passages in the Iguvine Tables mention this
> > people along with several others as foreigners who may
> > not participate in the Iguvine rites.
> > Tab. Ig. Ib:15-18.  ... pune menes aker^uniamem enumek
> > etur^stamu tuta tar^inate trifu tar^inate turskum
> > naharkum numem iapuzkum numem. svepis habe purtatulu pue
> > mer^s est feitu uru per^e mer^s est.
>
> > 'When you come to Acedonia, then pronounce banishment on
> > the Tadinate state, the Tadinate tribe,
>
> r^ stands for d?

-r^- is the regular reflex of inherited -d- between vowels in Umbrian,
unless the lenition was hindered by the dissimilative effect of
neighboring -r- (either original or resulting from rhotacism of
inherited -s-).

> > the Tuscan (name), the Naharcan name, (and) the Japudic
> > name.  If anyone (of the banished peoples) remains, bring
> >  him to that place to which the law is, (and) do with him
> > that which the law is.'
>
> > VIb:52-55.  ... ape acesoniame hebetafe benust enom
> > termnuco stahituto poi percam arsmatia habiest etursta.
> > eso eturstahmu. pisest totar tarsinater trifor tarsinater
> > tuscer naharcer iabuscer nomner eetu ehesu poplu. nosue
> > ier ehe esu poplu sopir habe esme pople portatu ulo pue
> > mersest fetu uru pirse mersest. ...
>
> 'tarsinater' has not the same r^?

Yes, but in the Latin alphabet of the later Tables the phoneme /r^/ is
written <rs>, making it homographic with ordinary <rs> representing
the sequence /rs/. Neither the Etruscan nor the Latin alphabet was
entirely adequate for writing Umbrian. History shows us that less
than adequate writing systems are generally tolerated, of course.

> > 'When (the augur) has come to Acedonia, to the exits,
> > then (the two prinuati) shall stand at the boundary.  He
> > who holds the ritual wand shall pronounce banishment.
> > Thus shall he pronounce banishment. Whoever is of the
> > Tadinate people, of the Tadinate tribe, of the Tuscan,
> > the Naharcan, (or) the Japudic name, he shall go out from
> > this people.  If no going out from this people takes
> > place, if anyone remains among this people, bring him to
> > that place to which the law is, (and) do with him that
> > which the law is.'
>
> So VIb says the same as Ib, but in a different dialect of
> Umbrian?

Probably the same (Iguvine) dialect, but a later form of it with
different orthographic conventions, beyond the fact that the alphabet
is slightly modified Latin rather than slightly modified Etruscan.
Also the later text goes into more detail in many of the ritual
matters.

> > Following comes a curse against the alien peoples
> > mentioned, but you get the idea.  These peoples evidently
> > surrounded the territory of the Iguvine state.
>
> > Kretschmer argued that the Tadinate people and tribe
> > lived to the east of Iguvium; their city *Tadinum or
> > *Tadina is represented today by the toponyms Gualdo
> > Tadino and Santa Maria Tadina about 20 km SE of Gubbio.
> >  The Tuscans/Etruscans lived to the west; the nearest
> > large Etruscan city was Perusia, about 40 km to the SW.
> >  The Naharcans, dwellers along the Nahar/Nar/Nera, lived
> > to the south, where the river flows.
> > That leaves the north as the general direction from
> > Iguvium where the Japudes lived.
>
> What period do the Iguvine texts describe, the 3rd c BC?

Probably more like the 5th c., if we are talking about the composition
of the archetypes of the ritual texts. But the latest stage of
composition arguably postdated the Social War, since the amounts of
fines to be levied against ritual officials in case of dereliction of
duty seem ridiculously large unless a massive devaluation is taken
into effect. As with any Traditional Book, we have entanglements of
different strata of composition. The ritual of pronouncing banishment
against foreigners apparently continued well into the 1st c., although
politically it had been obsolete for several centuries.

> Pliny says that in his time the last remnant of the
> Liburnians on Picene coast lived at Truentum, more to the south:
> "Truentum, with its river of the same name, which place is
> the only remnant of the Liburni in Italy;"http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?lookup=Plin.+Nat.+3.18

Here again we have initial accent (modern Tronto not *Trovento), and
probably initial devoicing of a stop, from *Dru- (as in Padus, Padua
vs. Bodincus). The Liburnians can reasonably be assigned to the
Illyrian group.

> (I don't know the broader conections of the archaeological
> "culture of Novilara", which IIRC starts in the final-bronze
> or early iron, but it stretches on the Adriatic from
> Novilara south to Molise..)

It would be tempting to call this an Illyrian expansion down the
western Adriatic, but I also am not familiar with the archaeology. Of
course, if the text of the stele of Novilara and the other scraps of
the North Picene language are in fact Illyrian, this would explain how
the language got there.

I have a copy of a paper somewhere dealing with this problem. Until I
find it, I can only note that -eu- becomes -ou- in Italic but is
retained as -eu- in Illyrian (as we see from several proper names
based on *teuta:), while both <peico> acc. sg. 'woodpecker' and
<peica> acc. sg. 'magpie' are mentioned as augurial birds in the
Iguvine Tables, so it is not implausible that some P-Italic tribe,
such as northeastern Sabines, took their name from a totem of either
of these birds. The vowel in <Pi:ce:num> is long, as in the bird-
names; that in <picea> 'pitch-pine' is short, so we have no basis for
supposing that Peuc- would be calqued as Pi:c- if it represented
'pitch-pine, fir' as in Greek.

> > Arguing from inscriptions and a historical mention by
> > Firmus, Kretschmer identifies Monte Petrara to the NE of
> > Gubbio as the site of an important shrine to Juppiter
> > Appenninus, and suggests that this shrine, long being in
> > the territory of Illyrian Japudes,
>
> Illyria became just a generalizing name for all of the land
> on the eastern Adriatic.

Well, yes, this happens with names, and that is why we must look at
soundlaws as well as geography.

> > would have given rise to the epithet Grabovius 'zur Eiche
> >  gehörig, Eichengott'.
>
> also Wosigrabis (old-Prussian).

Thanks.

> > This epithet, of Illyrian origin,
> > would have been extended by the Umbrians to Mars and
> > Vofionus as well; these three gods constituted their
> > principal triad, like the archaic Roman triad of
> > Juppiter, Mars, and Quirinus.
>
> > As for the specifically Illyrian nature of 'Grabovius',
> > K. cites Illyrian personal names <Grâbos> and <Grábo:n>.
> > The Epirote dialect of Modern Greek has <grábos> 'oak'
> > (formerly written <grâbos>), evidently continuing a
> > loanword from Illyrian to ancient Epirote Greek.
> > A fragment of Sophocles has the dat. pl. <graphíois>
> > 'oaken', so the root was evidently *gra:bh-, which would
> > have become *gra:f- if inherited into P-Italic, but
> > *gra:b- in Illyrian and *grab- in Slavic.  The latter can
> > be ruled out for borrowings during antiquity.
>
> While that may be so, there were other languages we don't
> know anything about, such as Siculian:
> "Upon the coast we have Cluana, Potentia, Numana, founded by
> the Siculi, and Ancona, a colony founded by the same people
> on the Promontory of Cumerus" -Pliny 3.18

One possibility is that the Siculi were responsible for names in which
PIE voiced aspirates are represented by unvoiced stops. Then the
Rutuli could be understood as the Red Ones, Leuternoi as the Freedmen
(vel sim.), Aetna as the Fireplace (*aidh-), and so forth. A
promontory typically has a narrow neck, and Ancona could reflect
*angh- under this scenario.

Since the -h- in Nahar most likely represents an Indo-European *gh
inherited into Italic (no other plausible source of the -h- being
available), I wonder whether we might connect it with Greek <né:kho:>
(Doric <ná:kho:>) 'I swim', <nêssa> (Boeotian <nâssa>) 'a duck', the
original sense being 'to dive, plunge'. The Nahar, flowing out of the
Appennines, has waterfalls; one is pictured on the website

http://www.parks.it/parco.fluviale.nera/par.html

which may be the Cascata delle Marmore mentioned in the text, for all
I know. This would explain the 'diving' or 'plunging' aspect of the
river-name, and would make it parallel to those Baltic river-names in
Ner-. The duck is a diving bird, and derivation of the Greek word
from *na:gh-ja makes more sense than the usual connection with Latin
<anas> and the rest (in Chantraine and Pokorny) which requires
irregular loss of initial a- in the Greek form.

Pokorny puts Grk. <né:kho:> under his root *sna:- usw.
'schwimmen' (IEW 971), the extension being comparable to that in
<smé:kho:> 'I wipe down', <psé:kho:> 'I rub down'. If I am correct
that the extended PIE form *sna:gh- (or, if you prefer, *sneH2gh-)
meant 'to dive', not simply 'to swim', we may be dealing with a PIE
verbal postfix *-gh- 'down', superseded in the daughter branches of IE
by preposed adverbs which tended to become prefixes.

The connection with Sabine <na:r> 'sulphur' is not necessarily
vitiated by this scenario. After the verb *(s)nah- disappeared from
Sabine, the river-name Nahar(s) would have been etymologically
isolated, and may have been reinterpreted as 'the Sulphurous', leading
to back-formation of the common noun for 'sulphur'.

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 25, 2007, 6:26:22 PM12/25/07
to
lorad...@cs.com wrote:
> lorad...@cs.com wrote:

> > "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
>  The definitive paper is by Hans Krahe, "Die germanische
> > Lautverschiebung und der Neckar", _Beiträge zur Namenforschung_
> > 11:144-7 [1960].  Krahe noted that some other toponyms and hydronyms
> > in this area have unshifted -g- of Celtic origin, hence Germans did
> > not move in until their consonant-shift was done, hence the -c- of
> > <Nicer> (first attested in a panegyric to Constantine) is also
> > unshifted, and we can refer the river-name to PIE *nikro- 'violent,
> > fierce', referring to its strong current; presumably the name was
> > applied by Celts.
>
>  Do you have any idea upon which linguistic examples the PIE construct
>  " "*nikro- 'violent, fierce' " has been based?

Krahe cites Latvian <nikns> 'heftig, zornig' and <naîks> 'schnell,
heftig' as well as Greek <neîkos> 'Streit'. Pokorny has a few other
words under his root *ne:ik-/*ni:k-/*nik- (IEW 761), including Old
English <genæ:stan> (*ge-naihstian?) 'streiten'. I wonder whether
Eng. <nasty> 'disgusting, disagreeable, difficult' might belong here
as well, with ME <nasty>, <naxty> representing OE *næ(h)stig, rather
than a variant of <nesty> 'fouled like a dirty bird's nest' (suggested
as possible by the AHD, implausible because birds don't foul their own
nests). The sense of <nasty> would then have developed from 'doing
violence to one's taste, assaulting one's sensibilities' or the like.
But I digress.

> I don't want to put anyone on the spot, but an answer (or Celtic
> example) would be most helpful in arriving at a more clear resolution
> of origin and perhaps even indicate some more applicable comparative
> methodology.

Pokorny, a Celticist, has no other Celtic examples, and no other
derivatives in -ro-, but the latter is a sufficiently common IE
adjectival suffix that no eyebrows should be raised.

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 25, 2007, 7:19:42 PM12/25/07
to
Franz Gnaedinger wrote:

The only plausible way to lose P- in such a rump form is for Celts to
have the name before their /p/ vanished, and Pisaurum is too far south
to be a Celtic settlement. Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to
have the same root, but different suffixes. The suffix in Isaurus
cannot be identical to Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom>
(Festus) shows that the -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an
unrhotacized -s-. Pisaurus (the usual Latin name of the river) was
evidently applied by analogy from the town Pisaurum, since with the
demise of Illyrian, the connection between the Isaurus and Pisaurum
'on the Isaurus' could no longer be understood.

Faesulae is probably of Etruscan origin. I have no attestation of the
Etruscan form, but I would expect *Feisli by analogy with Ceicna/
Caecina, Velathri/Volaterrae and similar known pairs. Whether this is
native Etruscan or an adaptation of a non-Etruscan name, I know not.
I am reasonably sure that Etr. Felsina (later Bononia, now Bologna)
comes from IE *pels- 'rock, cliff' (Ger. <Fels>, Maced. <pélla>
'líthos' (Hsch.), also Maced. town Pella), so an IE source for
Faesulae is phonetically possible.

Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,
meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).

Abdullah Konushevci

unread,
Dec 25, 2007, 9:10:45 PM12/25/07
to
On Dec 26, 1:19 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
> Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
> > "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
> The only plausible way to lose P- in such a rump form is for Celts to
> have the name before their /p/ vanished, and Pisaurum is too far south
> to be a Celtic settlement. Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to
> have the same root, but different suffixes. The suffix in Isaurus
> cannot be identical to Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom>
> (Festus) shows that the -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an
> unrhotacized -s-. Pisaurus (the usual Latin name of the river) was
> evidently applied by analogy from the town Pisaurum, since with the
> demise of Illyrian, the connection between the Isaurus and Pisaurum
> 'on the Isaurus' could no longer be understood.

Working on the study of Gallap's (Dardanian Province) place-names, I
face very hard place-name Desivojca, attested as Dexiuoevzi in some
Raguzian sources, later as Desilofc and Desivçe in Ottoman sources.
Being aware that across this village goes homonym river and that in
Albanian we have almost regular dissimulation i - i > e - i (cf. Sl.
ličiti > Alb. leçit 'to deprive'), I came to conclusion that this
place-name is motivated by river name and should be derived form
prefixed form d- + is-il-/-iv-. Root *H1is-ro seems to be a suffixed
zero-grade form of *H1eis-, attested in Greek hieros 'powerful,
holly'. So, I think that *H1is- gets very early the meaning of
'powerful, holy river', attested in river Illyrian river name Isamnus,
in Illyrian TN Histroi, in place-name Istra, in Dardanian place-name
Istrina, as well as in Celtic Isaurus, Ukrainian river name Dn-ister
etc.
To sum up, Illyrian-Albanian prefix d- is attested not only in river
names, as: D-rin-us, D-ril-o, D-riv-astum, D-ab-anos, D-ab-esh-ec >
Dabishec, due to dissimulation e - e > i - e (cf. Sl. beseda > Alb
bisedë 'conversation, chat, interview') but as well as in D-is-il-/D-
is-iv- etc.

Konushevci

lora...@cs.com

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 12:28:55 AM12/26/07
to

Thanks for the clarification.
I was at a loss to find any related Celtic word form, and most
certainly did want to point out the Baltic Latv. 'nikns' as being the
closest in form and meaning - despite definitions from Hans Krahe to
the contrary.

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 3:39:46 AM12/26/07
to
On Dec 26, 3:10 am, Abdullah Konushevci <akonushe...@gmail.com> wrote:

> Working on the study of Gallap's (Dardanian Province) place-names, I
> face very hard place-name Desivojca, attested as Dexiuoevzi in some
> Raguzian sources, later as Desilofc and Desivçe in Ottoman sources.
> Being aware that across this village goes homonym river and that in
> Albanian we have almost regular dissimulation i - i > e - i (cf. Sl.
> ličiti > Alb. leçit 'to deprive'), I came to conclusion that this
> place-name is motivated by river name and should be derived form
> prefixed form d- + is-il-/-iv-. Root *H1is-ro seems to be a suffixed
> zero-grade form of *H1eis-, attested in Greek hieros 'powerful,
> holly'. So, I think that *H1is- gets very early the meaning of
> 'powerful, holy river', attested in river Illyrian river name Isamnus,
> in Illyrian TN Histroi, in place-name Istra, in Dardanian place-name
> Istrina, as well as in Celtic Isaurus, Ukrainian river name Dn-ister
> etc.
> To sum up, Illyrian-Albanian prefix d- is attested not only in river
> names, as: D-rin-us, D-ril-o, D-riv-astum, D-ab-anos, D-ab-esh-ec >
> Dabishec, due to dissimulation e - e > i - e (cf. Sl. beseda > Alb
> bisedë 'conversation, chat, interview') but as well as in D-is-il-/D-
> is-iv- etc.
>
> Konushevci

Quatsch!

The best contribution that Abdullah could possible make to the
Albanian linguistic science would be if he could have kept his mouth
shut.

Near Gacko (Bosnia) we can find the lake called Desivoj, and Desivoj
is one of the oldest Serbo-Slavic personal names beside Desimir.
Desirad. Desislav, Desa, Dejan, Desko, Tasa, Taško (from Tanasko ),
family names Desivojević, Desković; Serbian Desivojska Reka is equal
to another Serbian toponym - Gazivode (from Gon-Bel- basis).

If we compare the aboove Serbian Des- names with the Serbian words
desiti (happen), nenadano (unexpected; hence the Serbian personal name
Nenad) and iz-nenada (sudden) we will be able to understand that the
Serbian name Desivoj is a compound word (an agglutination and
assimilation of the primeval syllables Gon-Gon-Bel-Gon). When we
observe the name Desivoje more carefully we would be heavily surprised
seeing that this name is a counterpart to the Greek word δεσποτικός/
despotikos (autocrat, despotic) and Serbian gospodin (gentleman, lord,
sir).

Compare the so-called Thracian Decebalus and Serbian Župan (from
Gohpan/Gospan) ; all the above words are closely related to the words
as English king, Serbian knez.
Guess how it happened?

DV

for avarage and above-average intelligent peoples/pupils only ;-)

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 4:15:36 AM12/26/07
to
> for avarage and above-average intelligent peoples/pupils only ;-)- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

There is an Albanian family name - Desivojci - also derived from
Desivoj; i.e. it came from Serbian Desivoj, Desivojević and turned to
be Desivojci in a similar way as the Serbo-Slavic surname Konushevic/
Konjušević became Konushevci after their Slavic ancestors accepted the
Islamic Religion.

Of course, Desivojci means nothing in Albanian and there was no
Albanian who ever bore the name Desivoj
http://slavn.org/z/101/

DV

Brian M. Scott

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 4:24:49 AM12/26/07
to
On Tue, 25 Dec 2007 18:10:45 -0800 (PST), Abdullah
Konushevci <akonu...@gmail.com> wrote in
<news:51714358-20ce-497d...@e4g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>
in sci.lang:

[...]

> Working on the study of Gallap's (Dardanian Province) place-names, I
> face very hard place-name Desivojca, attested as Dexiuoevzi in some
> Raguzian sources, later as Desilofc and Desivçe in Ottoman sources.
> Being aware that across this village goes homonym river and that in
> Albanian we have almost regular dissimulation i - i > e - i (cf. Sl.
> ličiti > Alb. leçit 'to deprive'), I came to conclusion that this
> place-name is motivated by river name and should be derived form
> prefixed form d- + is-il-/-iv-. Root *H1is-ro seems to be a suffixed
> zero-grade form of *H1eis-, attested in Greek hieros 'powerful,
> holly'. So, I think that *H1is- gets very early the meaning of
> 'powerful, holy river', attested in river Illyrian river name Isamnus,
> in Illyrian TN Histroi, in place-name Istra, in Dardanian place-name
> Istrina, as well as in Celtic Isaurus, Ukrainian river name Dn-ister
> etc.

In river-names a sense closer to Pokorny's 'to move rapidly'
seems likely, something implying a swiftly or powerfully
moving current.

[...]

Brian

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 4:53:01 AM12/26/07
to
> DV- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

As everone can see, the family name Konushevci is meaningless in
Albanian; in Slavic it is derived from the word konj- (horse;
Konjević, Deri-konja, Konjić).

There is a great number of Konjušević family members in Klenak
http://www.prezimenik.co.yu/IZDANJA/Srpski_prezimenik/O_Prezimeniku.htm(the
northern Serbian Province Vojvodina, Srem) where they settled after
the first Great Serbian Migration from Kosovo (1690) .

I have already pointed out that the Slavic surname Konusevic could be
found even in Russia:
[...26 [Konusevic]
Конусевич, Е. Н. "Иван Серегеевич Тургенев." Литературное обозрение,
1993, № 11/12, 4?10...]
http://www.turgenev.org.ru/e-book/bibliography/1993.htm

DV

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 5:35:08 AM12/26/07
to
On Dec 26, 10:24 am, "Brian M. Scott" <b.sc...@csuohio.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, 25 Dec 2007 18:10:45 -0800 (PST), Abdullah
> Konushevci <akonushe...@gmail.com> wrote in

> <news:51714358-20ce-497d...@e4g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>
> in sci.lang:
>
> [...]
>
> > Working on the study of Gallap's (Dardanian Province) place-names, I
> > face very hard place-name Desivojca, attested as Dexiuoevzi in some
> > Raguzian sources, later as Desilofc and Desivçe in Ottoman sources.
> > Being aware that across this village goes homonym river and that in
> > Albanian we have almost regular dissimulation i - i > e - i (cf. Sl.
> > lièiti > Alb. leçit 'to deprive'), I came to conclusion that this

> > place-name is motivated by river name and should be derived form
> > prefixed form d- + is-il-/-iv-. Root *H1is-ro seems to be a suffixed
> > zero-grade form of *H1eis-, attested in Greek hieros 'powerful,
> > holly'. So, I think that *H1is- gets very early the meaning of
> > 'powerful, holy river', attested in river Illyrian river name Isamnus,
> > in Illyrian TN Histroi, in place-name Istra, in Dardanian place-name
> > Istrina, as well as in Celtic Isaurus, Ukrainian river name Dn-ister
> > etc.
>
> In river-names a sense closer to Pokorny's 'to move rapidly'
> seems likely, something implying a swiftly or powerfully
> moving current.
>
> [...]
>
> Brian

But it has nothing to do with neither the so-called Illyrian nor with
the modern Albanian language. As I showed above: Serbian personal name
Desivoj <= Desiboj <= Despot <= Gospod (Lord) = Greek Δεσποτης; all
also related to the Serbo-Slavic name Gostivoj [Serb. gazda lord; cf.
Serbian uspeti, uspeh (success; from h/uspeti), osvojiti, osvajač
(conquerer; from h/osvajač)]; uspinjati, uspenje Bogorodice/Gospe (the
elevation of mother Mary; Mary is also named Gospa in Serbian.

DV

Trond Engen

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 10:52:10 PM12/26/07
to
Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:

> Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
>
>> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>>
>>> Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
>>> against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
>>> Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element
>>> as Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several
>>> other rivers of eastern Italy. Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms,
>>> Epídamnos, Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix
>>> Pi- to Epi-.
>>

>> [...]
>
> [...] Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to have the same root, but


> different suffixes. The suffix in Isaurus cannot be identical to
> Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom> (Festus) shows that the
> -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an unrhotacized -s-.

Hypothetically speaking, couldn't the first -s- have survived because of
some consonant that later disappeared, say *ins- > *i:s, or because the
compound *is+ausus was transparent at the time of the sound change? What
is *is in these compounds? IE *eis- "powerful"?

Given the parallel to <Isamnus>, I understand that you see <aurus> as a
word for (some type of) river. The following may be obvious or stupid,
but since I'm unable to tell the difference between either of them and
genious I'll give it a shot.

AFAICT, *ausus wouldn't necessarily mean "golden". There seem to be two
homonymous PIE roots *H2ews. One is the "shine" root from e.g. Lat.
<aurum> "gold" and <aurora> "morning red", Norw. <aust> "east", and Eng.
<east>. The other is the "scoop, pour (water)" root from e.g. Lat.
<haurire> and Norw. <ause> (to which Eng. 'ease' would fit like a glove
if it weren't for that bloody French word), not a bad candidate for a
river name. Even better, perhaps, if one dared to connect the two IE
roots in something like "unleash".

An *aurus, OTOH, would seem to fit that *H2ewr- (?) "water, moisture"
root behind e.g. OInd <vá:r>, Lat. <urina> "urine", and Scand. <ur>
"drizzle, fog, etc.". There are several rivers in Norway and one in SW
Finland by the name of Aura. The name is normally explained as "The
sandy one" < ON <aurr> "sand, pebbles; deposit at a river mouth" < Gmc.
*aura-. AFAIK, this Gmc. word is unexplained. Semantically, one could
perhaps see it as a shift of meaning "river" > "river bed" > "sand.
pebbles". The rivers are sort of sandy so there's no particular reason
to doubt the explanation, but I still wanted to mention it.

--
Trond Engen
- dreaming of doing this with ease

Trond Engen

unread,
Dec 26, 2007, 11:06:13 PM12/26/07
to
Trond Engen skreiv:

> ON <aurr> "sand, pebbles; deposit at a river mouth" < Gmc. *aura-.

I misedited again. ON <aurr> "sand, pebbles; muddy water?", <eyrr>
"deposit at a river mouth". The latter from Gmc. *aurio:-.

--
Trond Engen
- polishing the aura

Paul J Kriha

unread,
Dec 27, 2007, 2:46:21 AM12/27/07
to
"Dušan Vukotic" <dusan....@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:11075c0c-4892-4265...@q77g2000hsh.googlegroups.com...

>On Dec 26, 10:15 am, "Dušan Vukotic" <dusan.vuko...@gmail.com> wrote:
[...]

>>
>> There is an Albanian family name - Desivojci - also derived from
>> Desivoj; i.e. it came from Serbian Desivoj, Desivojević and turned to
>> be Desivojci in a similar way as the Serbo-Slavic surname Konushevic/
>> Konjušević became Konushevci after their Slavic ancestors accepted the
>> Islamic Religion.
>>
>> Of course, Desivojci means nothing in Albanian and there was no
>> Albanian who ever bore the name Desivojhttp://slavn.org/z/101/
>>
>> DV
>
>As everone can see, the family name Konushevci is meaningless in
>Albanian; in Slavic it is derived from the word konj- (horse;
>Konjević, Deri-konja, Konjić).
>
>There is a great number of Konjušević family members in Klenak
> http://www.prezimenik.co.yu/IZDANJA/Srpski_prezimenik/O_Prezimeniku.htm(the
>northern Serbian Province Vojvodina, Srem) where they settled after
>the first Great Serbian Migration from Kosovo (1690) .
>
>I have already pointed out that the Slavic surname Konusevic could be
>found even in Russia:
>[...26 [Konusevic]
>Конусевич, Е. Н. "Иван Серегеевич Тургенев." Литературное обозрение,
>1993, № 11/12, 4?10...]

That's "Konusevich" with a "s".
"Konus-" is most unlikely to be the same as "Konush-".

There's this place in Bulgaria:
http://www.fallingrain.com/world/BU/34/Konush.html
People from over there are likely to have been known as
"Konushev"s or "Konushevich"s. :-)

>
>DV

Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 27, 2007, 3:40:18 AM12/27/07
to
On Dec 26, 1:19 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
>
> The only plausible way to lose P- in such a rump form is for Celts to
> have the name before their /p/ vanished, and Pisaurum is too far south
> to be a Celtic settlement.  Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to
> have the same root, but different suffixes.  The suffix in Isaurus
> cannot be identical to Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom>
> (Festus) shows that the -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an
> unrhotacized -s-.  Pisaurus (the usual Latin name of the river) was
> evidently applied by analogy from the town Pisaurum, since with the
> demise of Illyrian, the connection between the Isaurus and Pisaurum
> 'on the Isaurus' could no longer be understood.

What do you make of the river Sapis running parallel
to the river Pisaurus / Isaurus? of the village Pistoriae
on the Umbro, side arm of the Arnus? of the river Pisuarge
in northern Spain?

> Faesulae is probably of Etruscan origin.  I have no attestation of the
> Etruscan form, but I would expect *Feisli by analogy with Ceicna/
> Caecina, Velathri/Volaterrae and similar known pairs.  Whether this is
> native Etruscan or an adaptation of a non-Etruscan name, I know not.
> I am reasonably sure that Etr. Felsina (later Bononia, now Bologna)
> comes from IE *pels- 'rock, cliff' (Ger. <Fels>, Maced. <pélla>
> 'líthos' (Hsch.), also Maced. town Pella), so an IE source for
> Faesulae is phonetically possible.

As far as I know the Etruscan root of Felsina was Velzna,
the meaning of it unknown, perhaps having to to with fertility.
I explain Velutne via BEL TON 'warm sound', sound occurring
in the warm seasons, namely thunder. Velzna may then be an
analoguous compound, warm (bel vel) flash (zna, onomatopoeic).
As for *pels 'rock, cliff', I would tentatively derive it from PIS for
water in motion, also bodies moving in water, movement caused
by water, etc. It might originally have been rock that was bared
and polished by water. German Pelz for fur would be another
derivative, the analogy being the one of hair and water observed
by Leonardo da Vinci.

> Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
> this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,

> meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).- Hide quoted text -

This goes along with hypothetical PIS with the above
meanings.

Dušan Vukotic

unread,
Dec 27, 2007, 9:24:15 AM12/27/07
to
On Dec 27, 9:40 am, Franz Gnaedinger <f...@bluemail.ch> wrote:

> > Faesulae is probably of Etruscan origin.  I have no attestation of the
> > Etruscan form, but I would expect *Feisli by analogy with Ceicna/
> > Caecina, Velathri/Volaterrae and similar known pairs.  Whether this is
> > native Etruscan or an adaptation of a non-Etruscan name, I know not.
> > I am reasonably sure that Etr. Felsina (later Bononia, now Bologna)
> > comes from IE *pels- 'rock, cliff' (Ger. <Fels>, Maced. <pélla>
> > 'líthos' (Hsch.), also Maced. town Pella), so an IE source for
> > Faesulae is phonetically possible.

There is nothing that cannot be "phonetically possible" ;-); for
instance Faesulae could be Greek φασόλι (bean); Serbian pasulj (bean);
Italian fagiuolo (flageolet); Serbian family name Pasuljevic; PN
Pasuljevo;
or more plausabe, maybe it was connected to the herb bosiljak (sweet
basil); Bosilj-grad, Bulgarian Bosile-grad (a town in Serbia; the city
of basil); surname Bosiljčić, Bosiljković; Serbian bosiljak is a
shortened form (the Bel-Gon basis) of the Serb. blagoslov (blessing);
i.e. blagosiljati (bless, sanctify) => blagosiljak => blohsiljak =>
bosiljak/bosiok (basil; a good example of a word simplification
through the assimilation; a Basil's Blessing :-)
Of course, there are other words as Serbian vaseljena/vasiona "Božja
sila" (God's potency) and the Greek name βασιλιάς/Basileus (king,
emperor) that could be a potential heirs of "Etruscan Faesulae".

Yes Felsina (cf. Serbian region Vlasina, near the Bulgarian border)
could be a "rock" (Ger. Felsen rock); again Bel-Gon basis, this time
related to Serbian obala (coast); i.e. a littoral area; Greek λιθώνας
(moraine; Serb. litica a steep rock above the water; from the Serbian
verbs liti <= obliti pour in, splash)...; also Serbian planina
(mountain).

> As far as I know the Etruscan root of Felsina was Velzna,
> the meaning of it unknown, perhaps having to to with fertility.
> I explain Velutne via BEL TON 'warm sound', sound occurring
> in the warm seasons, namely thunder. Velzna may then be an
> analoguous compound, warm (bel vel) flash (zna, onomatopoeic).
> As for *pels 'rock, cliff', I would tentatively derive it from PIS for
> water in motion, also bodies moving in water, movement caused
> by water, etc. It might originally have been rock that was bared
> and polished by water. German Pelz for fur would be another
> derivative, the analogy being the one of hair and water observed
> by Leonardo da Vinci.

Again, Serbo-Slavic toponyms Vlasina, mountain Velež above Mostar
(Bosnia), city of Veles (FYROM); Slavic god Veles; Roman Vulcanus;
Balkan

First we should know that the English word tone is related to Greek
τέντωμα (stretch), Serbian verb otegnuti, otegnem (raising of voice,
to deploy an extended accent; otegnut extended; Eng. extended = Serb,
istegnut).
The other thing we should know here is that the Ur-basis Bel-Gon came
from the sungod Bel (Belus) and all words derived from that basis were
semantically distributed in three main direction:
1) The round shape (as if of the sun); Serbian oblo (round), Latin
bulla (a round swelling), Eng. oval, apple; Greek αμφελκω (draw
around, be surrounded by; related to Serbian beležiti notice => pisati
write; oblik form).
2) Irradiation of light and heat (flame, blaze!); Latin flamma
(flame); Serbian plamen (flame; planuti to blaze);
- light, Serbian belo (white), Latin albus; fulgeo fulgere to flash,
to lighten; Serb. bljesak, blistati, blještati (glitter, flash,
glint), baklja torch, Greek φωτεινός; cf. Serbian s/vitanje dawning,
vid (sight)
3) Liquid; Serbian voda, English water, Latin fluo, fluere (flow),
unda (water, fluid); English wet, Serbian vlaga (wetness); Serbian
oblak (cloud), German Wolken (clouds)...

> > Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
> > this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,
> > meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).- Hide quoted text -

> This goes along with hypothetical PIS with the above
> meanings.

The name of Pisa is probably related to the Peloponnesian town Pylos
(Strabo) and to the above mentioned place and god names. There are a
lot of Slavic river names Bistrica (a clear river, clean water) across
the eastern part of continent). Let us mention the Thracian Pistyrus
lake on the cognominal town known as Bystirus/Bisterta; cf Bistro
Jezero in Lika/Croatia (Fair Lake); On the other side there are the
Thracian people (tribe) called Bastarni, in fact those Bastarni were
the Slavic Bistrani; Bistričani (today's village in Bosnia near Kakanj
- Bistrani).

Now we can scope the size of the problem the Roman have generated with
the Illyrian and Thracian names, which they were noting in a way as
they had heard it - wrongly of course. Just see this: Pistyrus,
Bystirus, Bisterta and Bastarni!

DV

Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 27, 2007, 10:12:04 AM12/27/07
to
On Dec 26, 1:19 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
>
> The only plausible way to lose P- in such a rump form is for Celts to
> have the name before their /p/ vanished, and Pisaurum is too far south
> to be a Celtic settlement.  Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to
> have the same root, but different suffixes.  The suffix in Isaurus
> cannot be identical to Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom>
> (Festus) shows that the -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an
> unrhotacized -s-.  Pisaurus (the usual Latin name of the river) was
> evidently applied by analogy from the town Pisaurum, since with the
> demise of Illyrian, the connection between the Isaurus and Pisaurum
> 'on the Isaurus' could no longer be understood.

Second reply. I found a case where an initial p was
lost in a Celtic language: PIE *pel(i)s 'cliff, rock outcrop'
Old Irish ail 'cliff'. So I'd say that Is might be a rump form
of PIS. Considering the northern Spanish river Pisuerga
I propose PIS ARG as origin of a series of rivers: PIS
for moving water, etc., and ARG for the shining wall of
a painted cave representing the sky, together shining
water in motion, shining river. ARG would later also
have been used for streaks and veins of precious
materials found in mines, wherefrom ancient Greek
argos for shining, Latun argentum for silver, aureum
for gold, also Austria east Osten for the eastern sky,
dawn. PIS ARG Pisuerga Pisaurus Isara Isar (in
western Austria) Isara Isère (in southeastern France),
Isara Oise (in Belgium). A second possibility might
be PIS ARA 'moving water area', a river confining the
area of a tribe or a country, a river as border.

Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 28, 2007, 6:45:23 AM12/28/07
to
On Dec 26, 1:19 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
>
> Faesulae is probably of Etruscan origin.  I have no attestation of the
> Etruscan form, but I would expect *Feisli by analogy with Ceicna/
> Caecina, Velathri/Volaterrae and similar known pairs.  Whether this is
> native Etruscan or an adaptation of a non-Etruscan name, I know not.
> I am reasonably sure that Etr. Felsina (later Bononia, now Bologna)
> comes from IE *pels- 'rock, cliff' (Ger. <Fels>, Maced. <pélla>
> 'líthos' (Hsch.), also Maced. town Pella), so an IE source for
> Faesulae is phonetically possible.

As my killrater is active again, I take up my Magdalenian
work again. The origin of Felsina / Bologna was Velzna,
which I explain in analogy to Veltuna: BEL TON for warm
sound, namely thunder occurring in the warm seasons.
The same BEL is present in the Vel- of Velzna, while the
-zna may be onomatopoeic for a flash, so Velzna would
have been warm flash, flashes occurring in the warm
seasons of the year. As for PIE *pel(i)s for rock, cliff,
I found a new provisional explanation yesterday:

PpAL --- rock, stone; ancient Greek pella for stone
(Mallory and Adams), German Fels for rock (emphatic
p repaced by final s)

LAPp --- shining stone, also stone lamp (in use from
around 18 000 BP onward, usually a concave piece
of limestone, but also the wonderful lamp in the shape
of a spoon from Lascaux, finely carved from sandstone,
marked with open chevrons); Latin lapis for stone, marble,
gem, pearl, tessera, PIE *lap for shine, ancient Greek
lampos for torch, lamp, light, sun (emphatic p replaced
by additional m), English lamp German Lampe

PpLA --- flat land, large and wide; ancient Greek platus
for flat, large, wide, English flat German platt and flach

ALPp --- snow capped mountains, shining mountain top;
ancient Greek Alpeis English Alps German Alpen,
Celtic alp for a high mountain

LPpA --- dark silhouette of a mountain (range), especially
in the east, where the sun will rise; ancient Greek lepas
for bare rock, mountain

APpL --- sun rising over the eastern mountain (range),
first rays darting; personified in the sun god and archer
Phoibos Apollon, Shining Apollon, Etruscan Aplu

ALP LPA --- high mountain, snow capped (alp) dark
eastern mountain range before the sun raises (lpa).
The contracted form alpa might be the origin of alpha,
the first letter of the alphabet. Canaanitic alp means
ox, the Northern Semitic word for ox was eleph, hence
aleph, Greek alpha. The ox or rather bull can still be
seen when you turn our A around (triangle of the head
plus a pair of horns). The first letter of our alphabet
was named for an ox. How come? does it convey the
value of an ox for the early farmers? There might also
be a second reason rooted in a very ancient myth,
traces of which might have survived in ancient Egypt.
The Western Mountain of Upper Egypt was the home
of Hathor, alter ego of the sky goddess Nut. Seen from
Karnak / Luxor, the mountain range somewhat resembles
a lying cow, the natural pyramid above Deir el-Bahri
reminding of a horn, the Egyptian word el-Qoru does
mean horn. Hathor as cow carried the sun between
her horns. A double peak north of Phaistos in Crete,
part of the Ida mountain devoted to Zeus, reminds of
the front and horns of a bull, the Cretan Zeus bull?
The aurochs was domesticated some 8,500 years ago.
It may have been named for a telling high mountain
range in the east where the sun rose. If so, the ox
that marks the begin of our alphabet is a bull or a cow,
a mythological animal worshipped in an eastern
mountain range, and placing this animal at the begin
of the alphabet was equalling the alphabet with a day,
the begin alpha with the mountain range of the rising
morning sun ...

Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 2:27:05 AM12/29/07
to

> PpAL --- rock, stone; ancient Greek pella for stone
> (Mallory and Adams), German Fels for rock (emphatic
> p replaced by final s)

The Ionic alphabet had 24 letters, which also represented
the numbers 1 till 24: alpha 1, beta 2 gamma 3 ... chi 22
psi 23, omega 24. Taken as hours, the Ionic letters would
have represented a whole day. If alpha 1 was early morning,
omega 24 was again early morning. The lowercase omega
shows a rudimentary round form in a pair of arcs evoking
horns, while the uppercase omega may be seen as the
sun (round form) rising from the horizon (broken line).
Hypothesis: alpha and omega were complementary
letters representing early morning and the rising sun -
rising from an eastern mountain in the shape of a cow
or a bull from a long lost myth a reflex of which might
have survived in Hathor and Apis.

The word omega means o mega, great o. Greek mega
and English much may be derivatives of Magdalenian
MUC for bull, a big animal, much of an animal. Consider
the instructive drawing of a big bull and the small chief
bull hunter in front of it's head, ready to apply the first and
all deciding blow, in the cave of Gabillou. The word for the
chief bull hunter would have been MAS, a Magdalenian
word surviving in English master and in Latin masculus
for small man - small in comparison with the big animal.
The shape of the vowel o refers to the round lips we make
when pronouncing this vowel. It is also present in many
words for the sun, Egyptian Horus Greek helios Latin sol
Italian sole French soleil German Sonne, appropriate for
a word denoting the solar disk.

From alpha to omega would then have meant: from one
to the next sunrise, day and night, a whole day, a full cycle,
the cosmic serpent biting it's tail, thus creating a loop,
a world in space and time --- and letters allow to tell about
the world, and to weave the ambrosic veil, immortal veil,
divine veil of Kadmos' daughter Ino Leukotheae which
enabled Odysseus to go on his time travel to an early Troy
(Eberhard Zangger) symbolized in pleasant Scherie.

Peter T. Daniels

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 8:10:31 AM12/29/07
to
On Dec 29, 2:27 am, Franz Gnaedinger <f...@bluemail.ch> wrote:

> The Ionic alphabet had 24 letters, which also represented
> the numbers 1 till 24: alpha 1, beta 2 gamma 3 ... chi 22
> psi 23, omega 24. Taken as hours, the Ionic letters would
> have represented a whole day.

When do you suppose the 24-hour day was invented?

When do you think the Greek alphabet was first used as "numbers" (as
opposed to a device for serial ordering, as the alphabet still is in
English even though it's not used at all as numbers)?

> If alpha 1 was early morning,
> omega 24 was again early morning. The lowercase omega
> shows a rudimentary round form in a pair of arcs evoking
> horns, while the uppercase omega may be seen as the
> sun (round form) rising from the horizon (broken line).

Do you have any idea when today's familiar shapes of the letters came
about?

> Hypothesis: alpha and omega were complementary
> letters representing early morning and the rising sun -
> rising from an eastern mountain in the shape of a cow
> or a bull from a long lost myth a reflex of which might
> have survived in Hathor and Apis.

> From alpha to omega would then have meant: from one


> to the next sunrise, day and night, a whole day,

What evidence do you have that days were reckoned to begin in the
morning?

> a full cycle,
> the cosmic serpent biting it's tail, thus creating a loop,
> a world in space and time --- and letters allow to tell about
> the world, and to weave the ambrosic veil, immortal veil,
> divine veil of Kadmos' daughter Ino Leukotheae which
> enabled Odysseus to go on his time travel to an early Troy

> (Eberhard Zangger) symbolized in pleasant Scherie.-

Very pretty, and far more pernicious fantasizing than "Magdalenian,"
since it demonstrably clashes with the historical record.

Dušan Vukotić

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 11:12:49 AM12/29/07
to
On Dec 29, 8:27 am, Franz Gnaedinger <f...@bluemail.ch> wrote:
> > PpAL --- rock, stone; ancient Greek pella for stone
> > (Mallory and Adams), German Fels for rock (emphatic
> > p replaced by final s)
>
> > LAPp --- shining stone, also stone lamp (in use from
> > around 18 000 BP onward, usually a concave piece
> > of limestone, but also the wonderful lamp in the shape
> > of a spoon from Lascaux, finely carved from sandstone,
> > marked with open chevrons); Latin lapis for stone, marble,
> > gem, pearl, tessera, PIE *lap for shine, ancient Greek
> > lampos for torch, lamp, light, sun (emphatic p replaced
> > by additional m), English lamp German Lampe

Greek λυχνος (lamp) is an equivalent to the Serbian word luča
(luminance, light) and that word did not start from your "Magdalenian"
LAP but from the Bel-Gon basis (Serb. paljenje (blaze, ignition) <=
pal/e/gne; Lat. flamma; Greek φλεγω burn up);
In case of lapis we have a different logic; this time related to the
Latin libatio and Greek επιλειβω (pour; Serb. po-livati pour, livati
libation, liti pour); in reality, Latin lapis has been derived from
the same basis as Greek λιθινος (stone) or Serb. litica (a big
vertical rock near and above the water); hence littoral (/stony/
coastal area; Latin littus the shore of a lake or river (again Bel-Gon
basis; Serb. obliti/oblivati suffuse; liptati gush, litica rock, from
ob-litica) cf. plateau.

DV

Dušan Vukotić

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 11:44:58 AM12/29/07
to

Cf. Greek λαμβανω (to take); λαπτω (to lap with the tongue), λαμπας
(torch)
Serb. lapiti (take, to steal), lapati (to lap; ob-laporan voracious);

Considering all the possible options of the history of the Greek word
"lampe" it seems that that word must be the metathesised Latin flamma
(Serb. plam => lamp; Eng. flame); for instance, Greek υπολυχνιον (lamp-
stand) sounds almost the same as Serbian upaljenje, upaljač (lighter),
paljenica (a fire sacrifice)

DV

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 5:18:32 PM12/29/07
to
Franz Gnaedinger wrote:

> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
> > The only plausible way to lose P- in such a rump form is for Celts to
> > have the name before their /p/ vanished, and Pisaurum is too far south
> > to be a Celtic settlement.  Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to
> > have the same root, but different suffixes.  The suffix in Isaurus
> > cannot be identical to Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom>
> > (Festus) shows that the -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an
> > unrhotacized -s-.  Pisaurus (the usual Latin name of the river) was
> > evidently applied by analogy from the town Pisaurum, since with the
> > demise of Illyrian, the connection between the Isaurus and Pisaurum
> > 'on the Isaurus' could no longer be understood.
>
> What do you make of the river Sapis running parallel
> to the river Pisaurus / Isaurus? of the village Pistoriae
> on the Umbro, side arm of the Arnus? of the river Pisuarge
> in northern Spain?

The root of Sapis (now Savio) is *sap-, as shown by the Tribus Sapinia
of Umbrians dwelling around the river, with their principal town at
*Sapinium (now Sapigno). The river-name cannot be decomposed as SA-
PIS.

Pistoriae (also -ia, -ium, now Pistoia) is probably simply
'Bakersville', from Latin <pistor> 'baker'. Of course, the Latin name
of the place might be a paretymological deformation, but I have no
idea what the original would have been, and no basis for guessing
anything.

I have no etymological information on Pisoraca (now Pisuerga). The
ending is apparently identical to that of Arriaca, a town of the
Arevacae nearby. Menendez Pidal mentions other towns of the Carpetani
in -aca (now mostly -aga, of course), but that provides no help on the
Pisor- part.

> > Faesulae is probably of Etruscan origin.  I have no attestation of the
> > Etruscan form, but I would expect *Feisli by analogy with Ceicna/
> > Caecina, Velathri/Volaterrae and similar known pairs.  Whether this is
> > native Etruscan or an adaptation of a non-Etruscan name, I know not.
> > I am reasonably sure that Etr. Felsina (later Bononia, now Bologna)
> > comes from IE *pels- 'rock, cliff' (Ger. <Fels>, Maced. <pélla>
> > 'líthos' (Hsch.), also Maced. town Pella), so an IE source for
> > Faesulae is phonetically possible.
>
> As far as I know the Etruscan root of Felsina was Velzna,
> the meaning of it unknown, perhaps having to to with fertility.
> I explain Velutne via BEL TON 'warm sound', sound occurring
> in the warm seasons, namely thunder. Velzna may then be an
> analoguous compound, warm (bel vel) flash (zna, onomatopoeic).

Etruscan F- and V- are not interchangeable. Apart from the suffix -
na, Felsina has nothing to do with the family name Velzna, the basis
of Velznal 'Volsinii' (now Orvieto; the inhabitants were forcibly
removed and resettled at Volsinii Novi, now Bolsena). Velz-na cannot
be divided as VEL-ZNA.

In the U.S., Beltone is a brand of hearing aid.

> As for *pels 'rock, cliff', I would tentatively derive it from PIS for
> water in motion, also bodies moving in water, movement caused
> by water, etc. It might originally have been rock that was bared
> and polished by water. German Pelz for fur would be another
> derivative, the analogy being the one of hair and water observed
> by Leonardo da Vinci.

Now that's way out in left field, as we say.

> > Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
> > this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,
> > meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).
>

> This goes along with hypothetical PIS with the above
> meanings.

Or, as noted by Liddell and Scott, with Grk. <pí:so:> 'I will give to
drink' (reduplicated in the present, <pipísko:>), causative of
<pí:no:> 'I drink' (2nd aor. <épion> with short /i/), so the actual
stem could be *pin-, the root simply *pi-.

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 5:43:43 PM12/29/07
to
Trond Engen wrote:
> Douglas G. Kilday skreiv:
> > Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
> >> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
> >>> Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, also
> >>> against Latin rules) apparently has *H1pi- 'upon', the river being
> >>> Isaurus (in Lucan and Vibius Sequester) with the same first element
> >>> as Isamnus, the second element agreeing with Metaurus and several
> >>> other rivers of eastern Italy.  Greek forms of Illyrian toponyms,
> >>> Epídamnos, Epídauros, ktl., have presumably Hellenized the prefix
> >>> Pi- to Epi-.
>
> >> [...]
>
> > [...]  Isara/Isaar/Isère and Isaurus appear to have the same root, but
> > different suffixes.  The suffix in Isaurus cannot be identical to
> > Latin <aurum> 'gold', since Sabine <ausom> (Festus) shows that the
> > -r- is a rhotacized -s-, and Isaurus has an unrhotacized -s-.
>
> Hypothetically speaking, couldn't the first -s- have survived because of
> some consonant that later disappeared, say *ins- > *i:s, or because the
> compound *is+ausus was transparent at the time of the sound change? What
> is *is in these compounds? IE *eis- "powerful"?

That seems to be the consensus, *eis- 'powerful, swift, aroused,
passionate', etc. (Lat. <i:ra> from *eis-a:), secondarily 'inspired,
divine, holy': for the rivers probably a prosaic sense, 'powerful' or
'swift', not 'passionate' or 'holy'. Transparency of the compound
would not prevent rhotacism, just as transparency of the genitive
singular did not prevent it in Lat. <o:ris>, <ju:ris>, <mu:ris>, etc.
If the root was *ins- or whatever, we are back to the drawing board.
The simplest solution is that *eis- is indeed the first element, no
rhotacism occurred in the language from which <Isaurus> was Latinized,
and the second element retains original -r-.

> Given the parallel to <Isamnus>, I understand that you see <aurus> as a
> word for (some type of) river. The following may be obvious or stupid,
> but since I'm unable to tell the difference between either of them and
> genious I'll give it a shot.
>
> AFAICT, *ausus wouldn't necessarily mean "golden". There seem to be two
> homonymous PIE roots *H2ews. One is the "shine" root from e.g. Lat.
> <aurum> "gold" and <aurora> "morning red", Norw. <aust> "east", and Eng.
> <east>. The other is the "scoop, pour (water)" root from e.g. Lat.
> <haurire> and Norw. <ause> (to which Eng. 'ease' would fit like a glove
> if it weren't for that bloody French word), not a bad candidate for a
> river name. Even better, perhaps, if one dared to connect the two IE
> roots in something like "unleash".

Then we still have the selective-rhotacism problem.

> An *aurus, OTOH, would seem to fit that *H2ewr- (?) "water, moisture"
> root behind e.g. OInd <vá:r>, Lat. <urina> "urine", and Scand. <ur>
> "drizzle, fog, etc.". There are several rivers in Norway and one in SW
> Finland by the name of Aura. The name is normally explained as "The
> sandy one" < ON <aurr> "sand, pebbles; deposit at a river mouth" < Gmc.
> *aura-. AFAIK, this Gmc. word is unexplained. Semantically, one could
> perhaps see it as a shift of meaning "river" > "river bed" > "sand.
> pebbles". The rivers are sort of sandy so there's no particular reason
> to doubt the explanation, but I still wanted to mention it.

That sounds reasonable to me.

Brian M. Scott

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 6:16:14 PM12/29/07
to
On Sat, 29 Dec 2007 14:18:32 -0800 (PST), "Douglas G.
Kilday" <fuf...@chorus.net> wrote in
<news:cfac3bce-818a-4dfb...@r60g2000hsc.googlegroups.com>
in sci.lang:

> Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
>> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:

[...]

>>> Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
>>> this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,
>>> meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).

>> This goes along with hypothetical PIS with the above
>> meanings.

> Or, as noted by Liddell and Scott, with Grk. <pí:so:> 'I will give to
> drink' (reduplicated in the present, <pipísko:>), causative of
> <pí:no:> 'I drink' (2nd aor. <épion> with short /i/), so the actual
> stem could be *pin-, the root simply *pi-.

PIE *peh3-, *pih- 'to drink'. Beekes says that the origin
of the zero-grade form *pih- > *pi:- is unknown. Watkins
gives the root as *peh3(i)-; perhaps the odd zero-grade form
is metathesized from **ph3i-.

Brian

Dušan Vukotić

unread,
Dec 29, 2007, 8:42:54 PM12/29/07
to
On Dec 29, 11:18 pm, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:

> The root of Sapis (now Savio) is *sap-, as shown by the Tribus Sapinia
> of Umbrians dwelling around the river, with their principal town at
> *Sapinium (now Sapigno). The river-name cannot be decomposed as SA-
> PIS.

There is a river Sapna in eastern Bosnia, Savinja in Slovenia
(tributary of Sava) Drina's tributary, and there is a valley Sapna in
Iraq and a river with the same name. The Germans named the river
Savinja Sann and that example showed all the difficulties we have to
struggle with when the names of certain "modern" toponyms are
concerned. If Savinja could become Sann than we could only imagine
what corruption the old (ancient) toponyms, written by the Roman
writers, have survived.

The first association that crossed my mind when the name Sapna is in
question was the Sanskrit word 'svapati' (sleep; Serb. spavati); i.e.
svapna => sapna. Of course, I rejected that idea almost immediately:
for god's sake, who would have ever gave such an "uninventive" name to
a river? A sleeping river? No! Then I thought that Sapna and Savinja
could have something in common with the Thracian god Sabazios (known
in Serbia as Savaot) but I quickly rejected that idea too. I couldn't
remember any river that might have been directly associated with the
some of the god's names.

I supposed that Sapna could be (as for most of river's names) somehow
related to water, wetness or some of the many water activities. Maybe
the name Sapna is related to the kind of words as flow (Serbian
plaviti). In a moment, I thought that the problem is solved; namely,
Sapna and Savinja are the quick mountainous rivers and people were
using the power of their streams to transport the timber on rafts for
millenniums. In Serbian raft is called 'splav' but rafting is not
splavanje (as I would have wanted it to be) but splavarenje; too long
and not likely to be reduced to Savinja (splavarenje could eventually
become sviranje /playing/!). .-)

Finally, I tried to think more "liberally"; why not begin with the
words as pour, stream, splash, douche, tide...? There is a river in
Romania called Slava, mouthing into the Black Sea, and there is a
great number of rivers and other toponyms in the Balkan with the names
Savinja, Slavinja, Slivnica, Slavina. In Slovenia there are PN
Slavinje (cf. Serb. slavina a tap) and rivers Savinja and Slivnica.
Additionally, river Sapna is reach with the waterfalls as well as
rivers Savinja and Slivnica are. Waterfall is called "slap" in Serbian
and it would be very easy to erase the sound "l" from the the
supposed word 'slapna' slapna => sapna; cf. Loch Slapin in Scotland.

DV


Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 30, 2007, 3:13:48 AM12/30/07
to
On Dec 29, 11:18 pm, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:

> The root of Sapis (now Savio) is *sap-, as shown by the Tribus Sapinia
> of Umbrians dwelling around the river, with their principal town at
> *Sapinium (now Sapigno).  The river-name cannot be decomposed as SA-
> PIS.

What about a contraction of Sap- and -pis to Sapis?

> Pistoriae (also -ia, -ium, now Pistoia) is probably simply
> 'Bakersville', from Latin <pistor> 'baker'.  Of course, the Latin name
> of the place might be a paretymological deformation, but I have no
> idea what the original would have been, and no basis for guessing
> anything.

Also possible, but with all the other Pis-names around,
many of them referring to water, I still prefer the meaning
of water in motion. TOR means a bull in motion. PIS TOR
could then be water in motion, bull in motion, water rushing
with the force and power of a bull, for example - just a fancy
idea, should have to know more about the region and the
river, and specifically about the river in early times.

> I have no etymological information on Pisoraca (now Pisuerga).  The
> ending is apparently identical to that of Arriaca, a town of the
> Arevacae nearby.  Menendez Pidal mentions other towns of the Carpetani
> in -aca (now mostly -aga, of course), but that provides no help on the
> Pisor- part.

Aha, -oraca, a gold word again, golden river ...

> Etruscan F- and V- are not interchangeable.  Apart from the suffix -
> na, Felsina has nothing to do with the family name Velzna, the basis
> of Velznal 'Volsinii' (now Orvieto; the inhabitants were forcibly
> removed and resettled at Volsinii Novi, now Bolsena).  Velz-na cannot
> be divided as VEL-ZNA.

Then you must tell Wikipedia about it, they say Felsina
Bologna came from Velzna.

> Now that's way out in left field, as we say.

Yes, I agree, and my Xmas present for sci.lang was
the permutation group of PpAL for words about stone
and light. PpAL would account for Greek pella 'stone'
(Mallory and Adams 2006) and for PIE *pel(i)s and
German Fels (emphatic p replaced by final s). This
Fels- may then also be present in Felsina / Bologna.

> Or, as noted by Liddell and Scott, with Grk. <pí:so:> 'I will give to
> drink' (reduplicated in the present, <pipísko:>), causative of
> <pí:no:> 'I drink' (2nd aor. <épion> with short /i/), so the actual

> stem could be *pin-, the root simply *pi-.-

I would also derive this word from PIS for water in motion.
With a labial infix you get Pils, the place where the best
beer in the world is brewn, with a very fine water from
a local mineral water source, I assume.

Franz Gnaedinger

unread,
Dec 30, 2007, 3:45:14 AM12/30/07
to
On Dec 29, 2:10 pm, "Peter T. Daniels" <gramma...@verizon.net> wrote:

> When do you suppose the 24-hour day was invented?

Mesopotamia, 9,000 years ago? ancient Egypt 5,000
years ago? The Egyptians had a day of 24 hours, only
that their hours weren't of the same length, the duration
of an hour varied, but they were 24 hours a day.

> When do you think the Greek alphabet was first used as "numbers" (as
> opposed to a device for serial ordering, as the alphabet still is in
> English even though it's not used at all as numbers)?

The Ionic alphabet had 24 letters, which also represented
the numbers 1 till 24: alpha 1, beta 2, gamma 3, delta 4,
epsilon 5 ... ypsilon 20, phi 21, chi 22, psi 23, omega 24.
Later on the Greeks expanded their alphabet by a couple
of extra-signs to 27 letters and signs representing the
numbers 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9, 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90,
100 200 300 400 500 600 700 800 900. alpha' was 1 and
,alpha was 1,000. Omega' was 800 and ,omega 800,000.

> Do you have any idea when today's familiar shapes of the letters came
> about?

Yes, alpha from the head of an ox, or, as I now state, from
the head of a cow or a bull. I found nothing about omega
as a sign, so I venture my new explanation, a Xmas present
for sci.lang. I hoped you would see it, and am glad you did.

> What evidence do you have that days were reckoned to begin in the
> morning?

You can find the symbolism of morning everywhere,
it is the golden thread in all of ancient mythology,
from the Paleolithic onward. And quite understandable
for people who lived in pitch dark nights, in times when
there was no electric light, let alone light pollution.

> Very pretty, and far more pernicious fantasizing than "Magdalenian,"
> since it demonstrably clashes with the historical record.

Eberhard Zangger postulated that Odysseus' travel
to Scherie was a time travel to an early Troy. Brillant
idea. He should have gone along his key insight, I told
him so in a letter, but he claims that the other travels
are just fairy tales, in German Seemannsgarn, yarn
spun by sailors. So I went farther by saying that
Odysseus was dreaming, in his dreams he leaves
Troy and comes to very strange places, which are
-- nothing but Troy, but a Troy in disguise, blended
with other places and periods of time. Homer knew
about the mechanisms of dreams long before Freud
(Verschiebung, Verdichtung, Ueberdeterminierung).
I explained and further developed this understanding
of the Odyssey in the long thred "Did the Trojan war
really happen the way Homer said it did?" (or so).
We can read the Odyssey, we understand (nearly)
every word, but do we really understand the epic?
No, I say, not until we are able to understand the
symbols. One such symbol is the ambrosian /
immortal / divine veil of Ino Leukotheae, which
Odysseus has to bind around his chest in order
to reach the shore of pleasant Scherie safely.
This travel is a time travel. How can we go on
a time travel? Reading books about earlier times.
So that marvellous veil must be literature, composed
of letters, and the Greek letters are the gift of Ino's
father Kadmos. For a discussion of the Kadmeic
inscriptions on tripods in the temple of Thebes
according to Herodotus see: Derk Ohlenroth,
Das Abaton des Lykäischen Zeus und der Hain
der Elaia, 1996. Yes, it is the book you won't read.
You bravely avoid reading. You find excuses galore
not to read. Yes, it is the book you judge without
even having laid eyes on. Happy New Year, Peter,
although it will be yet another year that makes you
avoid having a look at that fine book.

Dušan Vukotić

unread,
Dec 30, 2007, 5:13:35 AM12/30/07
to
On Dec 30, 9:13 am, Franz Gnaedinger <f...@bluemail.ch> wrote:
> On Dec 29, 11:18 pm, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:
>
> > The root of Sapis (now Savio) is *sap-, as shown by the Tribus Sapinia
> > of Umbrians dwelling around the river, with their principal town at
> > *Sapinium (now Sapigno).  The river-name cannot be decomposed as SA-
> > PIS.

> What about a contraction of Sap- and -pis to Sapis?

> > Pistoriae (also -ia, -ium, now Pistoia) is probably simply
> > 'Bakersville', from Latin <pistor> 'baker'.  Of course, the Latin name
> > of the place might be a paretymological deformation, but I have no
> > idea what the original would have been, and no basis for guessing
> > anything.

Maybe Lat. pistris (sea monster, shark, whale), piscor (fish), piscina
(fish pond, a swimming pool); Italian pisciare (piss; cf. Serb.
pišati, pišuria piss, pišura a sloppy woman); also Serbian pesak
(sand), peskara (sandy pond). All these words are coming from the Bel-
Gon (or Bel-Gon-Hor) womb (cf. Serbian vlaga wetness, voda water,
vodenost wetness, Greek ά-φυδρος without water, υδραίνω equal to
Serbian vodurina a big water, Ger. feucht). Sometimes the phonetic
changes inside the IE languages are taking a of phantasmagoric
dimension: just compare German Feuchtikeit (wetness) and Serbian
vodnjikavost wetness, as if filled with water :-)

> Also possible, but with all the other Pis-names around,
> many of them referring to water, I still prefer the meaning
> of water in motion. TOR means a bull in motion. PIS TOR
> could then be water in motion, bull in motion, water rushing
> with the force and power of a bull, for example - just a fancy
> idea, should have to know more about the region and the
> river, and specifically about the river in early times.

Right! TOR has the meaning "motion" (mo-tor!) but it originally came
from the primeval Hor- syllable (Serbian krenuti start to go, kretanje
motion, English run. German rennen, Latin cursus rapid motion, run,
curro currere to run, Greek ρέω run, flow). Initially, the ancient
people connected any kind of motion to the flow (CURRENT) of river
water (Serbian reka river, Spanish rio).

> > Etruscan F- and V- are not interchangeable.  Apart from the suffix -
> > na, Felsina has nothing to do with the family name Velzna, the basis
> > of Velznal 'Volsinii' (now Orvieto; the inhabitants were forcibly
> > removed and resettled at Volsinii Novi, now Bolsena).  Velz-na cannot
> > be divided as VEL-ZNA.
>
> Then you must tell Wikipedia about it, they say Felsina
> Bologna came from Velzna.

There is a lake Vlasina (Vlasinsko Jezero) in the eastern part of
Serbia and it could be compared to the lake of Bolsena (Lago di
Bolsena). I am surprised that Abdullah and his "Proto-Illyrian"
mentors (G. Starostin and Lubotsky) have not yet taken that "fact" to
coroborate their "Shqip-Illirian proto-PIE language" and "the mother
of all European mothers" (not sister!).

DV

izzy

unread,
Dec 30, 2007, 9:55:33 AM12/30/07
to
Douglas G. Kilday quoted or wrote:
>> ... Pisaurum on the Adriatic (now Pésaro, hence it was Písaurum, ...

Trond Engen wrote:
> ... I understand that you see <aurus> as a word for (some type of) river. ...
> AFAICT, *ausus wouldn't necessarily mean "golden". ... An *aurus, OTOH,


> would seem to fit that *H2ewr- (?) "water, moisture" root behind e.g. OInd <vá:r>,

> *** Lat. <urina> "urine", *** and Scand. <ur> "drizzle, fog, etc.".
(emphasis added by Izzy)


> There are several rivers in Norway and one in SW Finland by the name of Aura.
> The name is normally explained as "The sandy one" < ON <aurr> "sand, pebbles;
> deposit at a river mouth" < Gmc. *aura-. AFAIK, this Gmc. word is unexplained.
> Semantically, one could perhaps see it as a shift of meaning "river" > "river bed" >
> "sand. pebbles". The rivers are sort of sandy so there's no particular reason
> to doubt the explanation, but I still wanted to mention it.

On anthropomorphic (body-part) maps, rivers and narrow bodies of water
are
often associated with bodily excretions.

Examples:
1 - Milk River is the lactation of "The Old Woman" in Alberta,
Canada.
2 - Mare Rubrum (the Red Sea) represents Aphrodite's menstruation.
Bab-el-Mandeb is at its southern entrance. Bab-el = gateway to.
Mandeb may be Semitic yaM NiDah = sea of menstruous woman.
3 - The Gulf of Aqaba is her Semitic QaVaH = alimentation /
defecation.

So, if you add another S to Pisaurum, you have "golden" urine. Why
not?
Compare the Yellow River in China.

Izzy (BPMaps moderator)
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/BPMaps/

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 31, 2007, 6:59:13 PM12/31/07
to
"Brian M. Scott" wrote:
> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
> > Franz Gnaedinger wrote:
> >> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >>> Pisa (Lat. <Pi:sae>) was said to be a colony of the place in Elis; if
> >>> this is correct, we may connect it with Grk. <písea> 'moist lands,
> >>> meadows', <piseús> 'swamp-dweller' (Thcr.).
> >> This goes along with hypothetical PIS with the above
> >> meanings.
> > Or, as noted by Liddell and Scott, with Grk. <pí:so:> 'I will give to
> > drink' (reduplicated in the present, <pipísko:>), causative of
> > <pí:no:> 'I drink' (2nd aor. <épion> with short /i/), so the actual
> > stem could be *pin-, the root simply *pi-.
>
> PIE *peh3-,  *pih- 'to drink'.  Beekes says that the origin
> of the zero-grade form *pih- > *pi:- is unknown.  Watkins
> gives the root as *peh3(i)-; perhaps the odd zero-grade form
> is metathesized from **ph3i-.

I'm skeptical about portmanteau roots, and I'd expect diphthongization
to *poi- in zero-grade. This verb 'drink' was apparently irregular in
PIE, and the two roots *peH3-, *pi(H)- were either connected through
some mechanism no longer productive, or they were suppletive roots.

In Indic, Italic, and Celtic, *pib- from *pipH3- has the form of a
reduplicated causative formed from an intransitive, like *sisd- 'cause
to sit' from *sed-, *sistH2- 'cause to stand' from *steH2-. Thus the
simplex *peH3- was probably not 'drink', but 'be contained' (of a
liquid).

Greek <pîsos> can be understood as a passive neuter in -es/-os from
*pi:s- 'cause to drink, drench', originally referring to a floodplain
or the like. But we also have <pí:no:> 'I drink', evidently with
nasal-present infix, suggesting that the simple *pi:- or *pi(H)- means
the same as the causative *pi-pH3- in the other branches. This is
reminiscent of the theory of Latin <cadere> 'fall' and <caedere>
'fell' suggested by Ernout in the 3rd ed. of the DELL, namely an /i/-
infixed causative (implicitly rejecting Pokorny's assignment of these
verbs to different roots). Lat. <ca:sus> is regularly from earlier
<ca:ssus> (Quintilian, cited in the DELL), from *ka:d-tu-, so <cadere>
presumably represents zero-grade *kH2d-, <ca:sus> normal-grade
*keH2d-. Postlaryngeal infixation of -i- would give *kH2id- or
*keH2id-, both reducing to *kaid- in Italic (the latter by way of a
long diphthong) if I understand laryngeal theory correctly.

To get the odd *piH- from *peH3- in a similar way, we must assume that
-i- was infixed to zero-grade *pH3- to form a causative *piH3-. If we
are dealing with one and the same process in <caedo:> and <pí:no:>,
the rule must be that -i- was infixed just before the final consonant
of the zero-grade root: *kH2id- 'cause to fall, fell', *piH3- 'cause
to be contained, drink'. In this hypothesis, /i/-infixation was a
very ancient way of forming causatives, no longer productive at the
breakup of PIE, having been superseded by other mechanisms, including
the reduplicating /i/-prefixation of *pi-pH3- and the others. But PIE
retained a few relics of the old causatives, and as it happens 'drink'
conjugated forms from old and new.

Of course, I may be the one out in left field this time, but I have no
other ideas for relating the two 'drink'-roots.

Douglas G. Kilday

unread,
Dec 31, 2007, 7:37:38 PM12/31/07
to
Franz Gnaedinger wrote:

> "Douglas G. Kilday" wrote:
>
> > The root of Sapis (now Savio) is *sap-, as shown by the Tribus Sapinia
> > of Umbrians dwelling around the river, with their principal town at
> > *Sapinium (now Sapigno).  The river-name cannot be decomposed as SA-
> > PIS.
>
> What about a contraction of Sap- and -pis to Sapis?

To render that plausible, you would have to find other examples of
rivers in -pis, show that *sap- would be attached without a connecting
vowel, and then show that *Sappis would indeed be reduced to Sapis in
the language spoken there, using other examples. A tall order!

> > Pistoriae (also -ia, -ium, now Pistoia) is probably simply
> > 'Bakersville', from Latin <pistor> 'baker'.  Of course, the Latin name
> > of the place might be a paretymological deformation, but I have no
> > idea what the original would have been, and no basis for guessing
> > anything.
>
> Also possible, but with all the other Pis-names around,
> many of them referring to water, I still prefer the meaning
> of water in motion. TOR means a bull in motion. PIS TOR
> could then be water in motion, bull in motion, water rushing
> with the force and power of a bull, for example - just a fancy
> idea, should have to know more about the region and the
> river, and specifically about the river in early times.

Etruscan for 'bull' was <thevru> (borrowed, in my opinion, from a pre-
Italic IE language). If this formed part of an Etruscan toponym, the
diphthong -ev- should have been Latinized as -eu- (like the Ager
Teuranus), unless it was Latinized or Italicized before -eu- became -
ou-, in which case we would expect -u:- in Latin. Your idea provides
no good reason to reject the simple 'baker' explanation.

> > I have no etymological information on Pisoraca (now Pisuerga).  The
> > ending is apparently identical to that of Arriaca, a town of the
> > Arevacae nearby.  Menendez Pidal mentions other towns of the Carpetani
> > in -aca (now mostly -aga, of course), but that provides no help on the
> > Pisor- part.
>
> Aha, -oraca, a gold word again, golden river ...

Not here, because no pre-Latin rhotacism is attested here. Also, as
Schuchardt emphasizes, the penultimate -a- of Pisoraca was short
(Pisorga 905, Esp. Sagr. tom. XXXVII), so the formation is not Celtic
and cannot be Latin in imitation of Celtic either (like the estate-
names in -a:cum). Pisoraca is probably either Iberian or Basque.
Schuchardt identifies the first element of Arriaca as Basque <(h)arri>
'stone' (also in French Bq. Harriague, cf. Harriette with different
suffix). But I still have no clue as to *pisor-.

> > Etruscan F- and V- are not interchangeable.  Apart from the suffix -
> > na, Felsina has nothing to do with the family name Velzna, the basis
> > of Velznal 'Volsinii' (now Orvieto; the inhabitants were forcibly
> > removed and resettled at Volsinii Novi, now Bolsena).  Velz-na cannot
> > be divided as VEL-ZNA.
>
> Then you must tell Wikipedia about it, they say Felsina
> Bologna came from Velzna.

I don't have time to edit Wikipedia. You have access to a large
library, and you are better off getting your Etruscan information from
reputable journals like _Studi Etruschi_ rather than Wikipedia.

Dušan Vukotić

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Dec 31, 2007, 9:37:34 PM12/31/07
to
On Jan 1, 12:59 am, "Douglas G. Kilday" <fufl...@chorus.net> wrote:

> > PIE *peh3-, *pih- 'to drink'. Beekes says that the origin
> > of the zero-grade form *pih- > *pi:- is unknown. Watkins
> > gives the root as *peh3(i)-; perhaps the odd zero-grade form
> > is metathesized from **ph3i-.
>
> I'm skeptical about portmanteau roots, and I'd expect diphthongization
> to *poi- in zero-grade. This verb 'drink' was apparently irregular in
> PIE, and the two roots *peH3-, *pi(H)- were either connected through
> some mechanism no longer productive, or they were suppletive roots.

I would say that Laryngeal Theory have brought more evil than good
into the general understanding of lunguage development. Let us take a
simple example which has often been used as a "key model" of the
"laryngealism" - the Hittite word ḫants (front; ḫantezzi first). It
seems that the modern linguistic science have not yet realized that
none of the Indo-Europen words has ever started with a vowel as an
initial sound of the word. It means, not only the Greek word αντί
(Lat. ante; Skt. anti) was "de-laryngealised" but all the other vowel-
beginning IE words also lost its initial "laryngeal" (pharyngeal,
glottal or velar). I do not remember that I ever found a comparison
between the Czech werb honit (chase, drive, hunt; Serb. goniti, Russ.
гнаться) and English hunt (OE huntian, If the "Laryngel Theory" were
so aplicable in the reconstruction of PIE, why nobody would be able to
explain different forms of the word *hant- in Germanic languages as
hunþs, hentan, hantian...? For instance, why there are more variants
of the word lepo (beautiful) in Serbo-Slavic: lepo. lipo and lijepo?
What is it that the last mentioned form (lijepo) is suggesting? A kind
of "laryngeal"? Of course, probably it was a glottal-fricative h
(*liH2epo-). And what happened here? The supposed H2 turned to be the
consonant "j"! Yes, we could say that H2 "colored" the folllowing
vowel "e" in this case, but what happened to the other variants of
Serbian "beautiful" (lepo, lipo, lijepo)? The word "lipo" (as well as
"lepo") looks as it were composed without its "laryngeal". Why in this
case the same "laryngeal" was so uneffective?

No, the problem is much more simple than we are ready to accept. In
Serbo-Slavic languages beauty was understood as "oblina" (roundness)
and that oblina is derived from the ancient basis Bel-Gon. It means
that "oblina" first sounded as HobliHna. In fact, in this case we have
to start from the agglutinated form Ho-Bli-Hno-Bla-Hno (Serb.
oblikovano formated, figured; oblikovanje design) where from the
Serbian words obljubljeno => voljeno (loved). We can here also see
that English word beautiful followed the same pattern as Serbian
"lijepo"; from ob-lHuHblje-Hno; cf. lepotan (nice guy, beautiful);
also Serbian "ljubiti" (kiss) comes from the same basis as lepota/
ljepota (beauty); Serb. ljubljen (loved).

I hope that not only Franz and Douglas will understand that the
solution for the problem of the genesis and relatedness of languages
lies much more in their semantic values than in the "regular" (or
irregular) phonetic changes (which are, by the way, very often the
biggest hindrance on our way to a full comprehension of the language
emergence and its development trough the history).

DV

Dušan Vukotić

unread,
Jan 1, 2008, 9:45:05 AM1/1/08
to
The "laryngeal" h2 inside the word "lijepo" could also be h1 (glottal
stop), h3 or some hypothetical h4 or hx (velar, glottal, pharyngeal or
some of their combinations) but it would not change a bit of the
semantics of that word.

Let us take still another example - English word wind (from the
supposed Pokorny's root uendh-1) and its possible relation to the
Serbian words huk (roar, hoot, blowing of the wind), huknuti/hukati
(hoot, blowing) and dah (breath), dahnuti/disati (breathe), duhati/
duvati (blow). Does it not seem more plausible that English wind is
related to the other English "airborne" words like wing or flying?

In fact, now it became clear that the root uendh-1 could not be the
source of the word wind, because the English words wind and wing
appeared through the aphaeresis of the word blowing. The similar
process could be followed in Serbian when we start with the word
puvanje/puvati (to wind, blow; cf.Eng. pump), which has been derived
from the Bel-Bel-Gon basis (from oblivanje/polivanje suffusing,
bljuvanje disgorge, gush) and the verb vinuti se (soar, fly high in
the sky).

Some of the piercing minds on sci.lang of the Brainy type could say
that there is another Serbian word - puhati/puhanje with the same
meaning as puvati/puvanje. It is the truth as well as it is the truth
that the Serbian words, duvanje/duvati (blow, blowing) and duhanje/
duhati (blow, wind), corresponds clearly to puvanje/puvati (blow,
wind) and puhanje/puhati (blow, wind).

Even the Chinese word tái fēng (typhoon; cf. Greek Τυφάων a
mythological monster with a hundred heads who breathed out flames)
looks as a cognate of Serbian duvanje (blowing) as well as the English
word wind sounds phonetically close to Chinese fēng (wind). Although
the Serbian words puvanje and puhanje have the same meaning they have
not come from the same basis.

Namely, as we told earlier, puvanje is a "descendant" of the Bel-Bel-
Gon basis (bluvati => puvati; cf. Eng. bubble) while the other word,
Serbian puhati, has been derived from the Bel-Gon basis (Serb.
bljunuti/ from bljuhnuti disgorge, puhnuti blow, wind; cf. Eng. wind).
Now it bacame clear that English wind is related to the Serbian words
puhnuti/puhati or vijanje/vejanje/uvijanje (wind/winding/snowing; also
Serb. vinuti se "soar", vintati "to twist", mantati "feel the
dizziness"). Serbian uvinuti is the same word as English wind
(twine).

Serbian lep (beautiful; from ljubiti kiss, love) and English beautiful
(pretty), as we have already shown, are the descendent of the same
ancestor. The similar is with the Latin word bellulus (pretty), which
is related to the OFr. bealte (being handsome).

The Serbian verb voleti (love) clearly correspond with the English
beauty and OFr. bealte, although these words have no identical meaning
(love vs. beuty). Such a discrepancy in the meanings of above-
mentioned Serbian and English words indicates that Slavic and Germanic
languages had a different path of their own evolution and that these
two tongues were separated physically in the past for a long period of
time (probably more than a few millenniums).

On the other side, the meaning of the words that were derived from the
Gon-Bel-Bel-Gon “agglutinated” basis did not deviate much from the
primary idea of a “kinship” showed by the sun and a cloud (Serb.
obljubiti to adhere, cling, stick or hold together and resist
separation).

In reality, Serbian obljubiti is born from a transient (temporary) hn/
o-bl-ub(l)-hne basis, which was the platform from which the Serbian
words oblak (cloud), kobeljanje (rolling about; kobeljanje oblaka “the
rolling of the clouds”) and okupljanje (gathering) were launched into
the world of speech. Symbolically, the “closeness” among the sun and
clouds has been “implemented” into the area of everyday human
life.

Trond Engen

unread,
Jan 1, 2008, 10:36:46 AM1/1/08
to
Dušan Vukotić skreiv:

> [Snipping belgianisms]


>
> Let us take still another example - English word wind (from the
> supposed Pokorny's root uendh-1) and its possible relation to the
> Serbian words huk (roar, hoot, blowing of the wind), huknuti/hukati
> (hoot, blowing) and dah (breath), dahnuti/disati (breathe), duhati/
> duvati (blow). Does it not seem more plausible that English wind is
> related to the other English "airborne" words like wing or flying?
>
> In fact, now it became clear that the root uendh-1 could not be the
> source of the word wind, because the English words wind and wing
> appeared through the aphaeresis of the word blowing.

Bjorvand & Lindeman take No. <vind> and <vinge> (i.e. Eng <wind> and
<wing>) as derivations from the root Gmc *we:- > Non-Anatol. *Hwe:- <
PIE *H2w-eH1-. (Accepting this, the suffixes are self-evident.) Since
the "wind"-word has reflexes in several branches, it's probably older
than Germanic. In Non-Anatolian this derivated stem wouldn't look very
different from Pokorny's *uendH1-. The "wing"-word, OTOH, must be
younger, since the verbal noun suffix -ing is a Germanic innovation.

> [Snipping more belgianisms]


>
> Now it bacame clear that English wind is related to the Serbian words
> puhnuti/puhati or vijanje/vejanje/uvijanje (wind/winding/snowing;
> also Serb. vinuti se "soar", vintati "to twist", mantati "feel the
> dizziness"). Serbian uvinuti is the same word as English wind (twine).

B&L mention OCS <vejõ> among the reflexes of PIE *H2w-eH1-. Some of your
"cognates" aren't even remotely close, and you still mix prefixes and
roots, but at least some looks OK. I'd better leave that to someone who
actually knows something about Slavic, though.

> [Even more belgianisms]

--
Trond Engen
- wishing a happy new year to everyone

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