Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

Re: Using letters to recreate sounds

3 views
Skip to first unread message

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:24:54 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 29 2009, 3:30 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Dec 28, 11:35 pm, John Lawler <johnmlaw...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 22, 11:44 am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > Um, why do we use the alphabet for writing?
>
> > We use the alphabet because the Romans did, and they did it
> > because the Greeks did it, and they did it because the Punes
> > did it.  The Punes (Phoenicians)  invented the version of the
> > alphabet that we use.  Other versions spread to the East
> > and became Asian alphabets like Devanagari.
>
> > The Chinese, of course, invented a different way of writing,
> > even earlier, but they have languages that are better suited
> > to logographic writing than most.
>
> > As for making up words to represent sounds like "grrrr",
> > that's normal onomatopoeia, as BMCT pointed out. Common
> > in all languages, whether they have standard spellings
> > or not (standard spelling is not a universal phenomenon).
>
> > -John Lawler      http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler
> >  "A sentence uttered makes a world appear
> >   Where all things happen as it says they do;
> >   We doubt the speaker, not the tongue we hear:
> >   Words have no words for words that are not true."
> >        --  W.H. Auden, Notes on the Comic
>
> To put it simply:  we use an alphabet because that way, we can most
> clearly write down the sounds of our speech.  There is nothing weird
> or strange about using strings of letters to represent sounds or
> noise.
>
> BTW,  ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
> onomatopoeic at all.  The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
> w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.

what phoneme do you mean by <C>?

> Note:  Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
> major Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic); we do not know for sure

well, there were single consonant signs, but Egyptian did not
regularly use it as a consonantal aphabet ("abjad"), except for
foreign words. but yes, the signs represent the groups of consonants
and the consonantal skeleton of the words is known with a much higher
degree of certainity than the vowels (unless they happen to be
transliterated into Greek, as it is with some names). there is a
method of guessing reconstructing) the vowels from Coptic with some
complicated rules, but there is a potential error in that so Ancient
Egyptian words are usually given in the consonantal skeleton only.

> any of the vowels used or where they were placed.  (Linguistic
> Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
> certain about any of them.  And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
> learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:28:27 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 30 2009, 12:25 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Dec 29, 10:13 pm, John Lawler <johnmlaw...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 29, 1:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:

>
> > > Cece wrote:
>
> > > > BTW,  ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
> > > > onomatopoeic at all.  The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
> > > > w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.
> > > > Note:  Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
> > > > major Semitic languages, Hebrew andArabic); we do not know for sure

> > > > any of the vowels used or where they were placed.  (Linguistic
> > > > Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
> > > > certain about any of them.  And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
> > > > learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)
>
> > >      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> > > language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> > > white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> > > wrong, though.
>
> > > --
> > > You'd be crazy to e-mail me with the crazy. But leave the div alone.
>
> > Ancient Egyptian was definitely an Afroasiatic language. That's
> > the family to which Semitic (Arabic, Hebrew, Ethiopic) belongs.
> > Skin color has absolutely *nothing* to do with language family.
>
> > Egyptian (and Coptic, which is modern Egyptian, though it's
> > not spoken by most Egyptians, who speakArabic, natch),
> > however, is *not* a Semitic language, but rather a separate
> > branch of Afroasiatic, parallel to Semitic.  Other parallel
> > branches are Cushitic (spoken in Somalia, NW Kenya, and
> > environs); Omotic (spoken in the Omo valley of Ethiopia);
> > Berber (N. Africa, esp. Morocco); and Chadic, which is
> > spoken west, south, and east of Lake Chad in sub-Saharan
> > Africa.  The most prominent Chadic language is Hausa,
> > mostly spoken in Nigeria.  (details from Comrie (ed) 1990,
> > 'The World's Major Languages', Oxford U Press)
>
> > A family tree of Afroasiatic is available online at
> > http://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=52-16
>
> > As for why we use an alphabet, it is a good way to represent
> > sounds, though the spelling system of English is a rather
> > poor one to use to represent anything except Middle English.
>
> > If you want to see an alphabet that actually represents the
> > sounds of modern English, try
> > http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/modestproposal.pdf
>
> > -John Lawler  http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/
> >   "Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day,
> >    but set fire to him and he's warm for the
> >    rest of his life."      -- Terry Pratchett- Hide quoted text -
>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> In the old books I've used, Egyptian is called "Hamito-Semitic," and

nowadays, the family is called "Afro-Asiatic".

> Gardiner uses Hebrew andArabicexamples, here and there, in the
> textbook.  Like Hebrew andArabic, the basic concept a word is usually
> conveyed by the (three) consonants; the form of the word (rather like
> donor, donee, donation, donate) is determined by the vowels, which
> don't need to be written because the sense is plain withoiut them.
> More or less.
>
> Modern English has 44 sounds and only 26 letters.  Middle English had
> 28 or 29 letters (ash, thorn, yogh), one fewer than Old English
> (edh).  Our spelling is developed from one variety of late Middle and
> our pronunciation developed from another variety.  Have you read
> Caxton's passage on the differences in language along the Thames?
> (The boatman who asked the housewife for eggys and she replied that
> she did not speak French.  It took a while, but she realized he meant
> eyroun.)  Personally, I like International Phonetic Alphabet --
> however, with that, Brits and Americans spell words differently.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:34:08 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Cece wrote:
>
> > BTW,  ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
> > onomatopoeic at all.  The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
> > w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.
> > Note:  Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
> > major Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic); we do not know for sure

> > any of the vowels used or where they were placed.  (Linguistic
> > Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
> > certain about any of them.  And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
> > learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)
>
>      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> wrong, though.

Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race" has nothing
to do with linguistic classification

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:42:12 AM1/7/10
to
On Jan 2, 12:16 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Dec 31 2009, 11:38 am, John Lawler <johnmlaw...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 30, 9:25 am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 29, 10:13 pm, JohnLawler<johnmlaw...@gmail.com> wrote:

>
> > > > On Dec 29, 1:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > Cece wrote:
>
> > > > > > BTW,  ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
> > > > > > onomatopoeic at all.  The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
> > > > > > w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.
> > > > > > Note:  Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
> > > > > > major Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic); we do not know for sure
> > > > > > any of the vowels used or where they were placed.  (Linguistic
> > > > > > Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
> > > > > > certain about any of them.  And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
> > > > > > learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)
>
> > > > >      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> > > > > language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> > > > > white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> > > > > wrong, though.
>
> > > > > --
> > > > > You'd be crazy to e-mail me with the crazy. But leave the div alone.
>
> > > > Ancient Egyptian was definitely an Afroasiatic language. That's
> > > > the family to which Semitic (Arabic, Hebrew, Ethiopic) belongs.
> > > > Skin color has absolutely *nothing* to do with language family.
>
> > > > Egyptian (and Coptic, which is modern Egyptian, though it's
> > > > not spoken by most Egyptians, who speak Arabic, natch),

> > > > however, is *not* a Semitic language, but rather a separate
> > > > branch of Afroasiatic, parallel to Semitic.  Other parallel
> > > > branches are Cushitic (spoken in Somalia, NW Kenya, and
> > > > environs); Omotic (spoken in the Omo valley of Ethiopia);
> > > > Berber (N. Africa, esp. Morocco); and Chadic, which is
> > > > spoken west, south, and east of Lake Chad in sub-Saharan
> > > > Africa.  The most prominent Chadic language is Hausa,
> > > > mostly spoken in Nigeria.  (details from Comrie (ed) 1990,
> > > > 'The World's Major Languages', Oxford U Press)
>
> > > > A family tree of Afroasiatic is available online athttp://www.ethnologue.com/show_family.asp?subid=52-16

>
> > > > As for why we use an alphabet, it is a good way to represent
> > > > sounds, though the spelling system of English is a rather
> > > > poor one to use to represent anything except Middle English.
>
> > > > If you want to see an alphabet that actually represents the
> > > > sounds of modern English, tryhttp://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/modestproposal.pdf
>
> > > > -JohnLawler http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/

> > > >   "Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day,
> > > >    but set fire to him and he's warm for the
> > > >    rest of his life."      -- Terry Pratchett- Hide quoted text -
>
> > > > - Show quoted text -
>
> > > In the old books I've used, Egyptian is called "Hamito-Semitic," and
> > > Gardiner uses Hebrew and Arabic examples, here and there, in the
> > > textbook.  Like Hebrew and Arabic, the basic concept a word is usually

> > > conveyed by the (three) consonants; the form of the word (rather like
> > > donor, donee, donation, donate) is determined by the vowels, which
> > > don't need to be written because the sense is plain withoiut them.
> > > More or less.
>
> > > Modern English has 44 sounds and only 26 letters.  Middle English had
> > > 28 or 29 letters (ash, thorn, yogh), one fewer than Old English
> > > (edh).  Our spelling is developed from one variety of late Middle and
> > > our pronunciation developed from another variety.  Have you read
> > > Caxton's passage on the differences in language along the Thames?
> > > (The boatman who asked the housewife for eggys and she replied that
> > > she did not speak French.  It took a while, but she realized he meant
> > > eyroun.)  Personally, I like International Phonetic Alphabet --
> > > however, with that, Brits and Americans spell words differently.
>
> > "Hamito-Semitic" is the old term for what's now called Afroasiatic.
> > It was used before the relation with Hausa was discovered.

>
> > On Dec 30, 9:25 am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > Personally, I like International Phonetic Alphabet --
> > > however, with that, Brits and Americans spell words differently.
>
> > Not if you use the English Phonemic Alphabet, which doesn't mark
> > differences so much as similarities (e.g, /r/ subsumes both rhotic
> > and non-rhotic pronunciations, /o/ is either [ow] or [ǝʊ]).  That's
> > what
> > phonemes *are*.  A modest example with accompanying transcribed
> > text is available athttp://www.umich.edu/~jlawler/modestproposal.pdf
> > (The text is intended as an indication of the intended audience and
> > the difficulty involved)
>
> > Happy New Year, Happy New Decade,
> > and welcome to the "Twenty-Something" Century.
>
> > -John Lawler        http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler
> > "Ye knowe ek, that in forme of speche is chaunge
> >   Withinne a thousand yer, and wordes tho
> >   That hadden prys now wonder nyce and straunge
> >   Us thenketh hem, and yet they spake hem so.
> >   And spedde as wel in love as men now do."
> >               -- Geoffrey Chaucer
> >                  Troylus and Criseyde II, 22-26- Hide quoted text -

>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> The computer I'm at (not mine) doesn't do pdf, nor does it show me
> many of the special characters most computers do.  Forex,  "o is
> either ow or [box][box]."
>
> Of course, I figured that "Afroasiatic" must be a newer term for the
> "Hamito-Semitic" I'd learned from an old book.  Still....
>
> I never will understand why people make so much of skin color!  And I
> will never understand why some people insist that ancient Egyptians
> were "black."  Including Cleopatra (whose ancestry was entirely
> Greek).
>
> Egyptian vowels -- we don't know, although some idea was gotten from
> some of the Amarna tablets, which are written in Akkadian using
> cuneiform; names are written phonetically.  Also, Coptic has some
> hints, if we run the language backward (although we cannot check to
> see if we got it right).  And Ptolemaic inscriptions can help some,
> too, if the text is written in Egyptian and Greek (like the Rosetta
> Stone).
>
> Egyptologists look at a string of hieroglyphs, or hieratic or demotic
> (the last being characterized as "page after page of demented commas"
> by Barbara Michaels), and write down the equivalents of the consonants
> indicated, then add "e" wherever a vowel is needed to pronounce the
> string.  Two letters -- a glottal stop and another that exists in
> Arabic -- are often written "a," and another is often written in
> "i" (doubled at the end of a word, "y").  If the Egyptologist is an
> English-speaker.  If the Egyptologist is a French-speaker, some of the
> vowels come out "o."  For example, the Egyptian word "nfr" is
> transcribed by an English Egyptologist "nefer"; by a French one,
> "nofre."
>
> The sun god Re -- the writing is a sundisk.  I think "Ra" is probably
> from Ptolemaic or Greek notes; "Re" is the standard (see above).  I've
> never seen "Rah."  How it was actually pronounced by an Egyptian,

the last consonant was an `ayn, the voiced pharyngeal fricative, IIRC
though in the late period it is regarded as having disappeared. it
was not something normally romanized as <h>

> through three or four thousand years, I don't know.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:49:26 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 23 2009, 11:52 am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
> wrote:
>
> > On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > (If you're wondering why I'm interested... it came up in a lunch
> > > conversation with my friend the other day, and ... I'm just a curious
> > > person!)
>
> > Well since you're the curious sort...
> > You might find it interesting to see how others write the sound a cat
> > makes;
>
> >http://nl.wiktionary.org/wiki/miauwen
>
> > It's in Dutch, but not that difficult to follow; "miauw" is "meow" in
> > Dutch.
> >  "Meow" in other languages shown too.
>
> The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly pronounced /
> mjuw/.

in Turkish meow is miyav, "to meow" is miyavlamak, root miyavla= with
denominal -la=

in chinese "cat" is māo 貓 , different tone and character than the
Chinese leader.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:57:29 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 28 2009, 3:05 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Dec 24, 6:03 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>

> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
> > > wrote:
>
> > > > On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > > (If you're wondering why I'm interested... it came up in a lunch
> > > > > conversation with my friend the other day, and ... I'm just a curious
> > > > > person!)
>
> > > > Well since you're the curious sort...
> > > > You might find it interesting to see how others write the sound a cat
> > > > makes;
>
> > > >http://nl.wiktionary.org/wiki/miauwen
>
> > > > It's in Dutch, but not that difficult to follow; "miauw" is "meow" in
> > > > Dutch.
> > > >  "Meow" in other languages shown too.
>
> > > The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly pronounced /
> > > mjuw/.
>
> > I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is "Wuuf" of
> > "Wooph"?- Hide quoted text -

>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> I'll look it up!
>
> The Egyptian word for "cat" is spelled "milk jug, reed leaf, quail
> chick."

a link would be helpful

Patok

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:12:11 AM1/7/10
to
Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Cece wrote:
>>
>>> BTW, ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
>>> onomatopoeic at all. The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
>>> w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.
>>> Note: Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
>>> major Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic); we do not know for sure
>>> any of the vowels used or where they were placed. (Linguistic
>>> Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
>>> certain about any of them. And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
>>> learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)
>> Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
>> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
>> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
>> wrong, though.
>
> Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"

Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.


> has nothing
> to do with linguistic classification

That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:14:28 AM1/7/10
to

found it, among a summary of the Egyptian writing system:

http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian.htm

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:17:45 AM1/7/10
to

"racial divide" is debatable.

Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:34:52 AM1/7/10
to

and finally, at the end, the classifier "cat"

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:58:10 AM1/7/10
to
On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
wrote:
> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
> > wrote:
>
> > > On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > > > (If you're wondering why I'm interested... it came up in a lunch
> > > > conversation with my friend the other day, and ... I'm just a curious
> > > > person!)
>
> > > Well since you're the curious sort...
> > > You might find it interesting to see how others write the sound a cat
> > > makes;
>
> > >http://nl.wiktionary.org/wiki/miauwen
>
> > > It's in Dutch, but not that difficult to follow; "miauw" is "meow" in
> > > Dutch.
> > > "Meow" in other languages shown too.
>
> > The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly pronounced /
> > mjuw/.
>
> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is "Wuuf" of
> "Wooph"?

http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm

<<

The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to the dog's
bark.

>>

AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 4:32:46 AM1/7/10
to
In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote in <hi47n2$rsl$1...@pcls6.std.com>:
: On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
: wrote:

:> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:

:>
:>
:>
:>
:>
:> > On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>
:> > wrote:
:>
:> > > On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:

:>
:> > The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly pronounced /


:> > mjuw/.
:>
:> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is "Wuuf" of
:> "Wooph"?

: http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm

: <<
:
: The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to the dog's
: bark.

: >>

: AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?

two other words are given here:

http://bleedingeyeballs.com/basenjiart/hieroglyphs.htm

<<

Below is the hieroglyphic spelling tsm, one word for dog. The first three
symbols represent the phonetic spelling: the hobble rope [top left] equals
t, the bolt {...} equals s, and the owl equals m. The pictogram
for dog follows, cementing the meaning of the word.

>>

actually it is t_sm , representing *ch*.

also


<<

For instance, uher, another word for dog, also means house. The pictogram
that followed thus helped the ancients clarify the word's meaning: When a
dog pictogram followed uher, the writer meant a dog; if the symbol for
house followed, then the writer meant a house.

The hieroglyphic word dog thus combines phonograms which represent the
sounds of the word together with a pictogram, the visual representation of
the thing itself.

>>

the semitic word for dog is *kalb-um (Classical Arabic kalb-un) root <klb>
(-um is teh nomiantive) from the bilitiral root <kl> + "animal ending"
-<b> . in other Afro-Asiatic language groups IIRC it appears as <kn>
(cognate with the Semitic). NB Latin canis (animal names tend to get
around).


Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 4:43:48 AM1/7/10
to
In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote in <hi47n2$rsl$1...@pcls6.std.com>:
: On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>

: http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm

: >>

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&basename=%5Cdata%5Csemham%5Cafaset&first=101

<<

Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *'ayVw-

Meaning: jackal, dog

Semitic: *'VwVy- 'jackal'

Egyptian: i:w 'dog' (MK)

Western Chadic: *'iy- 'dog'

Low East Cushitic: *yayy- 'wild dog; hunting dog; jackal; wolf'

High East Cushitic: *yayy- 'hunting dog'

Notes: Originally descriptive.

>>

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 5:03:00 AM1/7/10
to
In alt.english.usage John Lawler <johnm...@gmail.com> wrote in <9898c142-c729-459c...@a32g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>:

: On Dec 22, 11:44?am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:

:> Um, why do we use the alphabet for writing?

ease of conveying words?

: We use the alphabet because the Romans did, and they did it


: because the Greeks did it, and they did it because the Punes
: did it. The Punes (Phoenicians) invented the version of the
: alphabet that we use. Other versions spread to the East

they invented a strictly consanantal alphabet (abjad)

: and became Asian alphabets like Devanagari.

that is technically called an "abugida" (vowels are indicated by modifying
the consonant symbols)

: The Chinese, of course, invented a different way of writing,


: even earlier, but they have languages that are better suited
: to logographic writing than most.

I'm sure someone will quibble about that. the logographic writing also
represents syllables. due to the many homophones, and the desire to write
the various "dialects" of Chinese in a single script, the logographic
system persists.

: As for making up words to represent sounds like "grrrr",

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 5:05:39 AM1/7/10
to
In alt.english.usage Cece <ceceliaa...@yahoo.com> wrote in <3bffea8d-5910-4c82...@a32g2000yqm.googlegroups.com>:
: On Dec 28, 11:35?pm, John Lawler <johnmlaw...@gmail.com> wrote:

:> On Dec 22, 11:44?am, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
:>
:> > Um, why do we use the alphabet for writing?
:>
:> We use the alphabet because the Romans did, and they did it

:> because the Greeks did it, and they did it because the Punes
:> did it. ?The Punes (Phoenicians) ?invented the version of the
:> alphabet that we use. ?Other versions spread to the East
:> and became Asian alphabets like Devanagari.
:>
:> The Chinese, of course, invented a different way of writing,

:> even earlier, but they have languages that are better suited
:> to logographic writing than most.
:>
:> As for making up words to represent sounds like "grrrr",

:> that's normal onomatopoeia, as BMCT pointed out. Common
:> in all languages, whether they have standard spellings
:> or not (standard spelling is not a universal phenomenon).
:>
:> -John Lawler ? ? ?http://www.umich.edu/~jlawler
:> ?"A sentence uttered makes a world appear
:> ? Where all things happen as it says they do;
:> ? We doubt the speaker, not the tongue we hear:
:> ? Words have no words for words that are not true."
:> ? ? ? ?-- ?W.H. Auden, Notes on the Comic

: To put it simply: we use an alphabet because that way, we can most
: clearly write down the sounds of our speech. There is nothing weird
: or strange about using strings of letters to represent sounds or
: noise.

: BTW, ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been


: onomatopoeic at all. The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and

considred to be originally onomatopeic too, see my other posts.

: w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.

ah, <C> stands for *ch* (see my other post.

: Note: Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 6:11:02 AM1/7/10
to
On Jan 7, 4:43 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@TheWorld.com> wrote:
> In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote in <hi47n2$rs...@pcls6.std.com>:

> : On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>: wrote:
>
> :> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> :>
> :>
> :>
> :>
> :>
> :> > On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk>:> > wrote:
>
> :>
> :> > > On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
> :>
> :> > > > (If you're wondering why I'm interested... it came up in a lunch
> :> > > > conversation with my friend the other day, and ... I'm just a curious
> :> > > > person!)
> :>
> :> > > Well since you're the curious sort...
> :> > > You might find it interesting to see how others write the sound a cat
> :> > > makes;
> :>
> :> > >http://nl.wiktionary.org/wiki/miauwen
> :>
> :> > > It's in Dutch, but not that difficult to follow; "miauw" is "meow" in
> :> > > Dutch.
> :> > > "Meow" in other languages shown too.
> :>
> :> > The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly pronounced /
> :> > mjuw/.
> :>
> :> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is "Wuuf" of
> :> "Wooph"?
>
> :http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm
>
> : <<
> :
> : The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to the dog's
> : bark.
>
> : >>
>
> : AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>
> http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&ba...

>
> <<
>
> Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *'ayVw-
>
> Meaning: jackal, dog
>
> Semitic: *'VwVy- 'jackal'

jackal in arabic: ibn 'a:wa" "son of 'a:wa" " (ibn 'a:wa:, 'a:wa:
spelled <'a:wy> ) ابن آوى

Hebrew 'i: "jackal" (< *"howler") root *<'wy> *"howl"; arabic 'a:ha
"he cried" آهَ (BDB)

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 11:16:58 AM1/7/10
to
On Jan 7, 6:11 am, Yusuf B Gursey <ybgur...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Jan 7, 4:43 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@TheWorld.com> wrote:

> > :  <<
> > :
> > : The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to the dog's
> > : bark.
>
> > :  >>
>
> > : AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>
> >http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&ba...
>
> >  <<
>
> > Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *'ayVw-
>
> > Meaning: jackal, dog
>
> > Semitic: *'VwVy- 'jackal'
>
> jackal in arabic: ibn 'a:wa" "son of 'a:wa" " (ibn 'a:wa:, 'a:wa:

in classical arabic ibn-u 'a:wa: (with the nominative case ending in
the contstruct state)

CDB

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 11:36:50 AM1/7/10
to
Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey <y...@TheWorld.com> wrote:
>> In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>>>>
[onomatopoeia in animal names]

>
>>> The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to
>>> the dog's bark.
>>
>>> AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>>
>> http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&ba...
>>
>> Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *'ayVw-
>>
>> Meaning: jackal, dog
>>
>> Semitic: *'VwVy- 'jackal'
>
> jackal in arabic: ibn 'a:wa" "son of 'a:wa" " (ibn 'a:wa:, 'a:wa:
> spelled <'a:wy> ) ??? ???

>
> Hebrew 'i: "jackal" (< *"howler") root *<'wy> *"howl"; arabic 'a:ha
> "he cried" ??? (BDB)
>
Interesting parallel to my reported explanation for "canis"
elsethread. Any comments on "tan"? (I remember a song in Hebrew,
"Erev Ba", that uses that word for "jackal": "melaveh hatan et bo
haleyl," the jackal accompanies (musically, in this case, I suppose)
the coming of night.)
>
Yes, here it is, although the latin-alphabet transcription has a few
typos in it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yULjyc0sw34

CDB

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 11:36:56 AM1/7/10
to
That's often explained as being related to IE words meaning "sing",
and has a germanic cognate "hound" which would put it earlier than IE
contact with those southern languages, would it not? (That's really
the question it appears to be: I'm no expert.)


Patok

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 1:56:57 PM1/7/10
to

Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?

Cece

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 2:37:45 PM1/7/10
to
> http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian.htm- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

Oh, good! I don't have a link; I looked it up in my paper copy of
Gardiner.

Your other comments and questions: Yes, ayin is what I was referring
to; I couldn't remember the name and I have never heard the sound.

The phoneme I meant by C is, in ASCII IPA, /tS/. The consonants at
beginning and end of the English word "church." The monoliteral is a
tethering rope. The spelling of the word for dog does not include
that monoliteral.

A few words are represented by one monoliteral. The preposition "n"
is one; pronominal suffixes are a whole set. Usually, though, the
monoliterals are part of a spelling. Sometimes they are for more
sounds in the word, sounds not included in the pronunciation of the
ideogram or triliteral also used; sometimes they repeat sounds that
are included in the bi- or triliteral.

No, I don't know much Egyptian; I've studied it on my own, getting
into Gardiner's Lesson 11.

By the way, Omniglot says that the word for "cat" includes a picture
of a cat. Not in Gardiner! Gardiner shows the determinative of a
cowhide, used to indicate "animal."

Bill McCray

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 3:22:41 PM1/7/10
to
CDB wrote:

> Interesting parallel to my reported explanation for "canis"
> elsethread. Any comments on "tan"? (I remember a song in Hebrew,
> "Erev Ba", that uses that word for "jackal": "melaveh hatan et bo
> haleyl," the jackal accompanies (musically, in this case, I suppose)
> the coming of night.)

"Evening Falls". I don't know about the words, but the melody is
beautiful. I love the dance associated with it.

Bill in Kentucky

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 4:21:20 PM1/7/10
to
On Jan 7, 1:56 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> >>> On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> >>>> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> >>>> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> >>>> wrong, though.
> >>> Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"
> >>      Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
> >> Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.
>
> >>> has nothing
> >>> to do with linguistic classification
> >>      That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?
>
> > "racial divide" is debatable.
>
> > Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.
>
>      Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?

I don't subscribe to the notion of "race" to begin with, but NB the
great variation in apperance of the speakers in those language groups.
besides, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish are spoken as a first
language by people of African and Native American origin.

Patok

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 4:35:48 PM1/7/10
to
Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> On Jan 7, 1:56 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>>> On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>>>>> On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>> Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
>>>>>> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
>>>>>> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
>>>>>> wrong, though.
>>>>> Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"
>>>> Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
>>>> Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.
>>>>> has nothing
>>>>> to do with linguistic classification
>>>> That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?
>>> "racial divide" is debatable.
>>> Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.
>> Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?
>
> I don't subscribe to the notion of "race" to begin with, but NB the

This is your problem. Races in humans are equivalent to breeds in
dogs or cats (cats is a closer match, since the variation between dog
breeds is too extreme). Are you unsubscribing from the notion of breeds too?


> great variation in apperance of the speakers in those language groups.

External appearance (especially skin color) is the most
insignificant of the markers that separate races.


> besides, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish are spoken as a first
> language by people of African and Native American origin.

Well, yes, but these are not the languages that they spoke
natively. My point was, that native languages and populations evolve
together, and speakers of the same language family share genetic origins
too.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 6:09:23 PM1/7/10
to
On Jan 7, 4:35 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > On Jan 7, 1:56 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> >>> On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> >>>>> On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >>>>>>      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> >>>>>> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> >>>>>> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> >>>>>> wrong, though.
> >>>>> Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"
> >>>>      Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
> >>>> Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.
> >>>>> has nothing
> >>>>> to do with linguistic classification
> >>>>      That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?
> >>> "racial divide" is debatable.
> >>> Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.
> >>      Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?
>
> > I don't subscribe to the notion of  "race" to begin with, but NB the
>
>       This is your problem. Races in humans are equivalent to breeds in
> dogs or cats (cats is a closer match, since the variation between dog
> breeds is too extreme). Are you unsubscribing from the notion of breeds too?
>

"race" as conventionally tthought of is not a scientific category.
there are population groups with certain genetic markers.

> > great variation in apperance of the speakers in those language groups.
>
>      External appearance (especially skin color) is the most
> insignificant of the markers that separate races.
>
> > besides, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish are spoken as a first
> > language by people of African and Native American origin.
>
>      Well, yes, but these are not the languages that they spoke

they speek it natively. adoption of a new language by a population
group is quite common. so is intermarriage.

> natively. My point was, that native languages and populations evolve
> together, and speakers of the same language family share genetic origins
> too.

sometimes, but there are many grand exceptions, and as I said before,
adoption of a new language, intermarriage etc. are quite common. this
issue was just discussed in another thread in sci.lang . attempts to
make a close correlation between language families and genetic markers
have not proven to be very succesful.

Harlan Messinger

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 6:18:36 PM1/7/10
to
Patok wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>> On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>>>> On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>> Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
>>>>> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts)
>>>>> were
>>>>> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I
>>>>> may be
>>>>> wrong, though.
>>>> Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"
>>> Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
>>> Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.
>>>
>>>> has nothing
>>>> to do with linguistic classification
>>> That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial
>>> divide?
>>
>> "racial divide" is debatable.
>>
>> Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.
>
> Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?

All of them, given almost anyone's definition of "race".

Trond Engen

unread,
Jan 7, 2010, 6:47:32 PM1/7/10
to
Patok:

> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>
>> On Jan 7, 1:56 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>>>
>>>> On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
>>>>>

>>>>>> [...]


>>>>>
>>>>> Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?
>>>>
>>>> "racial divide" is debatable.
>>>> Afro-Asiatic, Indo-European, Turkic for starters.
>>>
>>> Which of these language groups are spoken by more than one race?
>>
>> I don't subscribe to the notion of "race" to begin with, but NB the
>
> This is your problem. Races in humans are equivalent to breeds
> in dogs or cats (cats is a closer match, since the variation between
> dog breeds is too extreme). Are you unsubscribing from the notion of
> breeds too?

Only where deliberate selection of arbitrary characteristica has been
pursued over many generations, artificially narrowing the genetic pool,
resulting in a population with some few very characteristic arbitrary
features and a high risque of genetic diseases.

>> great variation in apperance of the speakers in those language
>> groups.
>
> External appearance (especially skin color) is the most
> insignificant of the markers that separate races.

Yeah, right. Musicality and rhythm, then?

>> besides, English, French, Portuguese, Spanish are spoken as a first
>> language by people of African and Native American origin.
>
> Well, yes, but these are not the languages that they spoke natively.

Brilliant! "Excluding languages spoken by other populations than the
original no language has ever spread to other populations."

> My point was, that native languages and populations evolve
> together, and speakers of the same language family share genetic
> origins too.

No.

Or: Over a short time span: Yes, naturally, by collocation. Over a long
time span: No, too much noise from language change and migration.

--
Trond Engen

CDB

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 8:12:05 AM1/8/10
to
Cece wrote:
>
[onomatopoeia]

>
> Your other comments and questions: Yes, ayin is what I was
> referring
> to; I couldn't remember the name and I have never heard the sound.
>
Remember Merrilee Rush? I thought she came pretty close (for English)
to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning". At about 1:14
here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU


Ruud Harmsen

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 8:35:34 AM1/8/10
to
Fri, 8 Jan 2010 08:12:05 -0500: "CDB" <belle...@sympatico.ca>: in
sci.lang:

>Remember Merrilee Rush? I thought she came pretty close (for English)
>to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning". At about 1:14
>here:
>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU

Sounds more like hamza than ain.'
Some real ains here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ

--
Ruud Harmsen, http://rudhar.com

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 9:31:25 AM1/8/10
to
On Jan 8, 8:35 am, Ruud Harmsen <r...@rudhar.eu> wrote:
> Fri, 8 Jan 2010 08:12:05 -0500: "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca>: in

> sci.lang:
>
> >Remember Merrilee Rush?  I thought she came pretty close (for English)
> >to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning".  At about 1:14
> >here:
> >http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU
>
> Sounds more like hamza than ain.'

hamza is a glottal stop, for those who don't know

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 10:32:44 AM1/8/10
to
On Jan 8, 8:35 am, Ruud Harmsen <r...@rudhar.eu> wrote:
> Fri, 8 Jan 2010 08:12:05 -0500: "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca>: in

> sci.lang:
>
> >Remember Merrilee Rush?  I thought she came pretty close (for English)
> >to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning".  At about 1:14
> >here:
> >http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU
>
> Sounds more like hamza than ain.'
> Some real ains here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ

the title of the song and the refrain is: h.abi:bi: ya: nu:r el`ain ,
"my love, o light the eye (soul, self)"

`ain "eye" obviously starts with an `ayn , i.e. the voiced pharyngeal
fricative. h. is it's unvoiced equivalent (in Ancient Egyptian
symbolized by "twisted flax")

>
> --
> Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 10:34:48 AM1/8/10
to
> >http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian.htm-Hide quoted text -

>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> Oh, good!  I don't have a link; I looked it up in my paper copy of
> Gardiner.
>
> Your other comments and questions:  Yes, ayin is what I was referring
> to; I couldn't remember the name and I have never heard the sound.
>
> The phoneme I meant by C is, in ASCII IPA, /tS/.  The consonants at
> beginning and end of the English word "church."  The monoliteral is a
> tethering rope.  The spelling of the word for dog does not include
> that monoliteral.
>
> A few words are represented by one monoliteral.  The preposition "n"
> is one; pronominal suffixes are a whole set.  Usually, though, the
> monoliterals are part of a spelling.  Sometimes they are for more
> sounds in the word, sounds not included in the pronunciation of the
> ideogram or triliteral also used; sometimes they repeat sounds that
> are included in the bi- or triliteral.
>
> No, I don't know much Egyptian; I've studied it on my own, getting
> into Gardiner's Lesson 11.
>
> By the way, Omniglot says that the word for "cat" includes a picture
> of a cat.  Not in Gardiner!  Gardiner shows the determinative of a
> cowhide, used to indicate "animal."

maybe it evolved as Egyptians got more and very familiar with cats?

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 10:39:11 AM1/8/10
to
> >http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian.htm-Hide quoted text -

>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> Oh, good!  I don't have a link; I looked it up in my paper copy of
> Gardiner.
>
> Your other comments and questions:  Yes, ayin is what I was referring
> to; I couldn't remember the name and I have never heard the sound.
>

voiced phayngeal fricative. lsiten to the video posted. for layman,
one coudl describe it as a slight retching sound.

ranjit_...@yahoo.com

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 1:22:41 PM1/8/10
to
On Jan 7, 3:12 am, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > On Dec 29 2009, 4:33 pm, Patok <crazy.div.pa...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >> Cece wrote:
>
> >>> BTW,  ancient Egyptian for "dog" does not seem to have been
> >>> onomatopoeic at all.  The consonants in the word for "dog" are y and
> >>> w; the consonants in the word for "hound" are, in order, C, s, m.
> >>> Note:  Egyptian wrote down the consonants only (just like the other
> >>> major Semitic languages, Hebrew and Arabic); we do not know for sure
> >>> any of the vowels used or where they were placed.  (Linguistic
> >>> Egyptologists have some idea for many words, but even they aren't
> >>> certain about any of them.  And I'm a dilletante, with pure book
> >>> learning; I have no ideas on that at all.)
> >>      Interesting. But are you sure about that Egyptian was a Semitic
> >> language? I seem to remember that the Egyptians (modern-day Copts) were
> >> white (Caucasian), just like ancient and modern-day Ethiopians. I may be
> >> wrong, though.
>
> > Ethiopians have dark skin color and skin color or "race"
>
>      Skin color has nothing to do with race. Ethiopians, same as Asian
> Indians, have dark skin, but are not of the black race.

There's no single black race. Would you like to guess why the British
called Chennaipatnam* Blacktown.
* the native settlement just north of Ft. St. George; what currently
stands there is Madras High Court & Law College

> > has nothing
> > to do with linguistic classification
>

>      That's debatable. Which language groups have crossed the racial divide?

Cece

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 3:37:51 PM1/8/10
to
> > Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

The "emphatic h"? I've never heard that, either! Even though I
attended a talk on Egyptian gods, paintings and statues, by an
Egyptologist, an Egyptian whose English and Egyptian were both
accented by his modern Egyptian Arabic. He'd mentioned /'be da
[upsidedown R]/ several times, with me wondering which god he was
talking about until he finally put up a slide of a wallpainting of
Ptah.

And no, I've never heard of Merrilee Rush.

Cece

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 3:43:11 PM1/8/10
to
> > >http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian.htm-Hidequoted text -

>
> > > - Show quoted text -
>
> > Oh, good!  I don't have a link; I looked it up in my paper copy of
> > Gardiner.
>
> > Your other comments and questions:  Yes, ayin is what I was referring
> > to; I couldn't remember the name and I have never heard the sound.
>
> > The phoneme I meant by C is, in ASCII IPA, /tS/.  The consonants at
> > beginning and end of the English word "church."  The monoliteral is a
> > tethering rope.  The spelling of the word for dog does not include
> > that monoliteral.
>
> > A few words are represented by one monoliteral.  The preposition "n"
> > is one; pronominal suffixes are a whole set.  Usually, though, the
> > monoliterals are part of a spelling.  Sometimes they are for more
> > sounds in the word, sounds not included in the pronunciation of the
> > ideogram or triliteral also used; sometimes they repeat sounds that
> > are included in the bi- or triliteral.
>
> > No, I don't know much Egyptian; I've studied it on my own, getting
> > into Gardiner's Lesson 11.
>
> > By the way, Omniglot says that the word for "cat" includes a picture
> > of a cat.  Not in Gardiner!  Gardiner shows the determinative of a
> > cowhide, used to indicate "animal."
>
> maybe it evolved as Egyptians got more and very familiar with cats?- Hide quoted text -

>
> - Show quoted text -

I double-checked Gardiner last night. In the Vocabulary, both
Egyptian-English and English-Egyptian, the determinative is "cow's
skin," meaning, among other things, animal/beast/mammal. So I looked
up the picture of the cat in the Sign-List -- and there it is, a
determinatve, for use at the end of the word "cat"!

Ruud Harmsen

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 6:02:39 PM1/8/10
to
Fri, 8 Jan 2010 12:37:51 -0800 (PST): Cece
<ceceliaa...@yahoo.com>: in sci.lang:

>The "emphatic h"? I've never heard that, either!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ

Habi:bi:, as Yusuf already pointed out.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 7:46:34 PM1/8/10
to
On Jan 8, 3:37 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> On Jan 8, 9:32 am, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > On Jan 8, 8:35 am, Ruud Harmsen <r...@rudhar.eu> wrote:
>
> > > Fri, 8 Jan 2010 08:12:05 -0500: "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca>: in
> > > sci.lang:
>
> > > >Remember Merrilee Rush?  I thought she came pretty close (for English)
> > > >to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning".  At about 1:14
> > > >here:
> > > >http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU
>
> > > Sounds more like hamza than ain.'
> > > Some real ains here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ
>
> > the title of the song and the refrain is: h.abi:bi: ya: nu:r el`ain ,
> > "my love, o light the eye (soul, self)"
>
> > `ain "eye" obviously starts with an `ayn , i.e. the voiced pharyngeal
> > fricative. h. is it's unvoiced equivalent (in Ancient Egyptian
> > symbolized by "twisted flax")
>
> > > --
> > > Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com-Hide quoted text -

>
> > - Show quoted text -
>
> The "emphatic h"?  I've never heard that, either!  Even though I

it's symbolized as an emphatic (sometimes it is written with barred h
<ħ> and it is written as such in Maltese), but it is not. it's not
pharyngelaized as the emphatics are, but it has has single point
pharygeal articulation.

> attended a talk on Egyptian gods, paintings and statues, by an
> Egyptologist, an Egyptian whose English and Egyptian were both
> accented by his modern Egyptian Arabic.  He'd mentioned /'be da
> [upsidedown R]/ several times, with me wondering which god he was

arabic has no /b/, so he was pronouncing it [b], dunno why he voiced /
t/, and /h./ is not pronounced as the uvular sound you symbolized. you
might have misheard.

> talking about until he finally put up a slide of a wallpainting of
> Ptah.

apparently it means "opener" (Wikipedia) in Ancient Egyptian.
interesting because the root <pth.> means "to open" in Semitic.

>
> And no, I've never heard of Merrilee Rush.

never mind, turns out to be irrelevant to the subject at hand.

Ruud Harmsen

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 8:39:21 PM1/8/10
to
Fri, 8 Jan 2010 16:46:34 -0800 (PST): Yusuf B Gursey
<y...@theworld.com>: in sci.lang:

>Peter Moylan:
>
>> On 05/01/10 02:06, Peter T. Daniels wrote:
>>
>>> On Jan 4, 9:22 am, Athel Cornish-Bowden <athel...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Your last sentence is true of my wife, but not of me. I am rarely
>>>> if ever in doubt about what language someone has used (if it's one
>>>> I know, i.e. English, French or Spanish), and I always know what
>>>> language I am speaking. My wife, however, hears sense and not
>>>> words, and frequently can't say what language someone has used, and
>>>> will often reply in a different one -- that is quite unconscious;
>>>> it's certainly not deliberate.
>>>
>>> Hopefully only when she knows (at some level) that her interlocutor
>>> speaks the language she is using. Early studies of code-switching
>>> found that that's the _sine qua non_ of doing it.
>>
>> I can report at least one exception to that. When my Belgian ex-wife
>> and I were in a mixed-language conversation, she would sometimes
>> speak to me in Dutch after addressing someone else in French. I don't
>> speak Dutch, and of course she knew that, but apparently she had my
>> native language mentally tagged as "not-French", and the most common
>> not-French language in Belgium is Dutch.


>
>> attended a talk on Egyptian gods, paintings and statues, by an
>> Egyptologist, an Egyptian whose English and Egyptian were both
>> accented by his modern Egyptian Arabic. �He'd mentioned /'be da
>> [upsidedown R]/ several times, with me wondering which god he was
>

>arabic has no /b/, /

has no /p/, you no doubt meant.

>/ so he was pronouncing it [b], dunno why he voiced /


>t/, and /h./ is not pronounced as the uvular sound you symbolized. you
>might have misheard.
>
>> talking about until he finally put up a slide of a wallpainting of
>> Ptah.
>
>apparently it means "opener" (Wikipedia) in Ancient Egyptian.
>interesting because the root <pth.> means "to open" in Semitic.

Must be cognate with Arabic alFatah., from fatah.a = open, conquer.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 9:18:50 PM1/8/10
to

yes, sorry.

>
> >/ so he was pronouncing it [b], dunno why he voiced /
> >t/, and /h./ is not pronounced as the uvular sound you symbolized. you
> >might have misheard.
>
> >> talking about until he finally put up a slide of a wallpainting of
> >> Ptah.
>
> >apparently it means "opener" (Wikipedia) in Ancient Egyptian.
> >interesting because the root <pth.> means "to open" in Semitic.
>
> Must be cognate with Arabic alFatah., from fatah.a = open, conquer.

in standard arabic it is al-Fath. . I remember that reading that it
was the Hebraized pronounciation with the second /a/ that got
popular in West. Wikipedia conifrms that it is also spelled al-Fateh.
it's a reverse acronym of << h.arakat al-tah.ri:r al-wat.ani: al-
filast.i:ni: >>, meaning the "Palestinian National Liberation
Movement".


> --
> Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 8, 2010, 9:33:31 PM1/8/10
to

I didn't realize it until know but Wikipedia adds:

(H.ataf حتف, the non-reverse acronym, would mean "death", and has not
been used by the movement.)

actually it should be Hatf in standard arabic.

CDB

unread,
Jan 9, 2010, 10:58:47 AM1/9/10
to
Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> On Jan 8, 8:35 am, Ruud Harmsen <r...@rudhar.eu> wrote:
>> "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca>: in sci.lang [and aeu]:

>>
>>> Remember Merrilee Rush? I thought she came pretty close (for
>>> English) to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning". At
>>> about 1:14 here:
>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU
>>
>> Sounds more like hamza than ain.'
>> Some real ains here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ
>
> the title of the song and the refrain is: h.abi:bi: ya: nu:r el`ain
> , "my love, o light the eye (soul, self)"
>
> `ain "eye" obviously starts with an `ayn , i.e. the voiced
> pharyngeal fricative. h. is it's unvoiced equivalent (in Ancient
> Egyptian symbolized by "twisted flax")
>> --
>> Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com
>
I thank you and Ruud for the example, and the explanation. I don't
speak Arabic, or any other language with a pronounced 'ain/ayin, but
I thought I saw the words for "my beloved", "light", and "eye" in the
song title, and was going to ask if there was an ayin at the beginning
of "ayn".
>
I must say that Merrilee's "angel" does seem to me to begin with a
voiced "h" at the back of the throat, which is how I would,
non-technically, describe a "voiced pharyngeal fricative", more than
like glottal stop. Considering that she's singing in English, I mean.


Ruud Harmsen

unread,
Jan 9, 2010, 11:59:10 AM1/9/10
to
Sat, 9 Jan 2010 10:58:47 -0500: "CDB" <belle...@sympatico.ca>: in
sci.lang:

>I must say that Merrilee's "angel" does seem to me to begin with a

>voiced "h" at the back of the throat, which is how I would,
>non-technically, describe a "voiced pharyngeal fricative", more than
>like glottal stop.

All three are very different. Voiced h and glottal stop occur in my
own language, Dutch, and form an opposition.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 9, 2010, 12:03:17 PM1/9/10
to
On Jan 9, 10:58 am, "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > On Jan 8, 8:35 am, Ruud Harmsen <r...@rudhar.eu> wrote:
> >> "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca>: in sci.lang [and aeu]:
>
> >>> Remember Merrilee Rush? I thought she came pretty close (for
> >>> English) to an ayin with "Just call me ?angel of the morning". At
> >>> about 1:14 here:
> >>>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhMqFNWnVNU
>
> >> Sounds more like hamza than ain.'
> >> Some real ains here:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fR5V3dPz1jQ
>
> > the title of the song and the refrain is: h.abi:bi: ya: nu:r el`ain
> > , "my love, o light the eye (soul, self)"
>
> > `ain "eye" obviously starts with an `ayn , i.e. the voiced
> > pharyngeal fricative. h. is it's unvoiced equivalent (in Ancient
> > Egyptian symbolized by "twisted flax")
> >> --
> >> Ruud Harmsen,http://rudhar.com
>
> I thank you and Ruud for the example, and the explanation.  I don't
> speak Arabic, or any other language with a  pronounced 'ain/ayin, but

the diphthongal character of /ay/ is more apparent in colloquial
rather than classical arabic, that's why the differences in spelling.

> I thought I saw the words for "my beloved", "light", and "eye" in the
> song title, and was going to ask if there was an ayin at the beginning
> of "ayn".

yes. and the phoenician letter from which ultimately the hebrew script
(actually aramaic) and arabic script letter is derived (it became
omicron in greek script) ultimately comes from the picture of an eye
(which is what `ayn litterally means).

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 13, 2010, 3:56:34 PM1/13/10
to
On Jan 7, 11:36 am, "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote in
> > <hi47n2$rs...@pcls6.std.com>:
> >> On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp
> >> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:

>
> >>> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >>>> On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp
> >>>> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> >>>>> On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >>>> The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly
> >>>> pronounced / mjuw/.
>
> >>> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is
> >>> "Wuuf" of "Wooph"?
>
> >>http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm
>
> >>  <<
>
> >> The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to
> >> the dog's bark.
>
> >> AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>
> > two other words are given here:
>
> >http://bleedingeyeballs.com/basenjiart/hieroglyphs.htm
>
> > <<
>
> > Below is the hieroglyphic spelling tsm, one word for dog. The first
> > three
> > symbols represent the phonetic spelling: the hobble rope [top left]
> > equals
> > t, the bolt {...} equals s, and the owl equals m. The pictogram
> > for dog follows, cementing the meaning of the word.
>
> > actually it is t_sm , representing *ch*.
>
> > also
>
> > <<
>
> > For instance, uher, another word for dog, also means house. The
> > pictogram
> > that followed thus helped the ancients clarify the word's meaning:
> > When a
> > dog pictogram followed uher, the writer meant a dog; if the symbol
> > for
> > house followed, then the writer meant a house.
>
> > The hieroglyphic word dog thus combines phonograms which represent
> > the
> > sounds of the word together with a pictogram, the visual
> > representation of
> > the thing itself.
>
> > the semitic word for dog is *kalb-um (Classical Arabic kalb-un)
> > root <klb> (-um is teh nomiantive) from the bilitiral root <kl> +
> > "animal ending" -<b> . in other Afro-Asiatic language groups IIRC
> > it appears as <kn> (cognate with the Semitic). NB Latin canis
> > (animal names tend to get
> > around).

memory played tricks it seemes the article "Languages of the World" in
Brittannica says Semitic kalb(-um) comes from kal-b- cognate with
Cushitic and Chadic *kala- / kara- . close but no that close.
nevertheless there are many words for "dog" in various language
families that start with k- (in pinyin Chinese gǒu, i.e. gou3 with g-,
but that is only weakly voiced, cantonese kau). turkic qan*ch*Iq (I
represents the undotted i of turkish, the back narrow unrounded vowel)
"female dog, bitch" (-*ch*Iq is a dimunitive), turkish köpek, uzbek
kopak (domestic, as opposed to feral dog) - probably russian sobaka is
"satem" version of it (acc. to Menges), bulgarian kuche (thought to be
of iranian origin), ku*ch*u ku*ch*u (turkish for calling a dog), etc.
similarly p- words for "panther, leopard", i.e. pardus, turkic bars /
pars etc. . I think these words traveled along with the animal.

>
> That's often explained as being related to IE words meaning "sing",
> and has a germanic cognate "hound" which would put it earlier than IE
> contact with those southern languages, would it not?  (That's really
> the question it appears to be: I'm no expert.)

another internal latin etymology is from cānus (with long a) "hoary,
white". but acc. to Britannica from PIE.: Hierog. Luwian śuwana-,
Sanskrit śvan-, Greek kúōn, Latin canis, Armenian *sh*un , Tocharian B
kwen-, Old Irish con-, Lithuanian *sh*un- (some of these are "satem
forms).

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Jan 14, 2010, 3:59:18 AM1/14/10
to

ah, Omotic has kan- .

http://www.uio.no/studier/emner/hf/iln/LING2110/v07/THEIL%20Is%20Omotic%20Afroasiatic.pdf

<<

4.2 Fleming's lexical comparisons
Below follows a summary of Fleming's (1974) presentation of
21 OM words with alleged AA cognates.

...

8. DOG. PNOM *kan-; «kana … virtually universal in [NOM]. SGO has an
innovating form kuna:n-o but NGO has kana» • SE *kl-b «with the
assumption
that -b is a suffix for animal terms».

>>

but the article in question does not regard Omotic as a branch of AA,
although most do.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Apr 8, 2010, 6:14:44 AM4/8/10
to

On Jan 13, 4:56 pm, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> On Jan 7, 11:36 am, "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > > In sci.lang Yusuf BGursey<y...@theworld.com> wrote in

> > > <hi47n2$rs...@pcls6.std.com>:
> > >> On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp
> > >> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > >>> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > >>>> On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp
> > >>>> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > >>>>> On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >>>> The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly
> > >>>> pronounced / mjuw/.
>
> > >>> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is
> > >>> "Wuuf" of "Wooph"?
>
> > >>http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm
>
> > >> <<
>
> > >> The ancient Egyptian word fordogwas "iwiw", which referred to

> > >> thedog'sbark.
>
> > >> AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>
> > > two other words are given here:
>
> > >http://bleedingeyeballs.com/basenjiart/hieroglyphs.htm
>
> > > <<
>
> > > Below is the hieroglyphic spelling tsm, one word for dog. The first
> > > three
> > > symbols represent the phonetic spelling: the hobble rope [top left]
> > > equals
> > > t, the bolt {...} equals s, and the owl equals m. The pictogram
> > > fordogfollows, cementing the meaning of the word.

>
> > > actually it is t_sm , representing *ch*.
>
> > > also
>
> > > <<
>
> > > For instance, uher, another word for dog, also means house. The
> > > pictogram
> > > that followed thus helped the ancients clarify the word's meaning:
> > > When a
> > > dog pictogram followed uher, the writer meant a dog; if the symbol
> > > for
> > > house followed, then the writer meant a house.
>
> > > The hieroglyphic word dog thus combines phonograms which represent
> > > the
> > > sounds of the word together with a pictogram, the visual
> > > representation of
> > > the thing itself.
>
> > > the semitic word for dog is *kalb-um (Classical Arabic kalb-un)
> > > root <klb> (-um is teh nomiantive) from the bilitiral root <kl> +
> > > "animal ending" -<b> . in other Afro-Asiatic language groups IIRC
> > > it appears as <kn> (cognate with the Semitic). NB Latin canis
> > > (animal names tend to get
> > > around).
>
> memory played tricks it seemes the article "Languages of the World" in
> Brittannica says Semitic kalb(-um) comes from kal-b- cognate with
> Cushitic and Chadic *kala- / kara- . close but no that close.

I do remember right, but wrong source.

Yusuf B Gursey

unread,
Apr 8, 2010, 6:17:16 AM4/8/10
to
On Jan 13, 4:56 pm, Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote:
> On Jan 7, 11:36 am, "CDB" <bellema...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
> > Yusuf B Gursey wrote:
> > > In sci.lang Yusuf B Gursey <y...@theworld.com> wrote in

> > > <hi47n2$rs...@pcls6.std.com>:
> > >> On Dec 24 2009, 7:03 am, aquachimp
> > >> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > >>> On Dec 23, 5:52 pm, Cece <ceceliaarmstr...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > >>>> On Dec 23, 10:07 am, aquachimp
> > >>>> <aquach...@aquachimp.freeserve.co.uk> wrote:
>
> > >>>>> On Dec 21, 11:12 pm, Mike C <mievl...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > >>>> The ancient Egyptian word for "cat" is "miw," possibly
> > >>>> pronounced / mjuw/.
>
> > >>> I don't suppose that the ancient Egyptian word for "dog" is
> > >>> "Wuuf" of "Wooph"?
>
> > >>http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/dogs.htm
>
> > >> <<
>
> > >> The ancient Egyptian word for dog was "iwiw", which referred to

> > >> the dog's bark.
>
> > >> AFAIK <i> may represent the glottal stop, perhaps read 'aw'aw ?
>
> > > two other words are given here:
>
> > >http://bleedingeyeballs.com/basenjiart/hieroglyphs.htm
>
> > > <<
>
> > > Below is the hieroglyphic spelling tsm, one word fordog. The first

> > > three
> > > symbols represent the phonetic spelling: the hobble rope [top left]
> > > equals
> > > t, the bolt {...} equals s, and the owl equals m. The pictogram
> > > fordogfollows, cementing the meaning of the word.
>
> > > actually it is t_sm , representing *ch*.
>
> > > also
>
> > > <<
>
> > > For instance, uher, another word for dog, also means house. The
> > > pictogram
> > > that followed thus helped the ancients clarify the word's meaning:
> > > When a
> > > dog pictogram followed uher, the writer meant adog; if the symbol

> > > for
> > > house followed, then the writer meant a house.
>
> > > The hieroglyphic worddogthus combines phonograms which represent

> > > the
> > > sounds of the word together with a pictogram, the visual
> > > representation of
> > > the thing itself.
>
> > > the semitic word for dog is *kalb-um (Classical Arabic kalb-un)
> > > root <klb> (-um is teh nomiantive) from the bilitiral root <kl> +
> > > "animal ending" -<b> . in other Afro-Asiatic language groups IIRC
> > > it appears as <kn> (cognate with theSemitic). NB Latin canis

> > > (animal names tend to get
> > > around).
>
> memory played tricks it seemes the article "Languages of the World" in

I do remember right, but wrong source.

It's from Ruhlen, found in the Starling database by Starostin et al.


Starostin et. al. have three similar Afro-Asiatic words for "dog"

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/semham/afaset&text_number=2599&root=config

Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *kVl-

Meaning: dog, wolf

Semitic: *kʷahil- 'fox-like animal' ˜ *ta-kʷVl- 'wolf,
jackal' (<Cush?) (Cf. *kalb- 'dog')

Berber: *kulVn 'wolf (or squirrel?)'

Central Chadic: *kVl- 'dog'

Beḍauye (Beja): tákʷla 'wolf; Lycaon pictus'

Central Cushitic (Agaw): *ta-kʷil- 'wolf'

Saho-Afar: *ta-kla 'wolf; hyena dog'

Warazi (Dullay): (?) *tVlVkk- (met.) 'Felis serval'

Omotic: *tolk- (<*tV-lVk-, with met.) 'hyena' 1, 'leopard' 2

Notes: > Sem *kalb-, with b- suffix of harmful animals? Cf. Bla Beja
24: Eth; Cush; Om; CCha (Uzam)

Borean etymology:

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/eura/globet&text_number=+694&root=config

Long-range etymologies :


Borean (approx.) : KVLV

Meaning : dog

Afroasiatic : *kVl-

Austric : *kVlu(R)

and, (what M. Ruhlen regards as from proto-world *kuan - see "On the
Origin of Languages" - Ch. 14 "Global Etymologies" p. 302-303):


http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/semham/afaset&text_number=2195&root=config


Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *kwVHen-

Meaning: dog

Berber: *kun- 'dog'

Western Chadic: *kwin-H- 'dog'

East Chadic: *kany- 'dog'

Mogogodo (Yaaku): kwehen 'dog'

Omotic: *keHen- 'dog'


Borean etymology:

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/eura/globet&text_number=++50&root=config

Long-range etymologies :

Borean (approx.) : KVNV

Meaning : wolf, dog

Eurasiatic : *ḲüjnA

Afroasiatic : *kwVHen-

Sino-Caucasian : *ẋHwĕ́je

Austric : PAN *u(ŋ)kuq 'puppy'? (POc. *nkaun 'dog'?)

Amerind (misc.) : *(a)kuan 'dog' (R 179) [+ A K]

Reference : МССНЯ 334, ОСНЯ 1, 361-362; GE 7 *kuan (+ ? Khois., ?IP).

which gives:

Nostratic etymology :

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/nostr/nostret&text_number=++63&root=config


Eurasiatic: *ḲüjnA

Meaning: wolf, dog


Indo-European: *k'uu̯on-

Altaic: ? *káŋV

Uralic: *küjnä 'wolf' (Wichmann FUF)

Eskimo-Aleut: *qǝnʁa- (˜ *qiHǝnʁa-?)

Comments: [For PA cf. rather PIE *(s)ken- 527?]

References: МССНЯ 334, ОСНЯ 1, 361-362; ND 1083 *Ḳüy(a)n̄V 'wolf,
dog'.


thus Indo-European:

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/ie/piet&text_number=+526&root=config

Proto-IE: *k'wen-


Meaning: dog

Hittite: h.l. śuwanis (Tischler 500)

Tokharian: A ku, obl. kon, B ku `собака' (Adams 179)

Old Indian: ś(u)vā́, gen. śúnaḥ m. `dog'

Avestan: spā, gen. sūnō 'Hund'; spaka- 'hunderartig, Hund-'

Armenian: šun, gen. šan `Hund'

Old Greek: küṓn, gen. künós, acc. kǘna m., f. `Hund, Hündin'

Baltic: *čō̃ (*čun=), *čwin-ia- c., -iā̃ f.

Germanic: *xun-d-a- m.

Celtic: OIr cū, gen. con; Cymr ci, pl. cwn; Bret, Corn ki 'Hund'

Russ. meaning: зверек (собака)

References: WP I 465 f


and Altaic:


http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/alt/altet&text_number=+723&root=config


Proto-Altaic: *káŋV

Nostratic:

Meaning: dog

Russian meaning: собака

Turkic: *KAŋ-čɨk

Tungus-Manchu: *kači-kān

Korean: *kàŋ-

Comments: The TM form may belong here if it goes back to *kaŋ-čikān (=
PT *Kaŋčɨk, MKor. kàŋ'àčí). See SKE 84-85, ТМС 1,385, Menges 1984,
270-271, АПиПЯЯ 296, Дыбо 9; TMN 3, 520 ("alles sehr unsicher").

the third Afro-Asiatic word for dog is:

http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/response.cgi?single=1&basename=/data/semham/afaset&text_number=+375&root=config


Proto-Afro-Asiatic: *kar-/*kayar-

Meaning: dog

Semitic: *wakar- 'fox'

Western Chadic: *kyara-

Central Chadic: *kur-/*kir-

Saho-Afar: *kar- 'dog'

Low East Cushitic: *kayir- 'dog'

Warazi (Dullay): *kaHar- 'dog'

South Cushitic: *ta-kur- 'bat-eared fox' 1, 'wild dog' 2

> Brittannica says Semitic kalb(-um) comes from kal-b- cognate with
> Cushitic and Chadic *kala- / kara- . close but no that close.

> nevertheless there are many words for "dog" in various language

0 new messages