Parsnips

[John Cowan]

Language Hat scripsit:

> And the source of the name, пастернак 'parsnip,' is from
> Latin _pastinaca_, as of course is _parsnip_.

The "r" in that word is thought to be a hypercorrection of the early loss
of /r/ before fricatives that gave us Americans _passel_ 'large quantity',
_bust, ass_ < _parcel, burst, arse_. It's not a specifically American
phenomenon, though: the oldest example is _bass_ 'the fish' < OE _baers_.

_Parsnip_ probably got into the language when some of the early loss
was undone: we no longer say _hoss_ < _horse_ or (very often) _cuss_
< _curse_. Of course, in non-rhotic varieties all postvocalic /r/
was lost anyway, thus restoring the ancient vocalism more or less.

But what I don't understand is, why is the name (and presumably the
Russian word) pronounced with a non-palatalized consonant in the
first place? That's Just Not Normal.

--
BALIN FUNDINUL UZBAD KHAZADDUMU co...@ccil.org
BALIN SON OF FUNDIN LORD OF KHAZAD-DUM http://www.ccil.org/~cowan

[John Cowan]

On Saturday, August 24, 2013 2:19:59 PM UTC-4, John Cowan wrote:

 

But what I don't understand is, why is the name (and presumably the
Russian word) pronounced with a non-palatalized consonant in the
first place?  That's Just Not Normal.

Okay, I do understand now; it's because _pasternak_ is a borrowing

and so came in with non-palatalized consonants, but it arrived

at a time when hard-E was used only initially. 

[Stephen Bruce]

Even nowadays, the letter е is more common than э after a consonant letter, unless the word is seen as very exotic. A good Russian dictionary will tell you when a е should be pronounced as an э, e.g. пастернак, интернет.