Re: [tied] Re: Euxine Event.

----- Original Message -----

From: João Simões Lopes Filho

To: cybalist@egroups.com

Sent: Wednesday, October 04, 2000 11:34 PM

Subject: Re: [tied] Re: Euxine Event.

PIE must had a word for "lion" only if it came from Anatolia or Balkans. I think it's most plausible that PIE had a word for "tiger".

 

Only if it derived from a very easterly homeland in Central Asia, or some place SE of the Caspian. Very doubtful, IMO. Both lions and leopards have always been more widely distributed than tigers. Anyway, as you remark, Joao, none of these words would have been likely to survive in languages that moved away from the range of those big cats.

 

A word for "monkey" is common to Greek (kepos) and Sanskrit (kapi), and Gamkrelidze and Ivanov argue for its connection with the Germanic and Celtic word "ape", which does not have the initial [k], for such k/mute alternation (which they derive from a pre­existing laryngeal) is also found in other IE words, e.g. Greek kapros next to Latin aper, Dutch ever, "boar".

 

I have read their book. They don't derive it from a laryngeal but from a hypothetical PIE uvular stop *q. To my knowledge, no respectable IEist has bought this particular innovation.

 

Matching boars with he-goats is a risky business if the match is only partial. The southern words for 'monkey' have next to nothing in common with the Germanic word (a nasal stem, unlike any of the alleged cognates) except for a medial bilabial stop. Impressionistic half-matches of this kind can't be accepted if you respect the principles of the comparative method.

 

Piotr