Re: [tied] Re: Latin Volcanus and Ossetic Værgon

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 7824
Date: 2001-07-06

The <kurd/kyrd> part means "smith", and that's for sure. The rest (*arja-v(a)rka:n-?) is rather speculative (though by no means crazy, as Abaev is a careful scholar); at any rate I'd prefer to see one or two more IE "Vulcani" before I wholeheartedly accept an Alanic one, let alone a PIE one. The velar, however, is not a problem. Some time ago on this list we sifted the evidence for three types of dorsals with a fine-tooth comb and concluded that *k (as different from both *k^ and *kW, but perhaps uvular rather than velar) must be posited for PIE. I defended a smaller system at first but eventually came round to accept the three-way contrast :)
 
Piotr
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From: liberty@...
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Friday, July 06, 2001 9:25 PM
Subject: [tied] Re: Latin Volcanus and Ossetic Værgon

Thanks all.  I can see that any connection to *wlkwo- is definitely
out, but I'm still confused as to whether there is any evidence that
Vulcan and Wærgon are cognates.  Was there a Proto-Indo-European
Vulcan and if so why is there no trace in any other branch of Indo-
Iranian than Ossetic?  Are the velars in *welk- and *werg- labio-
velars?  If not, wouldn't they result in something like *wærs- or
*wærz- in Ossetic?   Also is it possible that Abaev misanalyzed
Kurdalæwærgon as Kurd-Alæ-Wærgon "The Alan Smith Wærgon"?  I would
have expected an *Alæ-Kurd-Wærgon or an *Alon-Kurd-Wærgon if
anything.  It also seems strange that Alans speaking to one another
in their own language about one of their own gods would bother to
include in his name that he was an "Alan" god.  Is this sort of thing
typical?  A few scholars have been overly zealous to find traces of
the words Alan or Sarmatian in Ossetic.