--- In cybalist@..., "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...> wrote:
> > 2. It's often stated that Lithuanian <vis^ta`> and Lettish
<vista> 'hen' are cognates of Old Indic <vi'->/<ve'-> and Avestan
vi:s^ 'bird', Latin <avis> etc. But where does that Baltic *-s't-a: <
*-st-ah2 / -k^t-ah2 come from? The suffix looks rather unusually.
>
> Indeed, perhaps it's time someone started looking for a bran-new
etymology :)
>
But I got no idea, and it isn't fun: I'm re-reading Karaliu_nas and
Hamp on {u,i}r in Baltic now (my answer to Miguel was based on the
imression from reading these sources long ago when I had, let's say,
less ability to percept the matter critically) and re-analyzing the
examples they give to support their theory. Some of them, IMO, can't
be reliably etymologized as to point to pre-RUKI *s or *non-s (eg,
*k^) unequivocally. The prime suspect is Baltic *wis'ta:. Nut-word is
not very clear either (though Slavic seemes to warrant *s).
Sergei