--- In cybalist@..., "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...> wrote:
> Indo-Iranian *is^t- (Ved. is.t.-, Av. & OPers. is^t-) could derive
from a number of hypothetical PIE prototypes, *ist-, *ik^t- or *ig^t-
, if we only had independent evidence for any of them. The only
putative cognate I know of is Toch. is'cem 'clay (?)', which does not
guarantee an IE etymon, Tocharian and Indo-Iranian being within
borrowing distance of each other. Witzel points out that a similar
word for 'brick' exists in Burushaski (<dis.cík>), so its quite
likely that the 'brick' word comes from an unidentified Central Asian
substrate.
Some other cognate substrates of Indic: Santali 'i_t.' or
Telugu, 'it.uka', brick? In Tamil, cakati means 'mud, mire, bog,
puddle; the earth'.
Tamil: kit.t.akkal = iron dross; overburnt brick;
kit.t.am = one lump of metal; 2. dross or crust upon a precious
stone; 2. dross, scoria, scum of metal; 4. sedimetn, less, residum;
5. coating, crust