It can't be. Greek is one of the few
branches where it doesn't exist. They, of all people, have a different word for
'beaver' :) And if anyone was really familiar with beavers and their habits, it
was the people of northern Europe, where the beaver was (and still is) common,
not the Greeks.
Plus, even if we stretch the imagination
and assume thet the Greeks had the word a long time ago and then gave it away to
other people, the non-Greek reflexes rule out a word with original *b,
whether PIE or Greek. Latin has <fiber> (<biber> in post-Classical
Latin is a loan from Germanic), and Sanskrit has <babHru->, not
*<babru->, etc. There is really no escape from
*bHebHru-.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, September 06, 2002 8:04 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] The Beaver and Its Teeth (Origin?)
But the reflexes don't matter if the word is of Greek
origin!