Re: [tied] Re: Kastamonitu

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 15256
Date: 2002-09-07

You're wrong, Alex. The prediction does not mention the origin of the word. I don't say "The word Vlach can't be older than the eighth century IF it is of Slavic/Germanic origin", but simply "The word Vlach can't be older than the eighth century", full stop. In other words, I give you a chance to undermine the standard explanation by falsifying one of its corollaries. The corollary states that the ethnonym Vlach (Greek Blakh-) = (Proto-) Romanian cannot occur in sources older than the eighth century. If it does, the orthodox view will be proven unsatisfactory. Is that fair?
 
Piotr
 
P.S. OHG walah is just a variant of <walh> with an intrusive ("epenthetic") vowel breaking up a "liquid + h" cluster. We need no external influence to explain it, since it is found in many similar OHG words: bereht/beraht 'bright' < *berxt-, meriha 'mare' < *marx-jo:n-, felhan ~ felahan 'hide' < *felx-an-, etc. Comparison with the other Germanic languages confirms that <walh> is the primordial variant and <walah> is secondary. OHG walh (later <walch>) _is_ sufficiently attested, contrary to what you continue to repeat (despite having been corrected).
 
P.
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From: alexmoeller@...
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Saturday, September 07, 2002 10:29 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Re: Kastamonitu


To sum up, we should not expect to find <blakH-> [vlax-]
recorded like this before the eighth century, since the
metathesised form did not yet exist; and while *<balkH-> could
occur and perhaps diffuse into Byzantine Greek about a century
earlier (though I'm not aware of any examples), neither form
will be found with reference to a Romanised ethnic group in
the peninsula in sources that predate the southward expansion
of the Slavs in the mid sixth century. So far, no facts known
to me contradict these predictions.

Piotr

[Moeller]
this conclusion is based on an "if". And this was "if vlach
commes from slavic". And even if there have been a lot of
discution of this word (vlach) it seems it remains in the air.
I tried to see why there should have been 2 words from germans
for the same folk. Once "walah" and once "walh". The second
one , the "walh" unatested, reconstructed, tought as "must
be". It seems there is only one reason for the existence of
the second word.. To have a word where from the slavic form
could comme. So , from this point on, we have already 2 * "if.
"
--if a german walh then a slavic vlach-- = 2 * if
The second point is the fact that when the word vlach appears
in a sentence,this is automaticaly understood as synonim for a
romanised population. And this because of the firsts 2* "if".
So we have now 3 * "if".even if an another order on the
timeline.
The rpogramers which work with "if" elseif" else" and then
will understand my way to think here
----------
Private Sub About_Vlach ( german_word As Boolean)
Dim walh As String
Dim vlach As String
german_word=True  'here we go from teh fact we indeed have had
a german word which was the word "walh"
On Error GoTo Vlach_Error

If german_walh=True Then
    walh= "romanised population"
    walh=vlach   ' // in slavic mouth.
Else
   ' Tja... here is indeed just programmer way of thinking
    walh <> "romanised population"
    walch<>vlach  /' in slavic mouth
End if

Exit Sub

Vlach_Error:

    MsgBox " Please check the status of  german_word"

Exit Sub

It is very possible that because of the only one first
assumption " vlach= must be a slavic creation", we got all
these inconcordances here. It is could be just a possibility.


regards

a. moeller