On Sun, 19 Jan 2003 14:13:52 -0200, João Simões Lopes Filho
<
jodan99@...> wrote:
>From *gômbH- "tooth" ?
Perhaps. In Old Polish, zaNbrz was used for "tiger" (modern Polish
z.ubr has irregular z^- for z- [Mazurian dialect?] and -/u/- for
-/oN/- [East Slavic?]). Except for Russian dialectal <izubr> with i-,
the other Slavic forms point to *zoNbrU (or *zoNbrI), which could be a
regular adjectival formation from *g ^ombhos "tooth", *g^ombh-ros
"toothy, toothed". However, the word also occurs in Baltic, and the
initial there does not correspond with Slavic z-: Latv. sumbrs, su:brs
or subrs with s-, Lith. stum~bras with st-, and OPr. wissamb(e)rs with
wis(s)-. The Old Prussian form is suggestive of Germanic *wisantaz ~
*wirantaz [*wis-ont-os "the stinking one"] (> Greek, Latin biso:n).
=======================
Miguel Carrasquer Vidal
mcv@...