Re: Cattle Trouble (was: Transhumance)

From: g
Message: 29083
Date: 2004-01-04

On Sun, Jan 4, 2004, at 06:15 PM, Richard Wordingham wrote:

>> vacã (cow)= boalã (cf DEX < Slavic bolI "sickness")
>
> Am I missing something? All the meanings of _boalã_ that I could
> find relate to 'sickness'.

Of course. Just ignore it: <boalã> "illness," in this context, is
a mere... curse. The addressee is the poor cattle.

>> wild ox= bour (cf. DEX < Latin "bubalus", here phonetic trouble IMO)
>
> Probably an eye or finger problem (at DEX - on line, at least - not
> Alex's).

<bóur> and <táur/bou/vácã> are different species, although
related to one another within the ruminating animals frame.

>> oaie= there is not a properly synonim but the use of "mioarã" is
>> the only one I can remember about now. "mioarã" appears in my eyes
>> to be diminutival of "mia" (young sheep); "mia" cf DEX < Latin
>> "agnelia" (phonetic troubles too IMO)
>
> Eye trouble here - the Latin is _agnella_ (is it attested?),

<agnelliola>

<mioara> is standard (i.e. artificial modern) Romanian.
We should keep in mind older, intermediary things, such as
<ñioarã> as well as <ñel> (which is still contemporary a subdialect
lexem for <miel> "lamb"). Even if there ain't attestet forms in
*written*, IMHO, the existence regional/archaic close to forms
that seem natural developments from <agn-> (at that similar to
Italian and French variants) suffices in order to draw appropriate
conclusions.

> Richard.

George