--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, enlil@... wrote:
> Joao:
> > Is there any explanation for the IE words for monkey?
> > Germanic apan
> > Old Russian opica
> > Celtic (Hesychius) abranas
> > Greek ke:pos, ke:bos
> > Sanskrit ka:pi
> >
> > A loanword? *Ha:p-, *Xa:p
>
> Gamrelidze and Ivanov reconstruct a word for 'monkey' in IE
> but I've already mentioned my distrust for their reconstructions.
> Personally, I'd say that it's more likely that the word entered
> these languages independently after the fracture of the IE language
> area, although I don't know precisely from which language or
> languages offhand. Anybody else know a possible foreign source of
> the term?
>
>
from
koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/reviews/hock.pdf
"
An interesting little idea suggested by Prof. Witzel concerns an
alleged alternationk/zero, e.g. in the Greek rendering of the place-
name and ethnonym Kamboja (easternAfghanistan) as Ambautai,
apparently based on a native pronunciation without k-. CitingKuiper
and others, Witzel asserts that "an interchange k : zero 'points in
the direction ofMunda'" (p.362), though this "would be rather
surprising at this extreme western location". Indeed, it would mean
that not just Indo-Aryan but also other branches of Indo-Iranian
havebeen influenced by Munda, for Kam-boja seems to be an Iranian
word, the latter part beingthe de-aspirated Iranian equivalent of
Skt. bhoja, "king" (Eric Pirart: "Historicité des forces dumal dans
la Rgvedasamhita", Journal Asiatique 286.2, 1998, p.542; he also
gives an Iranianetymology to Vedic Agastya, from a-gasti, from
Iranian gasta, "ill-smelling, sin"). Well, if theMundas could
penetrate India as far as the Indus, they could reach Kamboja too.
But the interesting point here is that the "interchange k : zero" is
attested in IEvocabulary far to the west of India and Afghanistan,
e.g. ape corresponding to Greek kepos,Sanskrit kapi, "monkey", or
Latin aper, "boar", corresponding to Greek kapros. Gamkrelidzeand
Ivanov have tried to explain this through a Semitic connection, with
the phonologicalcloseness (somewhere in the throat) of qof and 'ayn.
But if the origin of this alternation mustbe sought in a Munda
connection, what does that say about the geographical origin of
Latin and Greek?
"
Torsten