From: Marco Moretti
Message: 34432
Date: 2004-10-04
>All these are totally worthless folk-etymologies.
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "etherman23" <etherman23@...>
> wrote:
> >
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "thrsnmrtn" <thrsnmrtn@...>
> wrote:
> > > Is there any possibility that quattro and a are related?
> >
> > Not in any obvious way.
>
> I've been talking to several Arabs and some of the answers (folk
> etymology) they give to their ethnonym is the number four
> (i.e. 'arba').
>
> Seems it (four) is also sacred to them (in contrast) as they relate
> it also to a holy mount called Arafa (in Mecca). And then 'arafa'
> to 'arif' "learneth/ to know".
>
> I was thinking if mountain and four then perhaps the -tor in *kWet-
> wor>>quatro? But more probably Arafa is related to Horeb, the other
> name of Mt. Sinai (also known in Arabic as At-tur). And if a
> mountain then a pillar.
> And if a pillar then the forefinger which is finger # four that we
> often use in gestures in making a point as well as pointing per se?
> Perhaps the flow could be the reverse (i.e from finger#four to
> pillar).
>
> We do know that Arabic has 'rabb' for "Lord". Hebrew has 'rabbi'
> for "teacher". Also related perhaps to angel Raphael who is
> sometimes depicted as a huge mountain together with the other three
> most trusted angels of God (Michael, Gabriel, Penuel).
>
> And perhaps (Horeb and Arafa) are further connected to Gk Erebos
> with a downturn meaning (i.e. underworld or one of the layers of
> underworld). The meaning probably due to a prehistoric
> propagandizing against the Middle Easterns in Greece? Or something
> else.
>
> We see the same thing with "Tartaros", said to be a deeper
> underworld than Erebos where the Titans where imprisoned after they
> lost the battle against Zeus and his sibling-gods. Some say tar-
> there is related to the Sanskrit -tala. Incidentally so many Indic
> names with the suffix -tala are depicted as anyone of the layers of
> heaven or of the underworld.
> Examples are Atala, Patala, Mahatala etc.
>
> Loreto