Re: The Pontic Indics

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "George Hinge" <litgh@...> wrote:

>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Aigius" <segijus@...> wrote:
>
> > What is etymology of Hypanis? Can Hypanis be misspeling of

Kypanis

> > or Kyponis? Theh: Lithuanian word IKYPAS (letter I here can be
> > prefix), meaning BEVEL, SIDELONG, > KYPAS > Kyponis or Kypanis?
>
> A miss-spelling is not probable. The word is transmitted in several
> Greek source from Herodotus onwards, and the form is unanimously
> rendered as Hypanis.
> When looking for an etymology, one has to take into consideration

that

> the initial h- did not necessarily belong to the original form,

given

> that an initial ypsilon is automatically written with spiritus

asper

> and pronounced with an h. Furthermore, in the Ionic dialect, which

both

> Herodotus and most of the Greek colonist of the northen Black Sea

coast

> spoke, there was no h (psilosis).
>
> I do not have an etymology at hand, but it could very well be

Iranian,

> since upa- was a common preposition in Indo-Iranian.

********
The other Hypanis which flows into the Sea of Azov (which the
other George mentions) is the modern Kuban. I'm not trying to
support Aigius' nutty derivation from the Lithuanian, but this does
suggest a K sound rather than an orthographic spiritus asper (I assume
however the modern name came about, it wasn't through the Greek).
There's still another Hypanis -- Hypanis Vallis on Mars, but this
was named in 1985 after the Kuban. Don't know what the native
Martians call it.
Dan Milton