From: Patrick Ryan
Message: 41631
Date: 2005-10-27
----- Original Message -----
From: "Joao S. Lopes" <josimo70@...>
To: "Cybalist" <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, October 27, 2005 10:26 AM
Subject: [tied] PIE wlkWos, Italo-Celtic
> Is there any Celtic example for PIE *wlkWos?
>
> This form is regularly present in Balto-Slavic (vilkas, vlIkU),
> Indo-Iranian (vrka, v&hrka, toponym Hyrcania) and Albanian ulk.
> In Latin and Greek it seems to there be a metathetic form: *wlkWos >
> *lukWos (lu:pus, lykos), but Greek form could be some deviant dialectal
> form, or non-Greek substratum, even as Latin that shows a deviant -p- for
> kW (Osco-Umbrian loanword?) and long u. Sabinian Hirpus (cf. Hirpinus) may
> be <*wlkWos (alternatively, could be cognate of hircus "buck"), and Latin
> also have vulpe:s "fox".
>
> I dont know the Hittite forms, is there something like *wulkuwash,
> walkuwash? It could explain the Greek Giant Alkyo:neus (>*alkuwo-
> <*walkuwo-).
>
> German has deviant *wolfaz, instead of expected
> *wolxwaz, but there is ON ylgr <*wulkWi:s "she-wolf". *wolfaz can be
> dialectal or some deviant development, through dissimilation or
> assimilation (cf. four, five).
> Beside *wlKwos, there are possible evidences of a form *wlp-, that would
> link Latin vulpe:s "fox", Lithuanian vilpis^ys "wild cat" and the Germanic
> *wulfaz.It would be a parallel development of same *wlkW, or some compound
> *wlkWo-p...-?
>
> Irish has fael, and Armenian gayl, could expect a common souce *wailos?
>
>
> Joao SL
***
Patrick:
You have chosen a very interesting word-family to look at.
The pre-PIE word for 'wolf' (and 'predators in general') was *wa:.
From *wa:, and adjective was formed, meaning 'wolf-like': *wa:y.
To that, -*l(a:) ('vibrate, sway') was added, yielding *wa:il-, 'howl like a
wolf'.
To that, -*(y)o was added, agentivizing and masculinizing it: *wa:ilo.
And finally -*s, for the masculine nominative singular: *wa:ilo-s.
PIE *wLkW- is a description of the effects of predators. It derives from
*wel-, 'wool/sheep') + *kWa, 'press together', in other words, 'the entity
that causes the sheep to fearfully press together'.
It is also present in Egyptian as wns, 'jackal'.
***