Here's what Jesus RodrÃguez Ramos himself has to say
re; Aquitanian
Note that m only exists before b as <mb> --which Trask
posited as /nb/. Note Basque seme < <sembe>, Trask's
/senbe/
AQUITANIAN LANGUAGE
The Aquitanian language is only known by means of
some proper names attested in Latin and Greek texts,
that is, there aren't Aquitanian inscriptions. Besides
a few place and tribe names transmitted by Greek and
Latin writers, the main data come from Latin
inscriptions found in Aquitania (mainly in the left
side of the high basin of the Garonne), in which there
are indigenous personal names and gods' names. But
there are also a few very short votive lead Latin
inscriptions found in the river Rhin (at Hagenbach)
which show Aquitanian personal names; probably written
by Aquitanian soldiers serving in the Roman army.
Ancient authors said that the Aquitanian people
were not Gaulish speaking, and Strabo stated that by
their language and their looks they were akin to
"Iberians" but different from Gauls (IV,1,1). It must
be noticed that in Strabo the word "Iberian" is
ambiguous, as it refers to the Iberian people, but
sometimes also to the inhabitants of the whole Iberian
Peninsula, but in this passage is probable the
reference to the Iberian people, as alternative
identifications are more problematic.
As a matter of fact, the Aquitanian language is
considered to be Old Basque. This is due to the
coincidence between Aquitanian personal names bases
and Basque lexicon. So among the Aquitanian men names
we find CISON, HANNA, SEMBE and SENIUS, which can be
compared with Basque 'gizon' "man", 'anai' "brother",
'seme' "son", and 'sehi'/'sein' (*'seni') "boy"; among
women names we can compare ANDERE and NESCATO to
'andre' "lady" and 'neska' "girl". Also we have the
town of ELIMBERRIS and the tribe of the AUSCI, to
compare with 'iri-berri' "new town" and 'euskal'
"Basque". Beside this, as stated by Gorrochategui,
many of other Aquitanian names have admissible
interpretations by the Basque lexicon, especially the
gods' names, usually matching with Basque animal and
plant names.
But with regard to the relations between the
Iberian and the Basque language, the Aquitanian
language is a kind of missing link, but a very special
one. The Aquitanian names resemble the Iberian
personal names. Many of the Aquitanian names,
especially the god names, are compounded as the
Iberian ones. Let's compare some Aquitanian names with
the attested anthroponymical Iberian bases:
AQUITANIAN IBERIAN
ILLURBERRIXO iltur-ber'i
HARBELEX ar's-beles'
BAESERTE baiser
BELEXCON-IS beles'-kon
ENNEBOX en(a)-bos'
LAURCO laur'-kon
TARBELLI (tribe) tar'-beles'
TALSCON- talsku
ERGE DEO -erker
DANN-ADINN- tan?-atin
But the problem is: what happens with those
Aquitanian words clearly interpretable by the Basque
language? There is no Iberian equivalence for CISON,
ANDERE or NESCA. Only the Iberian base s'an(i) may be
related with SENI and SEMBE (this probably from
*'sen-be'). Also worth noting is Gorrochategui's
remark that whereas those Aquitanian words that
resemble Basque adjectives (such as ILLUN 'ilun'
"dark" and BERRI 'berri' "new") do are attested in
adjective position (that is, as second member of
compound), the presumed Iberian "equivalents" iltun
and ber'(i) don't observe that rule!!. So, although
the data on Aquitanian language resemble that on
Iberian, probably they are not closely related.
Aquitanian is Old Basque, but Aquitanian is not
Iberian; they are two different languages.
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