Re: Marduk = Marut = Marutash ?

On 2008-10-09 18:24, kishore patnaik wrote:

> Again, you instinctively assume that wider IE distribution means older
> connotation. Am I right? This is what I precisely oppose.

Not "instinctively". This is what logic dictates. If Varuna is so very
ancient, what happened to him in the non-Indo-Iranian traditions?

> Agreed that I am not a scholar and as earlier it is said, being a layman
> does not warrant me to shoot off my ideas. Yet, I think what I say
> precisely becoming true - there is no independent proof to say that a
> word of wider IE distribution (here, Zeus) is older than the pure Indic
> word (Varuna).

You're trying to shift the burden of the proof, which lies squarely on
your shoulders, not mine. The wide distribution of the cognates of
*dje:us (as well as the characteristic set phrase *djeu *p&2ter 'O
Father Sky') allows us to assume a PIE date for the word. Where is such
evidence in the case of Varuna?

Piotr