Re: Reindeer domestication : two origins

From: Trond Engen
Message: 62147
Date: 2008-12-19

Piotr Gasiorowski:

> On 2008-12-15 22:29, Trond Engen wrote:
>
>> Another take: There's also an adjective (and a well established pun)
>> Da. + Sw. <ren>, No. <rein> "clean" < ON <hreinn> < *xraini-,
>> derived from the o-grade of IE *kr-ey- "separate, choose". The
>> animal name could be "the chosen", either directly from the
>> adjective or by back-formation from the compound <hreindýri>. It
>> might have denoted the animal as an object of trade, after how
>> herds were rounded up and animals singled out to be sold or
>> slaughtered. Or, noting <-dýri> with a final i as opposed to <dýr>
>> "animal", perhaps it originally meant "single animal in the herd" at
>> a time when <dýr> was still a collective.
>
> A good point. The root is actually something like *kreh1(i)-/*krih1-,
> well-known for its occurrence in *krih1-trom 'sieve' (Lat. cri:brum,
> OIr. críathar. OE hri:dder). I was aware of the homonymy of 'clean'
> and 'reindeer' but couldn't think of a way to connect them. See also
> Gk. krí:no: 'pick out, choose, decide' from the same root.

A tiny piece of evidence: I gather from Sammalahti's The Saami Languages that there's a noun North Saami <reaidnu>, South Saami <reajnoe> "herding". If I read him correctly the corresponding verb is derived from the noun. He doesn't discuss its etymology -- not anywhere I find it, anyway -- but supposing a development parallel to NS <geaidnu> "road" (< FS *kejno) it should be from FS *rejno-. FS *r- is regular from Gmc. *Cr-.

Thus, there might have been a Germanic *xrai-no- "separating or keeping herds apart (vel. sim.)".

But it's hardly the scientific breakthrough of the century. For all I know the word might have been borrowed directly from the animal name at a later stage, although the semantics of that would seem awkward without some derivation. Anybody knowledgeable in Finno-Saamic?

--
Trond Engen


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