From: tgpedersen
Message: 64074
Date: 2009-06-08
> > > They probably like it.FP is Finno-Permian, in other words *wis^a occurs in a limited area within that of Uralic. The safe bet is to assign it to a substrate under FP, possibly the ar-/ur- language.
> > > http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/17810
> > > Best way of keeping those pesky humans at bay.
> >
> > I have a new tentative proposal concerning the "wisent" word. Not
> > anything seriously developed yet, but perhaps worth considering
> > as an alternative to the usual stinker etymology. We have this
> > evidently archaic root *wes-, which occurs in Hitt. wesiya-
> > 'graze' < *wés-je/o- and westara < *wés-tor- 'shepherd', OIr.
> > fess and OIc. vist 'food' < *wes-tah2, PGmc. *wes-a-/*wis- i-
> > 'feast', etc. I am pretty convinced that the 'spring' word
> > *we:s-r./*wes- n- belongs here as well, with the etymological
> > meaning of '(the onset of) the grazing season'. So perhaps the
> > Germanic wisent was, somewhat prosaically, 'the grazer'
> > (*wés-(o)nt- > *wesanð- ~ *we/isunð-) rather than 'the stinker'.
>
> 'Stinker' is not prosaic enough for you? ;-)
> But how would an epithet of grazing set it apart from other grazing
> animals?
> How can this be related to bison?
> As a loanword where /w,B, v/ > /b/???