Glass, eye

From: tgpedersen
Message: 64397
Date: 2009-07-21

> > > As for
> > > http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/58962
> > > I think now it's rather like this
> > > *gel(w)-án,- -> *gl-án,-
> > > in (endingless) nom. *gl-án,# -> glak-
> > > in genitive (as appropriate for a mass noun) *gl-án,-s- ->
> > > *gla:s- with a lot of back and forth borrowing, of course
> > > (Lat. gla:ns, glandis, Russ. glaz, German Glanz etc).
> >
> > Lat. <gla:ns> 'acorn' belongs with Greek <balanos>; very likely
> > <Blandusia> reflects the P-Italic cognate 'productive in acorns'
> > vel sim., Proto-Italic *gWlan-d-, PIE *gW(e)lh2-n-.
> >
>
> That's right, except it's probably better to lose the laryngeal and
> reconstruct instead *g(W)l-ánd-, some nominal form (participle?) of
> *g(W)elW- "freeze; coagulate". And it's a substrate loan, cf
>
> Collinder
>
> 'Saami gielo ~ gíllumâ- clot of coagulated blood |
>
> [? Mansi keel&p blood; red |
>
> Khanty
> N Kazym haþt&p: h. juh alder (juh tree),
> S Nizjam hatt&p menstruation blood; blood] ||
>
> Yurak Samoyed sielw blood that has dried to a hard condition.'
>
>
> Any theory that includes the verb reconstructed as PIE *g(W)el- etc
> (Pokorny sidesteps it: 'wohl ursprünglich "Eiche"', "probably
> originally "oak"") will have to account for the distribution of the
> Uralic word.

This might be the orignal sense of the word *gland- etc
nicely situated semantically between "eye", "shiny pebble" and "gel".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vitreous_humour
Anyone who's cooked cod will know what I'm talking about: the gelatinous vitreous body of the eye turns into a small white round pebble.


Torsten