RE : [tied] Re: North of the Somme

From: tgpedersen
Message: 64748
Date: 2009-08-14

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "caotope" <johnvertical@...> wrote:
>
> > > > UEW
> > > > 'pis^ka 'Baumharz' FU "resin"
> > > > Finn. pihka (Gen. pihkan, pihan) 'Baumharz, Harz';
> > > > est. pihk (Gen. piha) 'klebrige Flüssigkeit (im Euter einer
> > > > trächtigen Kuh, als Harz od. Gummi aus einem Baume fließend)'
> > > > (ostseefinn. > lapp. K Nol. pihk 'Harz') |
> > > >
> > > > ostj. (676) Trj. piG&L 'Flicken an einem Boote, gew. einem
> > > > Einbaum', V piGli- 'mit Harz verstopfen (Spalten in einem
> > > > Boot), mit erhitztem Harz dichten'.
> > > >
> > > > Ostj. i ist ein denom. Verbalsuffix.
> > > > In ostj. piG&L 'Flicken...' kann ein Bedeutungswandel
> > > > 'Harz' -> 'Harz zum Dichten des Einbaumes' -> 'Dichtung,
> > > > Flicken' stattgefunden haben.'
> > > >
> > > > More likely resin never had any other uses so came to mean
> > > > "caulking" and the word was later transferred to pitch as
> > > > replacement.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > Proto Baltic Finnic /s^/ > /h/; most likely if the word was
> > > > borrowed, it never had /s^/ in the first place.
> > >
> > > No, Germanic "pitch" is loaned to BFinnic as *piki.
> >
> > Except that the word is not originally Germanic, no words in p-
> > are,
>
> Sidenote: I've not managed to really grasp if this is actually true
> or just circular logic - "there are no common IE words with *b;

Check *b- in Pokorny, and you'll know it's not circular.

> ergo, all the words that look like common IE words with *b must be
> substrate loans". Even if (trad.) *b > *w somewhere in preIE looks
> likely, nothing prohibits *b from being reëstabilish'd later into
> PIE itself.

There are very few *b- in Pokorny, as I said.

> (I do admit that in this specific case, the alteration points to a
> substrate origin.)
>
>
> > so why restrict the list of candidates to Germanic?
>
> Because it's easiest? Germanic > BF loans are kno'n to exist. I see
> no advantage to positing independant loaning from a substrate (in
> this case, anyway).

You will. See next comment.

> Anyway, not the point - it is that the immediate BF cognate is
> *piki "pitch", not *pihka "resin". The two might be ultimately
> related in some fashion, but the regular Khanty cognate of the
> latter means it cannot be from the direction of Scandinavia!

Exactly. Which shows you shouldn't have taken the easy option of choosing Germanic in the first place. A language subtrate to both solves it.

> Let it be said however that the vocalism is suspicious; *i_a is
> rare in inherited Uralic lexicon, and a little out of place too
> (it's the only place where *V_a and *V_ä contrast).
>
>
> > > Plain *k is never reshaped as *hk; the cluster can only
> > > originate from older *Sk.
> >
> > If it's derived within Baltic Finnic, yes.
> > But some NWEuropean (Celtic, Germanic and Saami) languages
> > pre-aspirate, cf.
> > http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/59202
> > and one might be tempted to ascribe it to a substrate language of
> > that area, in which case it's likely *pikk- > *pihk-.
>
> *S > *h is rather recent.

A loan of *pihk- from some substrate would be independent of that.

> Perhaps too new to be the result of any substrate *h.

But I didn't claim that.

> In coda position /h/ also remains to this day as a weak fricativ,
> not as preaspiration. And Germanic loans only ever have *-k- > *-k-
> (old) or *-k- > *-kk- (newer). So we should expect
> preaspiration(/preglottalization) from substrates, too, to simply
> disappear, not to become *-hk-.

Only if the Germanic -> BF loans were from preaspirating Germanic languages. If they weren't, there's no need to assume de-preaspiration in BF, which means a loan of *pihk- from some common substrate would stay *pihk-.


> > > > pec^ä ~ penc^ä 'Kiefer, Föhre; Pinus sylvestris' FP
> > > > Finn. petäjä (dial. petäjäs) 'Föhre, Kiefer';
> > > > est.
> > > > pedajas (Gen. pedaja),
> > > > pedakas (Gen. pedaka),
> > > > pädajas (Gen. pädaja),
> > > > pädakas (Gen. pädaka)
> > > > 'sehr harzige, harte, nicht hochgewachsene Kiefer;
> > > > Pinus sylvestris'|
> > > > lapp. N bæcce -æ:3- 'Pinus silvestris',
> > > > l. piehtse:, pä:htse: 'Kiefer, Föhre',
> > > > K (1525) T piecce, Kld. pie1cc, Not. piehe
> > > > 'Kiefer, Fichtenrinde (zur Speise)' |
> > > > '
> > > > mord. E pic^e, M pic^ä 'Kiefer; Pinus sylvestris' |
> > > >
> > > > tscher. (E. Itk.: FUF 31: 177)
> > > > KB p&nc^& 'Kiefer', U pün´c´ö 'Kiefer, Föhre' |
> > > >
> > > > wotj. S puz^im, puz^im, K puz^&^m
> > > > 'Fichte, Tanne, Kiefer; Pinus sylvestris',
> > > > (Wichm.) G puz^î.m 'Fichte, Kiefer, Föhre' |
> > > >
> > > > syrj. S poz^em, P poz^u.m, poz^i.m, PO po.z^øm 'Kiefer'.
> > > >
> > > > Finn. jä, est. jas, kas, wotj. und syrj. m sind
> > > > Ableitungssuffixe.
> > > > Das Finn., Lapp. und Mord. weisen auf *c^, das Tscher. auf
> > > > *nc^ und die perm. Wörter auf *c^ oder *nc^ hin.
> > >
> > > Mari changes rather regularly *nc^ > *c^ (*ponc^a "tail" >
> > > *paac^, *künc^i "nail" > *kööc^, *panc^a- "to open" > *paac^a-)
> > > so this is dubbly unexpected.
> >
> > But not in the 'language of geminates', where this is expected.
>
> So what? Perhaps it could cause insertion of *-n-, but said
> soundlaw would then delete it anyway.

Not if the loans was later.


> > > To attempt a Uralic-internal explanation, the
> > > *nc^ here could be by contamination with the next root. Or
> > > hypercorrection with influence from the voiced Permic medial
> > > (nasal + stop > voiced stop in Permic, which the Mari may have
> > > generalized to voiced affricates).
>
>
> > There is an interesting alternation in Estonian between the
> native actor suffix -ja- and the 'foreign' (also NWB) diminutive
> suffix -ka-
>
> -ja is not the actor suffix here, it's a common tree name suffix
> derived from former *-ka by consonant gradation.
> *kac^a "resin" > Fin. kataja, katava "juniper" (Votic kadag)
> *pic'la > Fin. pihlaja "rowan" (Votic pihlaga)
> *pec^a > Fin. petäjä "pine" (Livonian pietaag)

Thanks, I didn't know that.

> *s'äla > salava "crack willow" (back-harmonized by influence from:)
> Gmc *salaka > halava "willow"

That one is odd. I see that so many times: Uralic or FU word gets influenced in Finnish by some Gmc/IE word which happens to sound like it and mean something similar. The drastic course is to assume a common substrate for Germanic/Italic and FU/Uralic.

> Additionally: Estonian orthographical -k- is a geminate /k:/, which
> in this case would be the common BF diminutiv *-kka. Plain medial
> /k/ is written -g- (and orthographical -kk- is overlong /k::/).
>
OK.


> > I add
> > Lerchner
> > Studien zum NWGermanischen Wortschatz
> > 'pit, peddik "merg, zaadkorrel; kracht"
> (etc.)
>
> Stretching the semantics here. I don't think this can be related to
> "pitch", "resin", "pine".
>

I disagree.
Pokorny *pei-, *pi- "fat" etc. (I'd say, rather *pi(:)-)



Torsten