Re: bidet

From: dgkilday57
Message: 70457
Date: 2012-11-15

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Tavi" <oalexandre@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@> wrote:
> >
> > But all your examples involve Latin/Romance f-, not p-, so this single
> > word <oilo> requires an ad-hoc assumption. That is why I prefer to
> see
> > a borrowing from the Gaulish equivalent of <pullus>.
> >
> > > This is very unlikely. Spanish pollo gives Basque oilo just as
> Romance
> > > fongo gives onddo (with expressive palatalization).
> >
> > I rejected that etymology before, and believers in "expressive
> palatalization" need to explain why a mushroom would produce such a
> demand for expressivity in speakers that only palatalization could
> satisfy it. Are we talking about a MAGIC mushroom?
> >
> Although not widespread, palatalization of velar stops (especially at
> word-initial) is no way uncommon in Basque: kipula > tipula, kortika >
> tortika, kupa > tupa, *kapel > txapel, coloma > txoloma, *gaus > deus,
> etc.

Basque dialects also have <gipulla> and <dipula>. We are dealing with a culinary Wanderwort, and it is very rash to assert *k- > *t- within any one dialect. Your own theory involves unspecified other languages with their own soundlaws before the High Middle Ages.

> > (presumably used to explain on 'good' from Romance bono),
> > >
> > > Most Vascologists agree in considering Basque on a native word, as
> > > it's attested in Aquitanian inscriptions as BON-, HON-, -PON.
> >
> > I see no reason to equate these onomastic elements with each other, or
> with Bq. <on>.
> >
> > > See Gorrotxategi (1984), "Estudio sobre la onomástica indígena
> de Aquitania".
> >
> > When ONE GUY invokes an array of optional Aquitanian soundlaws that
> would make Sean Whalen blush, forgive me for not jumping aboard the
> bandwagon. Schuchardt was polemically opposed to the Neogrammarian
> school and yet he came NOWHERE NEAR Gorrotxategi in allowing such
> arbitrary variations in interpreting onomastics.
> >
> You seem to ignore that "Aquitanian" is an epigraphic corpus
> representing more than just one linguistic variety (probably a dialectal
> continuum), as shown by lexical isoglosses like this one. Another one is
> t-/h-, a particular case of Martinet's Law by which fortis plosives at
> word-initial got aspirated into /h/ or zero.

If Aquitanian is so heterogeneous, there is even LESS reason for making these equations. Martinet's theory invokes Latin influence for reduction of fortes (which I find "incroyable", like several other points in his section 14.10, pp. 378-9 of the 2nd ed., 1964). Do you really want this influence in Aquit. inscc.?

> > Obviously I have nothing against "submerged languages" (i.e.
> > substrates), but <borondate> is not some oddity in Basque. Its
> > importance in ordinary speech suggests that it was adapted directly
> from
> > Latin by bilingual speakers.
> >
> In my view, along Paleo-Basque there were other linguistic varieties
> with different soundlaws, and which finally merged with Paleo-Basque in
> the High Middle Ages ("Vasconization").
>
> > > This is actually Church Latin from the late (8th century or later)
> > > Christianization of Basques. The suffix -(i)tate can also be found
> with
> > > a "indigenous" root in the dialectal form pegorritate (LN) 'extreme
> > > misery', from pegor (LN) 'sterile, poor'.
> >
> > Mariner dates the beginning of Christianization to the 3rd-5th cc.,
> with <aingeru> from <angelus> reflecting the onset of palatalization of
> /g/. Solar disks on tombstones and pagan characterization in the
> Chanson de Roland tell us nothing about the date of the FIRST churches
> in the Basque Country.
> >
> But this doesn't mean these Christians were Basques or spoke
> Paleo-Basque, but rather their own dialect was replaced by Basque.

Christianization never really goes to completion, and it may take centuries for the Church to become dominant in a given area.

> > Anyhow, whatever century it comes from, the fact remains that
> <borondate> has initial bo-.
> >
> Comming from an earlier *p- as in poz, ponte, putre, palatu, pago, etc.

I doubt it, and <ponte> 'tufa' is from Latin <fontem>.

> > So does <bortitz> 'strong',
> >
> Also attested as portitz.

The latter from Lat. <fortis> directly.

> > I prefer to consider on 'good' ancient,
> >
> > > See above.
> >
> > and gizon 'man' (against giza-), which occurs in Aquitanian
> onomastics, to be originally 'good man, bonhomme'.
> >
> > > IMHO Basque gizon is a loanword from Celtic *gdonjo- 'man', most
> likely from Gaulish.
> >
> > I would expect an initial affricate or sibilant in Basque, not
> anaptyxis,
> >
> > > Why so? Even Iberian adapted the Latin ahtroponym Flaccus as
> /bilake/.
> >
> > Mute plus liquid is different.
> >
> This is your opinion, not mine.

I changed my opinion. Now I think that *gd- would give a long (or fortis) dental stop, realized as *t-.

> > and such borrowing still fails to explain the combining form <giza->,
> > which I regard as the original unmarked 'man', not 'good man', though
> > semantic devaluation has erased this distinction, as with <gentleman>,
> > <caballero>, etc.
> >
> > > Although ther form giza- remains unexplained, there's no such
> > > connotation in the Basque word.
> >
> > The form is explained by MY theory, and as explained, the distinction
> in connotation has been levelled out.
> >
> That is, it was erased without leaving any traces. This again speaks
> against it.

Some examples of compounds still hint at the distinction.

> > Two lenes produced a fortis (as in apais < abbas, zapatu < sabbatum)
> > which is hard to reconcile with any theoretical view failing to regard
> > consonant strength as the primary feature.
> >
> > > Please explain.
> >
> > Martinet said that ancient Basque opposed initial [pH]
> >
> = fortis /p:/
>
> > to [b],
> >
> = lenis /p/. I think you didn't read him well.

He used a special sign [b.] with a circle subscript.

> > and since Latin [p] was unaspirated, it was heard as [b] in <bake>
> 'peace' and other words.
> >
> Not exactly. It was heard as a lenis /p-/, which was rendered as [b] in
> the std variety of Basque. I think Proto-Celtic had a similar system,
> except for the absence of /p:/ [pH], which was spirantized into /F/.
>
> > I think ancient Basque opposed [PP] to [P] (i.e. fortis/geminate
> against lenis/simplex), so that Lat. [bb] was heard as [PP], reflected
> in modern Basque as [p].
> >
> Not only from Latin but also from other sources, as in *s'abbo (Semitic
> *s^abb-) > Spanish sapo, Aragonese zapo, Basque (z)apo, afo, apho
> 'toad'.
>
> > This distinction applied to other consonants, so Lat. <anno:na> yields
> Bq. <anoa> 'provisions', and <castellum> yields <gaztelu>, not *-eru.
> >
> Actually, this was postulated by Mitxelena more than 40 years ago.

I suspect that the strength distinction was secondary to length, and that long consonants resulted from earlier clusters.

DGK