Odp: uxellodunum

----- Original Message -----

From: vicente@...

To: cybalist@eGroups.com

Sent: Saturday, October 09, 1999 3:39 PM

Subject: [cybalist] uxellodunum

Dear list members i must apologize for my defficient english ( I'll try to improvenext times) I' very interested in find out as may cognates to uxello/uxellodunum/ux ama/uxo, al of them celtic place-names, in every part of Europe. I know some of them in Spain, France, England, etc. I would lik also as much information as possible as to i.e. root uks- Thank you all vicente centelles

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Dear Vicente,

 

As far as I know, the place-names you mention have nothing to do with PIE *uks-. The Gaulish element ux(-elo)- derives from PIE *up(-s)- 'over', *up-s-elo- 'high, elevated' (cf. Greek hypselos). Related words from English include up and (much less obviously) over. The group *ps yielded Proto-Celtic *fs, which developed regularly into Old Irish ss, Gaulish and Ibero-Celtic chs [xs] (transcribed x), Brythonic ch. Thus, uxelo- is related to Old Irish úasal, Welsh uchel 'high'. Uxellodunum is etymologically 'hill fort'.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by the "root uks-". PIE had the word *uks-en- 'ox, bull' (English ox, oxen  [note the archaic plural], German Ochs, Sanskrit ukšan-). The *uks- part may (or may not) be a zero-grade variant of the "extended" verbal root *xweg-s- [xweks] 'grow, increase' (cf. English wax [of the moon]), in which case *(x)uks-en- would originally have meant 'the big/fat one'. The "ox" word occurs in Celtic, too, though not in Uxellodunum. In Brythonic it retains its old meaning 'bull' (e.g. Welsh ych(-en), but in Goidelic it means 'stag' (Old Irish oss; a male deer is often called "bull" in the hunting slang of many languages, just as the English speak of bull elephants/whales). Hence the Gaelic name Oscar 'fond of deer', as well as its diminutive Oissín, a.k.a. (Scottish) Ossian.

 

Best regards,

 

Piotr