Piotr wrote:
>>Colere, colo, colui, cultum. You're right. Cult, culture & colony are in
>>this family; even pole is (Greek polos 'pivot, axis' ?>>is from *kWolos).
I wrote:
>So... if this colere is related to the Greek polos meaning "pivot,
> >axis"... wouldn't that mean that it derives from a *kWel- that means >"to
>turn" and NOT "to attend to" just as in "wheel"??
Piotr replied:
>The semantic development was 'go around' > 'attend to' > >'cultivate',
>[...]
>Greek has boukolos 'cowherd' (cf. bucolic). It was somebody who >tended
>cattle, not turned them over or made them spin.
The word "turn" to me, has a basic sense of "to go around" or "to move
something around". True, there are other meanings to the word like "become,
evolve into" (turn out), "go to bed" (turn in) or "appear" (turn up) and the
like, but I think that we both are meaning the same thing but insisting on
different English terms. The original meaning is still "turn (go around)"
with derivative meanings like "to attend to" and "to cultivate".
Question, though: Why must the meaning "to cultivate" be derived first from
"to attend to" instead of more directly from "to go around"? Couldn't it be:
"to (make) go round" > "to till" > "to attend to"
> "to cultivate"
Regardless of whether it is "to turn" or "to go around" there seems to me to
be a direct semantic link with this and "to till > to cultivate" since you
can both _turn_ soil AND cause the soil to _go around_ in whatever
half-hazard circular pattern you prefer, within the bounds of three
dimensions of course.
True though, an inanimate farmer especially would have trouble turning
cattle. ;)
- gLeN
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