Elves [was IE, AA, Nostratic etc.]

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

From: John Croft

But the word for elf seems to have a long PIE etymology.

 

It is an interesting word. *albho. It rests under English 'elf', and is said to be cognate with Indic r̥bh� (the R is supposed to be combining ring below, but in my browser, looks like caron-below). In Indic, they are described as divine craftsmen. Germanic myth makes them magical dwellers of earthen mounds.

 

So who were the elves? They could be nothing more than a VERY ancient memory of pixies, faeries, and assorted other mythical beings of the sort mothers entertain their children with.

 

There is a temptation, however, to see this as the PIE word for metal-working, metal-trading foreigners. They would have been either Danubians or Caucasians, and they would have been those who brought copper and bronze to the Urheimat.

 

The attempt to link it to the alb-word (white) might be correct, or it could be a very ancient example of folk-etymology relating a foreign word to a native one. Certainly, if we are to call the elves metal-smiths, the eerie light of the forge and their habit of burrowing into the earth for ore is certainly suggestive.

 

And if they really were (geographicall/ethnically) Caucasian, a la blue-eyed blond Circassians, the evocativeness is even greater.

 

At one point Sredny Stog got its metal from the Danube, at another it got it from the Caucasus. As I write I forget which came first, but I think Caucasian metal was later. Could 'elf' be the original self-appellation for the PIE-speakers? No, I am not prepared to defend this idea, but it is beguiling.

 

Mark.