Re: [tied] Nereus and nerove

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

From: Petr Strossa

To: cybalist@egroups.com

Sent: Tuesday, October 03, 2000 5:30 PM

Subject: Re: [tied] Nereus and nerove

But this 'strong' root is really *xner- with an initial laryngeal. It makes a difference in Greek, where one would expect *x@...:us > *andreus rather than Ne:reus. The long e: of Ne:reus is another difficulty (also if you want to connect this name with the items below).

 

Hydronimic *noru- is especially well attested in Baltic (e.g. Prussian Nerus, Nerusa, Polish Narew [a large tributary of the Vistula] < Sudovian *naru:-), though it isn't clear to me what it's supposed to mean. Some etymologists connect it with the root *ner- 'dive, penetrate'. I wonder if Germanic *naru- 'narrow' might be somehow related (although the Narew is a remarkably wide river).

 

Nerthus < *nér-tu- was a chthonic goddess and it's rather difficult to connect her semantically with diving, except into earth-holes ;). But I wouldn't exclude the possibility that this name is related to *xner- (cf. Celtic *ner-t-o- 'strength').

 

Piotr

 

 

 

 

Petr wrote:

After all, why couldn't it be also connected with the Germanic goddess Nerthus described by the Romans (Tacitus?)? If all these words were derived from a root *ner- meaning something like `(life-giving) strength', they would be also cognate to the
Osco-Umbrian word _ner_, `man'...