HLuw. zurni- 'horn' and zarwa(ya)- 'made of
horn' are almost certainly borrowed from early Indo-Aryan *s'rn- and *s'arwa-,
with <z> for Indo-Aryan *s'. This explains, among other things, the
unexpected -ur- of the first form (a reflex of Indo-Aryan syllabic *r). If HLuw.
<z> = Indo-Aryan *s', then zuwana- 'dog' and azuwa- 'horse' <
*s'(u)wan- and *as'wa-, respectively. Hitt. sasa-, an enigmatic game animal, is
perhaps 'hare' (< *s'asa- or *s'as'a-). The Indo-Aryan élite of the
Mitanni and other Middle Eastern states made their huntin' and chariot-drivin'
slang popular throughout Asia Minor.
Lycian sñta is unlikely to have come from
the same source (though Rasmussen has hypothesised that it is quite simply Old
Persian sada '100'). The problem with Lycian numerals is that their meaning is
highly uncertain. Heiner Eichner, a top expert on Anatolian numerals, says only
that sñta means 'something like 10 or 100'. A common element in the higher
numbers is -ta~ta, used more or less like Latin -ginta, and analysable as
*dayanta < *dakanta < *d@... or *d@... with Luwian-style
intervocalic lenition of the velar. However, the combinations of
*-ta~ta with other elements are variously interpreted. For example, aita~ta
has been explained as '10', '11', '100' and even '110'. My private suggestion is
that sñta may be a haplological shortening of *sñta~ta < *sem +
*dkntom 'one hundred'.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, December 08, 2000 2:10 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] PIE dorsals
Looking further towards the chapter on Anatolian in Ramat
& Ramat (by Silvia Luraghi), I find HLuw. zurni- "horn"; HLuw azu(wa)-
"horse" (Lyc. esbe), Lyc. sñta "100 (1000?)", none of them explicable by the
effect of neighbouring front vowels (and Luraghi further adds that *k before *i
> zero in Luwian/Lycian, without examples).