Re: [tied] tevas - otits

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 5285
Date: 2001-01-03

The OCS word is otIcI = [otItsI], where [I] is a reduced front vowel, presumably not unlike English short "i", and [ts] (conventionally transliterated as <c> in Slavic studies) is an affricate. The word is most often supposed to be a diminutive form (with the rather common IE suffix *-ik-o-) of *at(t)a- 'dad', the nursery-register counterpart of *ph2te:r. The development *-ikos > *-IcI is regular. Cognate words are found in most Slavic languages: Russian otéc, Polish ojciec (the older form "ociec", used until quite recently, often survives in dialects; the modern standard form owes its irregular [j] to the analogy of the oblique cases, e.g. oc'ca (Gen.) > ojca).
 
Lith. te.vas is obviously related to Latvian te:vs and Prussian ta:w(a)s. I don't know if it has any external connections. Perhaps Sergei knows more about it.
 
Piotr
 
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From: Yves Deroubaix
To: cybalist@eGroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, January 03, 2001 9:06 PM
Subject: [tied] tevas - otits

What is the etymology of the Lithuanian word „tevas (father)” and the Old Church Slavonic word „otits (father)”?

P.S.: I am not sure of the transcription of „otits”. Would you please write down the right transcription?