I don't think that cognates of *arja- and *a:r(i)ja- are
attested in IE branches other than Indo-Iranian, or that an
original meaning like "noble, honourable" or "high, lofty,
etc." can be attributed to these terms. The idea that other
IE groups (the Irish, in particular) called themselves the
Aryas in ancient times is a 19th-century myth. Of all the
modern etymologies the one I like best is Szemerényi's --
partly because I can imagine how it would have infuriated
the Nazis, though primarily, of course, for more serious
reasons.
Szemerényi matches I-Ir. *arja- with Ugaritic ?ary 'kinsman,
companion' and Ancient Egyptian jr.y 'companion' -- thus
proposing that the Indo-Aryans employed a Near Eastern
wanderwort of Semitic (or more generally Afroasiatic) origin
meaning roughly "kinsman, comrade" to refer to themselves.
The root of the "eagle" word is reflected as har- (< *h2or-
or *h3e/or-) in Hittite. Apart from the widely attested
n-stem (and its further derivatives) we have B-Sl. forms
that derive from *or-i-lo- and *or-el-jo-. If the base is a
verb root, it's perhaps *h2/3or- 'rise, spring up' as in
Lat. orior, which would then have to be separated from
*h1e/or- 'move' as in Hittite ar-nu-zi, OInd. r.-no-ti (<
*h1r-neu-ti), etc.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
From: tgpedersen@...
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2001 12:08 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] Bear, eagle
...
Question 2: Has the 'eagle' anything to do with that *arya-
word (cf Dutch 'noble-eagle')? Highness and such?