From: Greg
Message: 11346
Date: 2001-11-21
----- Original Message -----
From: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 4:21 PM
Subject: [tied] Digest Number 698
There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: Vanir
From: tgpedersen@...
2. RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
3. RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
4. RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
5. Re: Saving Hengist and Horsa
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
6. Re: *-s > *-z > Norse -r
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
7. Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: rhtabone@...
8. Re: Saving Hengist and Horsa
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
9. Re: Vanir
From: malmqvist52@...
10. RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
11. Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: malmqvist52@...
12. Silvanus "Calaedicus"
From: "Mark DeFillo" <ategnatos@...>
13. Re: Rydberg on the Ribhus of the Rigveda
From: "João S. Lopes Filho" <jodan99@...>
14. anthroponyms
From: "João S. Lopes Filho" <jodan99@...>
15. Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: rhtabone@...
16. apsinthion
From: john_monastra@...
17. Somes questions about iranian peoples
From: "Davius Sanctex" <davius_sanctex@...>
18. Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: liberty@...
19. RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
20. Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: rhtabone@...
21. Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
From: cas111jd@...
22. Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
23. Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
From: liberty@...
24. Re: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
25. Re: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
From: "Marc Verhaegen" <marc.verhaegen@...>
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 1
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 10:37:28 -0000
From: tgpedersen@...
Subject: Re: Vanir
--- In cybalist@..., celteuskara@... wrote:
>
>
> I think I must have missed the message wherein Piotr recommended
this "excellent article", could you tell me what this is please? I'd
be interested to see a different account.
>
>
Here it is:
http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~alvismal/2odin.pdf
Torsten
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Message: 2
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:50:13 +0200
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
Subject: RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
-----Original Message-----
From: george knysh +AFs-mailto:gknysh+AEA-yahoo.com+AF0-
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 3:06 AM
To: cybalist+AEA-yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: +AFs-tied+AF0- Old Rus' of the many +ACI-nationes+ACI-
Actually, let me take you up on your offer right away.
To clear up something I already mentioned in passing.
Ukrainians have two special +ACI-poetic+ACI- names for their
Dnipro: SLAVUTA and SLAVUTYCH (sometimes the spelling
is not SLA- but SLO-). Is this not related to Baltic
roots having to do with flowing streams or rivers, and
if so, could it not represent an early name for the
Dnipro in its Proto-Baltic, subsequently Slavicized
area? All the major analyses of +ACI-DNIPRO+ACI- +ACI-DNEPR+ACI- seem
to agree that it is a complex form of the river+-river
type, with one name (BORIS- going back to the Gr
witness) representing a +ACI-Thracian+ACI- name and -THENES an
Iranic one (specifically pronounced). But since
Proto-Balts lived along the river for quite a distance
they surely would have had a name for it also. What do
you think?+ACoAKgAqACoAKg-
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0- (The message is uncompromisingly UNICODed in
UTF-7, a font like Lucida Sans Unicode is needed. If you have trouble
reading it, please let me know and I'll re-post) The absence of any direct
traces of such a Baltic name for the Dnieper is a problem not solved in
today's Baltistics. Until now I have been aware of the two speculations
(both being rather shaky, IMO) mentioned in one of my recent messages: 1.
the name was +ACo-N+AOg-munas ( Lith. Ne+AwM-munas, Belarusian
+BB0EUQQ8BDAEPQ- 'Nemen'), later re-applied to today's Neman 2. the name was
+ACo-Dun+AQE-j-, since an abstract river is often called Dun+APU-jus,
Dunoj+ARcDAw-lis etc in Lithuanian folklore, but the Danube flows rather far
from today's Lithuania and such a close attention asks for its explanation.
I was aware of the Old... uhm... East Slavic alternative name (along with
more usual +BBQESgQ9BGMEPwRABEo- +ACo-D+BEo-n+ARs-pr+BEo-) for the
Dnieper, +BCEEOwQ+BDIEQwRCBDgERwRM- +ACo-Slov+Aes-ti+AQ0ETA-, since
it's mentioned in +BCEEOwQ+BDIEPg- +BD4- +BD8ESgQ7BDoEQw-
+BBgEMwQ+BEAENQQyBGM-, but wasn't aware of the form +BCEEOwQwBDIEQwRCBDA-
+ACoEIQQ7BD4EMgRDBEIEMA- +ADwAKg-Slov+Aes-ta and didn't know they both
have survived in Ukrainian (the forms with -a- seem to be of bookish origin,
obviously influenced by such Ukraino-Russian Church Slavonic spellings as
+BEEEOwQwBDI-ja+BD0EYw-).
The idea of +ACo-Slov+Aes-ta being a Slavic rendering of the originally
Baltic name is ingenious, and +ACoBWg-lau+Ay8--ant-+AQE- 'flowing, washing
(its banks)' (participle) as a possible Baltic prototype is not only
formally impeccable as to its structure, but also is continued in an
existant hydronym - cf. Lith. river-name +AWA-lavant+AOA-.
The only minor problem with this attractive hypothesis would be the fact
that such hydronyms as +BCEEOwQ+BDIEQwRCBDA- or +BCEEOwRDBE8- (Smolensk
district, Balto-Slavic +ACoBWg-lau+Ay8-j+AQE-) well may be properly
Slavic, continuing the same verbal root +ACoBWw-leu+Ay8--/+ACoBWw-lou+Ay8--
'flow, wash' or probably even +ACoBWw-lou+Ay8--/+AVs-l+AWs-- 'be famous',
cf. Slavic +ACo-slyti/slov+Aes- 'be famous/am famous'. It's sometimes hard
to distinguish something proper Baltic from proper Slavic.
While we're at that... There's a Lithuanian river +AWA-lav+ARcDAw-
(+ADwAKgFa-lau+Ay8-j+AQE-, thus a direct counterpart of Russian
+BCEEOwRDBE8-) with a village +AWA-lav+ARcDAQ-nai on its banks, the latter
being a formally nearly impeccable (except its acute accent, a circumflex
would probably be nicer) direct counterpart of Slavic self-designation
+ACo-Slov+ARs-n+ARs-.
Sergei
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 3
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 14:35:41 +0200
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
Subject: RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
-----Original Message-----
From: george knysh +AFs-mailto:gknysh+AEA-yahoo.com+AF0-
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 4:26 AM
To: cybalist+AEA-yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: +AFs-tied+AF0- Old Rus' of the many +ACI-nationes+ACI-
+ACoAKgAqACoAKg-GK: An additional complication here is the fact
that while in the south, Slavic groups and ethna (I
use the term +ACI-nationes+ACI- in my writings for entities
such as the Sivera/Siverjany et sim. +AFsAIg-nations of the
mediaeval type+ACIAXQ- were relatively cohesive as to
contact and contiguity in rural areas (the steppe
populations were largely a border phenomenon)further
north there were certainly large and as yet
unintegrated groups of Balts and Ugro-Finns living
amongst the (not always) majority Slavic population.
While this left little trace in the extant written
literature such as it was, the influence on daily
speech would have been more pronounced.
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0-
Agree. The question is since what time the consequences of this influence
let us state Old Ukrainian, Old Belarusian and Old Russian have alredy
emerged, replacing earlier dialectal bunches.
+ACoAKgAqACoAKg-GK: I'm not sure which is correct. I suspect,
however, that +ACI-national+ACI- (in the mediaeval
sense)consciousness in these groups was to a very
large degree independent of language (an excellent
example is 12th c. Suzdalia), and I would be more
inclined to favour solutions which emphasize diversity
over unity, esp. at the level of colloquial everyday
speech.+ACoAKgAqACo-
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0- Yes, that's why my doubts concerned not
ethnpolitical, but rather +AF8-linguistic+AF8- reality of Old Ukrainian etc
+AF8-languages+AF8- at the time in question.
+ACoAKgAqACo-GK Whatever the linguists have to say on this, it
is clear to me as a historian that these +ACI-nationes+ACI-
had political affinities different than the groupings
enumerated above, and I feel certain that these must
have had an increasing influence on their speech.Thus:
the Dregovichi (especially their northern areas) began
to integrate with the Western Krivichi (also known as
the Polochane) rather early (and particularly after
the rule of the Iziaslavichi began in Polotsk: this
branch did not even share in the making of the +ACI-Rus'ka
Pravda+ACI-). The Eastern Kryvychi were actively
colonizing Meryaland after 1058.
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0-
Agree, see above.
There is one group of
Kryvychi which was dominant in the Pskov area. I
remember that this dialect shared some features with
West Slavic (the only thing that comes to mind at the
moment is that +ACI-milk+ACI- here was +ACI-mleko+ACI- as in Poland
rather than the full-voiced +ACI-moloko+ACI-).
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0- Despite that Zaliznyak, being +ACM-1
researcher of the Krivichian, has emphasized some Krivichian-West Slavic
connections, the evidence he provides in his works doesn't demonstrate
anything especially West Baltic. As for that specific exmple, Krivichian
indeed seems to avoid /l/-velarisation, pertinent to the Standard East
Slavic (aka Old Russian) and reflexes Slavic +ACo-CelC as +ACoETA-l+BEw- or
+ACo-el+BEw- (instead of SES +ACo-olo), the feature that I can hardly
classify as characteristically West Slavic. Since graphemes +AHsENQB9- and
+AHsETAB9- are mutually interchangable in early birch bark inscriptions,
+AHsEPAQ7BDUEOgQ+AH0- could be an occasinalism instead of
+AHsEPARMBDsETAQ6BD4AfQ-. I'll check that later, but at any rate the
Krivichians formed an obviously separate +AF8-linguistic+AF8- unit.
I think I have
solved the issue of the +ACI-Ulichi+ACI- and +ACI-Tivertsi+ACI- (wrote
a special article about this in 1997).
The +ACI-Polany+ACIAWw-an
artificial literary name for the Central +ACI-natio+ACI- of
Old Rus' concocted in the 11th c.+AF0-were politically
very close to the Derevlany since the time of Yaropolk
Sviatoslavych (+-978).
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0-
Very interesting (both +ACI-Ulichi+ACI- and +ACI-Tivertsi+ACI- and
especially +ACI-Pol'ane's+ACI- artificiality - never heard of that).
+ACoAKgAqACo-GK: Certainly not according to the linguistic
groupings mentioned above. But politically there were
+ACI-nationes+ACI- which became the nuclei of the later
nations.
+AFs-Sergejus Tarasovas+AF0- Agree, but see above :)
Sergei
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 4
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 05:23:59 -0800 (PST)
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
Subject: RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
--- Sergejus Tarasovas <S.Tarasovas@...>
wrote:
two messages which I unfortunately could not decipher.
Would it be possible to repost them? GK
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Yahoo! GeoCities - quick and easy web site hosting, just $8.95/month.
http://geocities.yahoo.com/ps/info1
________________________________________________________________________
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Message: 5
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:34:45 -0000
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
Subject: Re: Saving Hengist and Horsa
There were no doubt later interpolations added in order to make the
H&H episode a better story -- like their having a sister and even
their being twins (neither "fact" is reported by Bede). I would not
exclude some deliberate Dioscurisation of H&H by mediaeval erudites.
It is at any rate quite possible that the choice of
alliterating "horse" names was motivated by older Jutish traditions,
if a Germanic pair of horse twins can indeed be reconstructed. Still,
I am inclined to accept the historicity of the brothers so named (or
at least of Hengist, granting the possibility that Horsa is merely
his ficticious "horse twin" invented by sycophantic genealogists) as
leaders of the Jutish mercenaries, given the short historical
distance -- four generations, or just a century -- between Hengist
and Ethelbert I, during whose reign the official genealogy of the
Oiscing dynasty, as transmitted to Bede by his Kentish collaborators,
was no doubt recorded at Canterbury.
Piotr
--- In cybalist@..., "Christopher Gwinn" <sonno3@...> wrote:
> I have serious doubts about H&H's existence - even if there were
two
> men named Hengist and Horsa, I would suspect they had taken on
these
> names in order to identify themselves with pre-existing Germanic
> horse twins (after all, we already have Tacitus' comments that some
> Western Germanic people worshipped divine twins that were very much
> like Castor and Pollux).
>
> There is a book on the subject (which I have not read yet, but am
> told that it is a good title):
> Donald Ward, "The Divine Twins. An Indo-European Myth in Germanic
> Tradition",1968.
>
> What would you make of the tradition that H&H had a sister named
> Swanna ("Swan")? Seems to me that there are enough parallels
between
> the stories surrounding H&H and Divine Twins in Greek, Vedic, and
> Baltic sources to seriously consider that H&H were divine twins
> themselves. There also seems to be some reflexes of the divine
twins
> in other Germanic tales, I believe (perhaps in the story of
> Sunild/Swanhilda and her avenging brothers).
>
> - Chris Gwinn
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Message: 6
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:38:28 -0000
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
Subject: Re: *-s > *-z > Norse -r
In a nutshell:
PIE inflectional *-s became voiced in PGmc., giving *-z (= early
Runic <-R>). Its further development in Scandinavian was -r.
Rhotacism, or the lenition *z > r, is a fairly common process, cf.
Latin intervocalic *-s- > *-z- > -r- (tempus : temporis, flo:s :
flo:ris).
PIE *gHostis > PGmc. *gastiz (Runic gastiR) > ON gestr 'guest'
PIE *gHostejes > PGmc. *gastijiz > *gasti:z > ON gestir 'guests'
PGmc. *gaizaz > ON geirr 'spear'
(Note the shortening or loss of unstressed vowels.)
The further fates of the final -z (-R) were pretty complicated and
differed from one Old Norse dialect to another. It was often
assimilated to the preceding consonant after the intervening
unstressed vowel had been lost:
*stainaz > *stainR > steinn 'stone'
*sto:laz > *sto:lR > stóll 'chair'
*i:saz > *i:sR > íss 'ice'
There were some characteristic dialectal developments:
Proto-Norse *mannR > OIc. maðr (acc. mann) 'man'
In Old Swedish an epenthetic reduced vowel (written <e>) appeared
before a stem-final consonant and unassimilated -r. A similar
epenthesis has taken place in Modern Icelandic and Faroese (where the
spelling is <u>):
*xringaz > OSw. ringer; OIc. hringr > ModIc. hringur 'ring'
*fiskaz > OSw. fisker; OIc. fiskr > ModIc. fiskur 'fish'
In the later history of the Scandinavian languages (except Icelandic
and Faroese) the declensional system was radically simplified. In
particular, the nom. and acc.sg. of masculine nouns were levelled out
and the nom.sg. -r ending (OSw. -er) was dropped. This was a
morphological, not a phonetic proces, so -(e)r of other origin was
unaffected.
Piotr
--- In cybalist@..., malmqvist52@... wrote:
> Hi Miguel Carrasquer Vidal <mcv@...> wrote:
> > On Mon, 19 Nov 2001 22:50:09 -0000, malmqvist52@... wrote:
> >
> > >So maybe it's time for me to learn Old Norse, and if someone
here
> > >knows what the r stands for please tell me!
> >
> > IE *-s (nom.masc.sg. *-s, nom.pl. *-es, etc.)
> >
>
> I'm sorry, but I don't understand this either. Would it be possible
> to get a more detailed explanation?
>
> Best wishes
> Anders
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Message: 7
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 08:31:13 -0000
From: rhtabone@...
Subject: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
Hello all.
I have been thinking about this for quite some time, but I never knew
how to go about it.
I wanted to gather evidence for my thesis that in all IE languages,
the comparative and superlative of 'Good' and 'Bad' are always formed
from another stem. This works for the adverbs as well.
I know an example from Romance:
Port: bom (adj), bem(adv), melhor (adj, adv comp and sup),
mau (adj), mal (adv) -> pior (adj, adv comp and sup).
Engl: good(adj), well(adv), better (comp), best(sup)
bad(adv), badly(adv), worse (comp), worst(sup)
Can anyone prove or disprove this statement?
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Message: 8
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 10:40:21 +0100
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
Subject: Re: Saving Hengist and Horsa
There were no doubt later interpolations added in order to make the H&H
episode a better story -- like their having a sister and even their being
twins (neither "fact" is reported by Bede). I would not exclude some
deliberate Dioscurisation of H&H by mediaeval erudites. It is at any rate
quite possible that the choice of alliterating "horse" names was motivated
by older Jutish traditions, if a Germanic pair of horse twins can indeed be
reconstructed. Still, I am inclined to accept the historicity of the
brothers so named (or at least of Hengist, granting the possibility that
Horsa is merely his ficticious "horse twin" invented by sycophantic
genealogists) as leaders of the Jutish mercenaries, given the short
historical distance -- four generations, or just a century -- between
Hengist and Ethelbert I, during whose reign the official genealogy of the
Oiscing dynasty, as transmitted to Bede by his Kentish collaborators, was no
doubt recorded at Canterbury.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
From: Christopher Gwinn
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 12:57 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] Saving Hengist and Horsa
I have serious doubts about H&H's existence - even if there were two men
named Hengist and Horsa, I would suspect they had taken on these names in
order to identify themselves with pre-existing Germanic horse twins (after
all, we already have Tacitus' comments that some Western Germanic people
worshipped divine twins that were very much like Castor and Pollux).
There is a book on the subject (which I have not read yet, but am told that
it is a good title): Donald Ward, "The Divine Twins. An Indo-European Myth
in Germanic Tradition", 1968.
What would you make of the tradition that H&H had a sister named Swanna
("Swan")? Seems to me that there are enough parallels between the stories
surrounding H&H and Divine Twins in Greek, Vedic, and Baltic sources to
seriously consider that H&H were divine twins themselves. There also seems
to be some reflexes of the divine twins in other Germanic tales, I believe
(perhaps in the story of Sunild/Swanhilda and her avenging brothers).
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 9
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:46:35 -0000
From: malmqvist52@...
Subject: Re: Vanir
> Another thing again: If the Vanir actually lived in Vani, they
would
> have been Colchians (no?). Colchians had immigrated from Egypt,
this
> proved by the fact that they practised circumcision (I think I read
> this in Herodotus?).
It appears that he puts it like this:
--
For it is plain to see that the Colchians are Egyptians; and
> what I say, I myself noted before I heard it from others. When it
> occurred to me, I inquired of both peoples; and the Colchians
remembered the Egyptians better than the Egyptians remembered the
Colchians; ...the Egyptians said that they considered the Colchians
part of Sesostris' army. I myself guessed it, partly because they
are dark-skinned and woolly-haired; though that indeed counts for
nothing, since other peoples are, too; but my better proof was that
the Colchians and Egyptians and Ethiopians are the only nations that
> have from the first practised circumcision
-----
I read somewhere that H. is mixing up the Sesostris part with
something, but the c. and the dark skin and the wolly-hair seems to
be his own observation
So they could have come from Ethiopia also I guess.
Njord married his sister, because that was
> permitted among the Vanir, but not among the Aesir. But Herodotus
> assures us that the only people that permitted that, were Egyptians?
If this is also correct it at least seems Herodotus was right about
the Egyptians. I copied this John Croft- made family tree of the
Rameside family tree for Dynasty 19:
---
Rameses II Isnofret
| |
-----------------
|
-----------------------------
| | |
Khaemwaset Bint-Anath |
|
|
Isnofret Merenptah Takhat
| | | |
--------------- ------------
| |
| --------------------
| | |
Tiaa Seti II Twosret Amenmese Bakwerel
| | | | | |
------------- ------------ ----------
| |
| Seti Merenptah
|
Siptah
Here Seti II and Twosret are half siblings.
Best wishes
Anders
> Torsten
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Message: 10
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 15:48:48 +0200
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
Subject: RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
-----Original Message-----
From: george knysh [mailto:gknysh@...]
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 3:24 PM
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Subject: RE: [tied] Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
--- Sergejus Tarasovas <S.Tarasovas@...>
wrote:
two messages which I unfortunately could not decipher.
Would it be possible to repost them? GK
[Sergejus Tarasovas] I UNICODed the text trying to avoid ugly
substitutions like {s^}, {e,}, {U} etc. here's a an ASCII-version of the
two messages:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------------
Actually, let me take you up on your offer right away.
To clear up something I already mentioned in passing.
Ukrainians have two special "poetic" names for their
Dnipro: SLAVUTA and SLAVUTYCH (sometimes the spelling
is not SLA- but SLO-). Is this not related to Baltic
roots having to do with flowing streams or rivers, and
if so, could it not represent an early name for the
Dnipro in its Proto-Baltic, subsequently Slavicized
area? All the major analyses of "DNIPRO" "DNEPR" seem
to agree that it is a complex form of the river+river
type, with one name (BORIS- going back to the Gr
witness) representing a "Thracian" name and -THENES an
Iranic one (specifically pronounced). But since
Proto-Balts lived along the river for quite a distance
they surely would have had a name for it also. What do
you think?*****
[Sergejus Tarasovas] (The message is uncompromisingly UNICODed in UTF-7,
a font like Lucida Sans Unicode is needed. If you have trouble reading
it, please let me know and I'll re-post) The absence of any direct
traces of such a Baltic name for the Dnieper is a problem not solved in
today's Baltistics. Until now I have been aware of the two speculations
(both being rather shaky, IMO) mentioned in one of my recent messages:
1. the name was *Ne`munas (> Lith. Ne~munas, Belarusian N'oman 'Nemen'),
later re-applied to today's Neman 2. the name was *Duna:j-, since an
abstract river is often called Duno~jus, Dunoje~lis etc in Lithuanian
folklore, but the Danube flows rather far from today's Lithuania and
such a close attention asks for its explanation.
I was aware of the Old... uhm... East Slavic alternative name (along
with more usual DUne^prU) for the Dnieper, Slovutic^I < *Slovo,tic^I,
since it's mentioned in Slovo o PUlku Igoreve^, but wasn't aware of the
form Slavuta < *Slovuta <*Slovo,ta and didn't know they both have
survived in Ukrainian (the forms with -a- seem to be of bookish origin,
obviously influenced by such Ukraino-Russian Church Slavonic spellings
as slavjane^ ).
The idea of *Slovo,ta being a Slavic rendering of the originally Baltic
name is ingenious, and * S'law-ant-a: 'flowing, washing (its banks)'
(participle) as a possible Baltic prototype is not only formally
impeccable as to its structure, but also is continued in an existant
hydronym - cf. Lith. river-name S^lavanta` .
The only minor problem with this attractive hypothesis would be the fact
that such hydronyms as Slovuta or Sluja (Smolensk district, <
Balto-Slavic *S'lawja: ) well may be properly Slavic, continuing the
same verbal root *s'lew-/*slow- 'flow, wash' or probably even *s'low
-/s'lu: - 'be famous', cf. Slavic *slyti/slovo, 'be famous/am famous'.
It's sometimes hard to distinguish something proper Baltic from proper
Slavic.
While we're on that... There's a Lithuanian river S^lave.~ (<*S'lawja:
, thus a direct counterpart of Russian Sluja ) with a village Slave.'nai
on its banks, the latter being a formally nearly impeccable (except its
acute accent, a circumflex would probably be nicer) direct counterpart
of Slavic self-designation *Slove^ne^.
Sergei
------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------------------------
*****GK: An additional complication here is the fact
that while in the south, Slavic groups and ethna (I
use the term "nationes" in my writings for entities
such as the Sivera/Siverjany et sim. ["nations of the
mediaeval type"] were relatively cohesive as to
contact and contiguity in rural areas (the steppe
populations were largely a border phenomenon)further
north there were certainly large and as yet
unintegrated groups of Balts and Ugro-Finns living
amongst the (not always) majority Slavic population.
While this left little trace in the extant written
literature such as it was, the influence on daily
speech would have been more pronounced.
[Sergejus Tarasovas]
Agree. The question is since what time the consequences of this
influence let us state Old Ukrainian, Old Belarusian and Old Russian
have alredy emerged, replacing earlier dialectal bunches.
*****GK: I'm not sure which is correct. I suspect,
however, that "national" (in the mediaeval
sense)consciousness in these groups was to a very
large degree independent of language (an excellent
example is 12th c. Suzdalia), and I would be more
inclined to favour solutions which emphasize diversity
over unity, esp. at the level of colloquial everyday
speech.****
[Sergejus Tarasovas] Yes, that's why my doubts concerned not
ethnpolitical, but rather _linguistic_ reality of Old Ukrainian etc
_languages_ at the time in question.
****GK Whatever the linguists have to say on this, it
is clear to me as a historian that these "nationes"
had political affinities different than the groupings
enumerated above, and I feel certain that these must
have had an increasing influence on their speech.Thus:
the Dregovichi (especially their northern areas) began
to integrate with the Western Krivichi (also known as
the Polochane) rather early (and particularly after
the rule of the Iziaslavichi began in Polotsk: this
branch did not even share in the making of the "Rus'ka
Pravda"). The Eastern Kryvychi were actively
colonizing Meryaland after 1058.
[Sergejus Tarasovas]
Agree, see above.
There is one group of
Kryvychi which was dominant in the Pskov area. I
remember that this dialect shared some features with
West Slavic (the only thing that comes to mind at the
moment is that "milk" here was "mleko" as in Poland
rather than the full-voiced "moloko").
[Sergejus Tarasovas] Despite that Zaliznyak, being #1 researcher of the
Krivichian, has emphasized some Krivichian-West Slavic connections, the
evidence he provides in his works doesn't demonstrate anything
especially West Slavic . As for that specific exmple, Krivichian indeed
seems to avoid /l/-velarisation, pertinent to the Standard East Slavic
(aka Old Russian) and reflexes Slavic *CelC as * IlI [yer' - l'udi -
yer'] or *elI [l'udi - yer'] (instead of SES *olo), the feature that I
can hardly classify as characteristically West Slavic. Since graphemes
{?} and {I} (yer') are mutually interchangable in early birch bark
inscriptions, { mleko } could well be an occasinalism instead of
mIlIko}. I'll check that later, but at any rate the Krivichians formed
an obviously separate _linguistic_ unit.
I think I have
solved the issue of the "Ulichi" and "Tivertsi" (wrote
a special article about this in 1997).
The "Polany"[an
artificial literary name for the Central "natio" of
Old Rus' concocted in the 11th c.]were politically
very close to the Derevlany since the time of Yaropolk
Sviatoslavych (+978).
[Sergejus Tarasovas]
Very interesting (both "Ulichi" and "Tivertsi" and especially
"Pol'ane's" artificiality - never heard of that).
****GK: Certainly not according to the linguistic
groupings mentioned above. But politically there were
"nationes" which became the nuclei of the later
nations.
[Sergejus Tarasovas] Agree, but see above :)
Sergei
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 11
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 14:13:11 -0000
From: malmqvist52@...
Subject: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
--- In cybalist@..., rhtabone@... wrote:
> Hello all.
>
> I have been thinking about this for quite some time, but I never
knew
> how to go about it.
>
> I wanted to gather evidence for my thesis that in all IE languages,
> the comparative and superlative of 'Good' and 'Bad' are always
formed
> from another stem. This works for the adverbs as well.
>
> I know an example from Romance:
> Port: bom (adj), bem(adv), melhor (adj, adv comp and sup),
> mau (adj), mal (adv) -> pior (adj, adv comp and sup).
>
> Engl: good(adj), well(adv), better (comp), best(sup)
> bad(adv), badly(adv), worse (comp), worst(sup)
>
> Can anyone prove or disprove this statement?
I can disprove it for one of the swedish words in one of it's
meanings.
god (adj.)( about food and mood) godare godast
but you can also say god bättre bäst which is a more original way I
guess. So the above seems to be the exeption to the rule.
The other word for good is bra, and both the adverb and adjectiv is:
bra bättre bäst. Here <bra> is a loan from italian <bravo>
in other cases it's
Cheers
Anders
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Message: 12
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 09:36:11 -0500
From: "Mark DeFillo" <ategnatos@...>
Subject: Silvanus "Calaedicus"
Thanks for the reply, and for posting the full inscription in question:
Chris Gwinn:
>None of my sources (which are normally quite comprehensive) list
>Calaedicus as a divinity, so I wasn't aware that this name existed
>(which is why I thought Cas or his source had confused the name)- I
>have done a search and found the inscription, though:
>
>ERRioja 052 = AE 1976, 00331.
>Silvano / Titullus /
>Calaedico(n) / Viam(i)
>f(ilius) / v(otum) s(olvit)
>l(ibens) m(erito)
>
>It seems to me that there is good reason for not considering
>Calaedico to be a divine name - if it was a theonym (and native
>byname of Silvanus), we should expect it to be written as Silvano
>_Calaedico_ Titullus Viam[i] f. v.s.l.m., while it makes perfect
>grammatical sense for Calaedico to be a nominative (like Titullus) n-
>stem (making our inscription read "To Silvanus, Titullus Calaedico,
>son of Viamus, willingly and deservedly fulfilling the vow".
Chris is almost certainly correct, of course. The inscription is a Latin
inscription, and there is nothing in it to suggest any Celtic connection,
particularly religiously. The book in which I found the entry for "Silvanus
Calaedicus", again, is a book cataloguing deities in the Roman Empire,
written by a pair of Romanists. I find it of value primarily as a resource
for Celtic religion in the Roman period, as it lists many Celtic deities,
though almost always in their synchretized forms. As far as anything Celtic
goes, Chris is certainly a superior authority to the Adkins pair... :)
I am confused as to why Romanists would fail to see what Chris explained
above... it seems to be, at best, wishful thinking based on an
interpretation of the meaning of "Calaedicus".
A question... is "f.v.s.l.m." a standard abbreviation in Roman religious
inscriptions?
Thanks!
~Mark
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Message: 13
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 11:29:38 -0200
From: "João S. Lopes Filho" <jodan99@...>
Subject: Re: Rydberg on the Ribhus of the Rigveda
*Bhagos is the blind god of fortune (Bhaga, Baga, Bogu). I dont see any
relation to the Rbhus.
----- Original Message -----
From: Glen Gordon <glengordon01@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, November 20, 2001 3:32 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] Rydberg on the Ribhus of the Rigveda
>
>
> Joao:
> >I didnt understand: why would Bhag^os fit in Rbhus?
>
> I remember Mallory in "In Search of IndoEuropeans" mentioning
> *Bhag^os. It was a little god that had gifts. I guess, kinda
> like a leprichaun or Keebler elf. Anyways, I can't help but feel
> that this probably is related to the Rbhus thing since I doubt
> that there would be multiple elf characters going around, doing
> the same things, in IE mythology. I'm not suggesting that *Bhag^os
> is etymologically related to Rbhus, btw. I'm just curious as to
> how this relates functionally.
>
> - love gLeN
>
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp
>
>
>
>
>
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
>
>
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Message: 14
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:06:02 -0200
From: "João S. Lopes Filho" <jodan99@...>
Subject: anthroponyms
A good source for anthroponyms http://www.panix.com/~mittle/names/
[This message contained attachments]
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Message: 15
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 16:02:47 -0000
From: rhtabone@...
Subject: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
Thanks Anders.
Your example is great.
I know there are some IE languages that regularized their
comparatives and superlatives but still have the 'original' irregular
form.
Anybody else?
--- In cybalist@..., malmqvist52@... wrote:
> --- In cybalist@..., rhtabone@... wrote:
> > Hello all.
> >
> > I have been thinking about this for quite some time, but I never
> knew
> > how to go about it.
> >
> > I wanted to gather evidence for my thesis that in all IE
languages,
> > the comparative and superlative of 'Good' and 'Bad' are always
> formed
> > from another stem. This works for the adverbs as well.
> >
> > I know an example from Romance:
> > Port: bom (adj), bem(adv), melhor (adj, adv comp and sup),
> > mau (adj), mal (adv) -> pior (adj, adv comp and sup).
> >
> > Engl: good(adj), well(adv), better (comp), best(sup)
> > bad(adv), badly(adv), worse (comp), worst(sup)
> >
> > Can anyone prove or disprove this statement?
>
> I can disprove it for one of the swedish words in one of it's
> meanings.
> god (adj.)( about food and mood) godare godast
> but you can also say god bättre bäst which is a more original way I
> guess. So the above seems to be the exeption to the rule.
>
> The other word for good is bra, and both the adverb and adjectiv is:
> bra bättre bäst. Here <bra> is a loan from italian <bravo>
> in other cases it's
> Cheers
> Anders
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Message: 16
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 19:09:57 -0000
From: john_monastra@...
Subject: apsinthion
> Apsinthos, Apsynthos (Dion., Steph. Byz.) - a frontier river and a
> main settlement of the tribe of Apsinthioi (Hdt.) to the north of
the
> Thracian Chersones (modern Galipoli peninsula); Apsinthis
(Apsynthis)
> (Strab., Steph. Byz.) - the country of the same tribe. The name is
> linked with apsinthion `wormwood', a word thought to be of Pelasgian
> origin in the Greek language, or with the Illyrian river name Apsus,
> derived from the IE *a^p- respectively *ab- `water, river'.
Partridge, in Origins, derives apsinthion from Old Persian, but cites
no etymon. What Old Persian word could he have been thinking of?
What was his source, I wonder? I could see ap- 'water' in there, but
would like to know what Persian connection has been postulated for
this word, if any.
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Message: 17
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 20:36:52 +0100
From: "Davius Sanctex" <davius_sanctex@...>
Subject: Somes questions about iranian peoples
1) What was the language of "Regnum Ponticum" of Mithridates IV?
2) What was the language of the "Alani"?
2) Is Saka (khontanese) some form of Scythian?
3) Did Sarmatians and Scythians speak the same language?
4) Are yazigians and sarmatians the same people?
5) What was the historical end of cimerii?
4) Hasta q época sobrevivió el cimerio? que relación exite entre esta lengua
y el escita?
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Message: 18
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 19:59:57 -0000
From: liberty@...
Subject: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
Ossetic has xorz "good" and xuyzdær "better" based
on the same stem, and fyd "bad" and fyddær "worse",
but I don't know how old they are.
-David
--- In cybalist@..., rhtabone@... wrote:
> Thanks Anders.
>
> Your example is great.
>
> I know there are some IE languages that regularized their
> comparatives and superlatives but still have the 'original'
irregular
> form.
>
> Anybody else?
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Message: 19
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 12:36:30 -0800 (PST)
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
Subject: RE: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
--- Sergejus Tarasovas <S.Tarasovas@...>
wrote:
The question is since what time the
> consequences of this
> influence let us state Old Ukrainian, Old Belarusian
> and Old Russian
> have alredy emerged, replacing earlier dialectal
> bunches.
*****GK: This is essentially a linguistic question of
course, to which the political historian can only make
a tentative and perhaps merely peripheral
contribution. But since we're talking about language
rather than ethnicity, "national consciousness" or
state appurtenance (with knowledge of the "leading"
lingo thereof) I would suggest that it all depends on
how extensive you wish "Old X" to be before
recognizing it as such. Do you wish "Old X" to be the
main lingo of most or all of the territory later
labelled "Modern X" or only of a part? I think the
latter is probably the safer course to take. In that
case I would hypothesize that you can already identify
the koine of Kyiv (Kiev) in ca. 1100 as "Old
Ukrainian" (If you're less ticklish about extent area
perhaps even the speech of the "Polany" would qualify
from the moment they changed their ethnonym to "Rus'"
[sometime soon after 944 AD]). By then it would have
an area of "strong" influence englobing the Derevlany,
Siverjany, and "lesser" radiation in all directions.
It would also have some influence as the "center"
speech of the Rus' dominions.=== On the same approach
principle I would call the speech of Polotsk "Old
Belarusan". Does Zalizniak include it into the area of
his "Krivichian" reconstructions? Before dealing with
"Old Russian" let me return for a minute to Ukraine.
What about the speech of its West? Here we must deal
with the "Galician problem". For a long time this
territory had a rather unique position in the Rus'
complex. Without getting into too many details, and
simply from the perspective of the early 12th c.
Kyivan chronicler, it was considered "Lyakh"
territory. But not in the sense of "Polish" even
though competition for its possession was constant
between Kyiv and Gniezno in the 10th and 11th
centuries. The term "Lyakh" (for Nestor=let's use the
traditional name) meant the following groups: (1) the
Poles (3 sub-groups mentioned) (2) the Pomorians (3)
the East Polabians (Liutichi) and (4) the east Croats
of the later Galicia.[only somewhat later did the term
come to be wholly identified with "Poles"] I would
suspect(though I can't prove) that in the 10th c. the
dialect of these Croats was either West Slavic (Belz
and 'Przemysl' as indicators)or intermediary between
West and East Slavic. So I would not yet call it "Old
Ukrainian". But after inclusion into the Rus' complex,
the language of the "center" made quick inroads here.
By c.1100 and perhaps even earlier "Old Ukrainian"
would probably be an acceptable designation for the
local lingo, despite some continuing dialectical
differences. After 1199, the fusion would become even
more intense, but we don't have to go into this.== Now
as to "Old Russian". I may have to modify some of this
after having a look at Zalizniak, but at the moment
here's my take. As a political historian I associate
the rise of Russia with the fortunes of Suzdalia and
its successor states not with Novgorod. But Novgorod
was absorbed by Moscow, much as Galicia by Kyiv
(mutatis mutandis et circumstanciis debitis
obervatis). Close connections between Novgorod and
Suzdalia were long standing, and the former was
clearly the latter's cultural superior for a long
time. Could we then state that in 1100 and earlier the
language of Novgorod was "Old Russian"? At that time
the centers of Suzdalia were just developing and the
Slavic koine in use there likewise. You had incoming
Krivichi, some administrators from "Rus'" proper (Old
Ukraine), and Novgorodian merchants, as key carriers
of Slavic speech, plus the local Ugro-Finnish Meryans.
Nor must we forget the scions of the Norse, who
probably constituted a large if not dominant
proportion of the local aristocracy. I'm not sure how
to characterize the Slavic koine of Suzdalia at that
time. Politically, Suzdalia would be "Old Russia" in
my eyes from the moment that Yuri Volodymyrych
transferred his seat there in 1136 (from the north of
the Pereyaslav Principality) and began to "build it
up". That is the moment when both Novgorod and
Suzdalia declared their political independence from
Kyiv. But the language issue is not too clear to me. I
have no problem in calling Suzdalian "Old Russian" on
all grounds other than linguistic ones. Perhaps there
are also linguistic ones. There surely were as time
went on.******
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Message: 20
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 20:23:49 -0000
From: rhtabone@...
Subject: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
Ok, so an Indo-Iranian language is either 'still' regular (assuming
that a change took place as the IE people moved westward) or 'already'
regular (assuming that Proto-IE started irregular and some earlier
groups decided to change while the travelling groups kept the
irregularity)
Intriguing.
--- In cybalist@..., liberty@... wrote:
> Ossetic has xorz "good" and xuyzdær "better" based
> on the same stem, and fyd "bad" and fyddær "worse",
> but I don't know how old they are.
> -David
>
> --- In cybalist@..., rhtabone@... wrote:
> > Thanks Anders.
> >
> > Your example is great.
> >
> > I know there are some IE languages that regularized their
> > comparatives and superlatives but still have the 'original'
> irregular
> > form.
> >
> > Anybody else?
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Message: 21
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 21:00:05 -0000
From: cas111jd@...
Subject: Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
--- In cybalist@..., "Davius Sanctex" <davius_sanctex@...> wrote:
> 1) What was the language of "Regnum Ponticum" of Mithridates IV?
As near as I have determined, the basal language of Cappadocia
Pontica was probably similar to or the same as Cappadocia; an
Anatolian language related to Lydian, Lycian, and groups in Cilicia,
Commagene, Pisidia, and Caria. The culture, including the language
and religion, seems to have been fairly heavily influenced by the
Achaemenid Persians just as was Armenia. Indeed, Mithridates' name
recalls the Zoroastrian god Mithra. Hellenization began after
Alexander, of course, but as the Macedonian rule was weak and short-
lived, Greek culture was assimilated more through diffusion from
contact with the Seleucids and the Greek ports of Sinope and Amisus
than through direct Greco-Macedonian rule.
> 2) What was the language of the "Alani"?
Iranian. They seem to have been a branch of the Sarmatians, though I
don't recall the details. The Ossets of the north Caucasus are
commonly recognized as their descendants.
> 2) Is Saka (khontanese) some form of Scythian?
Bascially, yes. Saka was the Persian name for them, whom they
referenced to their northeast. Some say it was probably a more
accurate appelation for all of them. As I recall, late survivors of
them fled into eastern Iran and Afghanistan as the Hephtalites
or "White Huns".
> 3) Did Sarmatians and Scythians speak the same language?
Dialects of the same language?
> 4) Are yazigians and sarmatians the same people?
We have a couple of experts who know about the fate of the Sarmatians
in eastern Europe.
> 5) What was the historical end of cimerii?
The ones wiped out by the Romans, with perhaps some surviving
remnants retreating northward to perhaps join the Aduatuci in Belgium
or the ones the Romans reported in Jutland?
> 4) Hasta q época sobrevivió el cimerio? que relación exite entre
esta lengua y el escita?
escita = Scythian? I think the consensus is that Cimmerian was a
Thracian language. The Scythians would have represented the first
intrusion of steppe Iranians into the Pontic region.
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Message: 22
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 13:57:32 -0800 (PST)
From: george knysh <gknysh@...>
Subject: Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
--- Davius Sanctex <davius_sanctex@...> wrote:
> 3) Did Sarmatians and Scythians speak the same
> language?
*****GK: Depends on which Scythians you're talking
about. The "Royal" Scythians spoke an Iranian dialect.
Some of the "Nomad" Scythians probably did also. But
the language of the sedentary population of Herodotus'
Scythia was closer to Thracian and Baltic. The
Sarmatians spoke Iranian tongues (which differed
somewhat from "Royal" Scythian if we believe
Herodotus.)
> 4) Are yazigians and sarmatians the same people?
*****GK: The Yazigians (and their close relatives the
Roxolanians) were certainly Sarmatians. After they
mixed in the area east of Pannonia they were
indiscriminately known as "Sarmatians".*****
> 5) What was the historical end of cimerii?
*****GK: If you mean the Cimmerians and not the
Cimbri, the consensus is that many of them migrated
into Asia Minor under Scythian pressure, where they
eventually dissolved amongst the locals. But Plutarch
claims that most Cimmerians stayed behind and were
incorporated into Scythia. If so they might have been
the older population dominated by the "real"
Cimmerians who then left.*****
> 4) Hasta q época sobrevivió el cimerio? que relación
> exite entre esta lengua y el escita?
*****GK: Actually the jury's still out on this. Strong
cases have been made for Thracian (as indicated), but
the argument that they (at least their dominants) may
have been Iranian persists (the reference is to the
names of two Cimmerian kings: Sandanshatru and
Tseushpa which are etymologized on the basis of
Iranian. Since the Scythians took over from the
Cimmerians, perhaps the situation was analogous: an
Iranian "Royal" group ruling a Thrakoid
population.****
>
>
>
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Message: 23
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 22:04:09 -0000
From: liberty@...
Subject: Re: Somes questions about iranian peoples
--- In cybalist@..., "Davius Sanctex" <davius_sanctex@...> wrote:
> 1) What was the language of "Regnum Ponticum" of Mithridates IV?
> 2) What was the language of the "Alani"?
> 2) Is Saka (khontanese) some form of Scythian?
> 3) Did Sarmatians and Scythians speak the same language?
> 4) Are yazigians and sarmatians the same people?
> 5) What was the historical end of cimerii?
> 4) Hasta q época sobrevivió el cimerio? que relación exite
entre
> esta lengua y el escita?
I hope that somebody more knowledgeable than myself
answers your questions, but in the meantime I can try to answer
some semi-competently.
The language of the Alani is usually called Alanic, which
doesn't clarify much, or Old Ossetic, which is disputed by some.
As far as I know Khotanese or Khotan Saka and Tumshuq Saka
are the only surviving dialects of Scythian.
The Sarmatian and Scythian languages were closely related but
not the same language. Compare these words for "son".
Avestic Scythic Sarmatic
puthra- purtha- *furta-
You can see that all are Iranian but that Scythian and Sarmatian
share the metathesis of -tr- > -rt- and therefore together consistute
a branch seperate from Avestan but that Iranian *p- and *-th-
become f- and -t- in Sarmatian therefore making it a distinct branch
of Scytho-Sarmatic.
The origin of the names Sarmatian and Sauromatian are obscure
but probably first designated just that tribe with which the Greeks
first came in contact and was thereafter applied by them to all
related tribes. Our modern use of the word is similar and so
Jazygian would be considered a sub-division within Sarmatian. I
favor the equation "Jaz-" in Jazygian = "Oss-" in Ossete = Hung.
Jász = Russ. Jassy = As/Asi/Asioi/Asianoi. Besides the formal
similarity the historical sources say that the ancestors of the
Hungarian Jász were Jazygians. I speculate that it could come
from adejctival derivatives of Yas- like *Yaz-æg, *Yaz-ig, or
*Yaz-ug. Also the Jász people's language is very close to Ossetic.
The Byzantine Greeks called the Ossetian's ancestors "Alans" and
their territory in the Caucasus "Alania" and several sources give
As or Yas as synonyms of Alan or as replacing the term Alan. So I
think that this not just proves the Alan/As identity, which is widely
recognized, but also the As/Yas/Jazygian (and therefore Sarmatian)
identity, which I'm not sure if scholars accept or not. In other
words I don't think that we should posit an East-Iranic branch
further subdivided into an Alanic and a Sarmatian branch. The
theory that I favor is that the Alans (< *aryana-) were a tribal
confederation of several tribes of East-Iranic nomads along with a
variety of Slavic, Tocharian and Altaic elements as well. Therefore
Alan wouldn't be a tribal name as such but the broader common ethnic
term for the majority Iranians who were divided into several tribes
under different names. I think that the Yas/As tribe must have
been a major component of the Alanic confederation from the beginning
and that over time as the various other components of the
confederation were assimilated to the Yassic culture and language
that the term Yas/As began to be used synonymously with Alan and then
eventually replaced it, hence the disappearance of the Sarmatians and
Alans and their replacement by the Oss-etes and Jász.
I can't answer your questions about the Regnum Ponticum's
language, the end of the Cimmerians, nor the Cimmerian language's
relation to Scythian.
My sources are old and incomplete and I have no formal training
in linguistics or history, so I would be very grateful for any
critiques of this scenario that better informed people could offer.
David
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Message: 24
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 22:17:56 -0000
From: "Sergejus Tarasovas" <S.Tarasovas@...>
Subject: Re: Old Rus' of the many "nationes"
--- In cybalist@..., george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:
> On the same approach
> principle I would call the speech of Polotsk "Old
> Belarusan". Does Zalizniak include it into the area of
> his "Krivichian" reconstructions?
The only material records of Krivichian at our disposal are birch
bark inscriptions from Novgorod, Pskov, Staraja Russa and
thereabouts. More or less prominent Krivichian influence can be
traced in some Standard Old Russian (= your Kievan koine; by the way,
this term, as a less confusing, is indeed used by some linguists,
including Zalizniak) documents from Smolensk and Polotsk areas, but
this evidence is rather scarce and doesn't help detect any
differences between the Krivichian of Polotsk and the Krivichian of
Pskov and Novgorod (Novgorodian koine).
>== Now
> as to "Old Russian". I may have to modify some of this
> after having a look at Zalizniak, but at the moment
> here's my take.
By the reasons discussed aboce, Zalizniak compiled a description (in
a fashion of a classical historical grammar) of what he calls 'Old
Novgorodian dialect'. The main reasin he uses such a neutral term
rather than 'Krivichian' is tend to abstract from the issues of
Krivichian in the broad sense. I'm not sure what dialect was spoken
in Suzdal'.
> Could we then state that in 1100 and earlier the
> language of Novgorod was "Old Russian
Whay not, but it was definitely not the Old Russian of the Ve,tic^i
and Radimic^i territory. Two Old Russians would be inconvenient.
I'm inclined to think it makes sense to use a general term as Old
Russian (let's treat Russian as an adjective from Rus' :) ) or any
other politically correct equivalent (eg, East Slavic) when there's a
need to designate a whole set of dialects sharing some specific
features (a _real_ need as to linguistics), and more precise terms
when one speaks of specific dialects (Krivichian) or koines
(Kievan/Novgorodian). I feel comfortable with the statement like
'RusIskaja PravIda is written in Kievan koine' (instead of
conventional Old Russian). I'm still not sure it's written in Old
Ukrainian, though :).
Sergei
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Message: 25
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 22:36:38 +0100
From: "Marc Verhaegen" <marc.verhaegen@...>
Subject: Re: Re: Good, better, Best. Bad, Worse, Worst
> > I wanted to gather evidence for my thesis that in all IE
> > languages, the comparative and superlative of 'Good'
> > and 'Bad' are always formed from another stem.
> > This works for the adverbs as well.
> > I know an example from Romance:
> > Port: bom (adj), bem(adv), melhor (adj, adv comp and sup),
> > mau (adj), mal (adv) -> pior (adj, adv comp and sup).
> > Engl: good(adj), well(adv), better (comp), best(sup)
> > bad(adv), badly(adv), worse (comp), worst(sup)
> > Can anyone prove or disprove this statement?
In Dutch, "bad"
= slecht, slechter, slechtst,
= kwaad, erger, ergst,
= erg, erger, ergst.
Marc
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