Re: [tied] Scythian tribal names: Paralatai

According to Herodotus Paralatai is a tribe descending from the youngest of 3 sons of Targitai.

According to Avesta Aryan is a tribe descending from the youngest of 3 sons of Thraetaona.

Could Targitai be linguistically compared to Thraetaona?

Alexander

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

From: Piotr Gasiorowski

To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Sunday, December 02, 2001 3:05 AM

Subject: [tied] Scythian tribal names: Paralatai

To take the bull by the horns -- I'd like to suggest an etymology of "Paralatai". The only known source of "Euro-Iranian" <l> is *ry/*ri, so let us suppose that the recorded form is not misspelt but contains a genuine -l- < *-ry-. If we detach the collective <-ta->, what remains is <parala-> < *pararya- (approximately). I can see two alternative (but similar) analyses of that:

(1) *pari-a:rya- 'thoroughly Aryan/most respectable' = *parya:rya- > *pælalæ- > *pæralæ- (note that liquid dissimilation is normal in Modern Ossetic). Looks like a suitable name for the Royal Scythians.

(2) *para-arya- 'outer/different Arya (?)' = *para:rya- > *pæralæ- (less attractive semantically, but formally possible).

Piotr

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