> What are some of the accepted IE cognates of Arya and Ariia?
>
> Are Eire, Ehre and Aristos accepted? Any others?
Thanks for the illuminating replies.
In summary, the three words are reconstructed as having rather
different meanings. I was definitely thinking of them more as
adjectives than as nouns, although the idea of using the adjective to
refer to ones group would be a natural outcome.
>Celtic = fat, fertile
>German Ehre = honor
>Greek 'excellent' is a somewhat stretched interpretation. Greek ari-
>means things like 'very', 'super-' or 'extremely'
Nevertheless, considering that the five cultures are separated by
serveral thousand years and probably ten thousand miles, there is a
fundamental, although *very* loose similarity between the meanings in
that they all describe something superlative.
Irish "Fat, fertile" would, I assume, refer to the Eire as a "fat,
fertile country or land" or a "noble land" in the same way as you
call a good horse a "noble steed"; German 'honor' is obvious and the
Greek analogy with 'super' or 'extremely' could have originally
meant 'very good' and then later applied in different circumstances
just as 'super' meant 'high' but broadened its usage as in the
contradictory term 'super low'.
Understanding that linguistics is historically full of this kind of
loose thinking, is there any even remotely reasonable liklihood
that 'arya' might have been carried over into these languages?
What does "Celtic *ario- " refer to?