--- In cybalist@..., x99lynx@... wrote:
> It is just as likely that what Tacitus was reporting was the same -
h- in Hermunduri that he reported in names like Boihaemi, Harii,
Helveconae, Helisii, Nahanarvali, etc. Or that he was simply
recording a Latin -h-, as in Hermes, adopted by Germanic speakers.
And the reason would logically be that this <h-> was what the
Hermunduri used in referring to themselves.
>
> ... So it looks like the literal <herma> also eventually lost its
<h-> in Germanic, as it did in later Latin.
It can't be the same <h->, historically speaking. The initial of
<harii>, <(boi)haemi>, <hasdingi> etc. represents Germanic *x (the
etymology of these names is transparent: *xarja-, *xaima-, *xazdinga-
). But this *x was not lost in _any_ Germanic language in word-
initial positions until rather late, although it was lenited to /h/
in language after language. Even nowadays initial /h/-dropping is
virtually restricted to dialectal British English. For example the
Old English reflexes of the very same words are <here>, <ha:m>
(modern <home>), <Hearding(as)>. By contrast, OE has h-less <eormen>
(and so do all the other known Germanic languages; I have already
cited the relevant forms). This can't go back to PGmc. *x, and there
is no other PGmc. source from which an <h-> might derive. You can't
propose a special Germanic laryngeal phoneme (*h as different from
*x) found in one word only (there's no independent need to posit such
a thing). Even if the pre-Proto-Germanic speakers had borrowed
<hermes> in prehistoric times, the word would have ended up adapted
as PGmc. *xerm- or *erm-. As shown above, *xerm- must be ruled out
(it fails to account for the attested reflexes), and *erm- has no
initial consonant, so the addition of an <h-> by the Romans remains
the only explanation of its appearance in Latin texts. To sum up,
this particular <h-> is bound to be of secondary (an non-Germanic)
origin no matter which one (if either) of us two is right about the
etymology of "Hermun-".
Piotr