--- In cybalist@..., Piotr Gasiorowski <piotr.gasiorowski@...>
wrote:
> If you refer back to the earlier discussions of this problem on
Cybalist, and in particular
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/6816
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/6866
>
> ... you will find Chris Gwinn's patient explanation why this
proposition is impossible. Cymru derives from *com-brogia via pretty
recent Brittonic (or rather early Welsh-Cumbric) sound changes. Chris
also explains why the term can't have been coined before that time. A
hypothetical Common Celtic *com-mrogi:, corresponding to the
Brittonic term, is surely much less attractive as the etymology
of "Cimmerian" or "Cimbri", let alone both ;)
>
> Piotr
>
I've read and reread those postings, but as far as I can see his
argument hinges on:
1) There was no *com-brogia in Common Celtic times (??? - absence of
evidence etc). Why wouldn't any Celt at the time have hit on the idea
of combining those two words? Why is that so certain?
2) *com-brogia must have been coined at Welsh-Cumbrian times and
therefore cannot have existed earlier. This argument rests on the
assumption that compounds are never re-formed, when phonological
development renders its various parts unrecognizable. That is false.
3) Much table-thumping.
Torsten