From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 17344
Date: 2003-01-02
----- Original Message -----
From: <S.Tarasovas@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 02, 2003 8:54 PM
Subject: [tied] Re: Modern Greek patronymic suffix -POULOS
> If we deal with the diminutive -Uk-(o) here, then a connection with
> the Baltic diminutive -uk- naturally suggests itself, and an Iranian
> source for a Balto-Slavic morpheme (*-uk- < *-u-ko- with the PIE
> diminutive suffix *-ko-) doesn't look plausible to me. But I'm not
> sure.
I agree native origin is more likely. The connecting vowel before *-k- is *I or *U (< *i, *u) in Slavic, as opposed to *a, which predominates in Iranian (*-aka-), the Baltic connection supports the Balto-Slavic status of the suffix (which is widespread in IE anyway), and I know of no facts that are better explained by assuming its foreign origin.
Piotr