From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 18615
Date: 2003-02-09
----- Original Message -----
From: <x99lynx@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, February 08, 2003 7:57 PM
Subject: [tied] "Sinew" versus "Sinus"
> "Sinew" seems to be considered as solely Germanic in origin, but perhaps there is some way that it as a trade word underwent peculiar early sound changes that were lost in time, and so it appears to be another one of those phonetically difficult "non-IE words" found in Germanic.
Difficult it certainly is, but why not try?
As a legacy of pre-Neolithic technology, at least some words for 'sinew, tendon' are related to verb roots meaning 'sew' or 'bind' (the second frequent connection is with 'stretch, pull tight') and may also mean 'cord, strap, bowstring' and the like. Thus, from *(s)neh1- 'sew, spin, thread' we get *(s)neh1-mn. 'thread' (Gk. ne:ma), but also *sneh1-wr./*-wen- 'sinew, tendon, strap' (which underlies Gk. neuron, Lat. nervus, Skt. sna:va and Ger. Schnur 'cord') as well as Skt. sna:yu- 'sinew, tendon, bowstring'.
I'm therefore tempted to agree with Pokorny and relate the Germanic 'sinew' word to *sh2ai(-H)- 'bind, tie' as in PGmc. *saila- 'rope' > Ger. Seil, OE sa:l, Goth. v. insailjan, PGmc. *si:man- 'straw rope' > OE si:ma from PIE *sh2iH-mon-, cf. Hitt. ishimana- 'rope, cord', Gk. hi(:)monia 'well-rope', hima:s (-ant-) 'strap, thong'. The morphological mechanism suggested by Jens in the discussion of <sinus> would have produced *sh2in(H)u- 'binding (adj.)' (cf. Av. hinu- 'bond, chain') via the infixed verb *sh2i-n(e)-H- (cf. Skt. sina:ti 'bind, tie'). The last step, the conversion of an archaic -u- stem (*sinuz) into a regular feminine noun (*sinuwo:), was accomplished rather late in (NW?) Germanic.
Piotr