Re: Cimmerians and Amazons

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, " Alexander Stolbov" <astolbov@...>
wrote:

> If I'm not mistaken the root of this word is in all probability a

part of the IE heritage (not a loan from a non-IE source). Original
meaning of this word seems to be 'winter' (Indian Himalayas and
Russian zima are cognates of it).

> What is the PIE form of it?

*g^Hei-m-, *g^Hj-em-, *g^Hi-m- or any of these with more suffixes.

> Secondary meaning of this root can be 'a goat or a sheep 1 year old'

, i.e. young animals which survived a winter.

Actually, the secondary meaning of the 'winter' root is 'one year (of
survival)' (even in older English expressions like "five winter(s)
old" were common, and were also used of humans). 'Yearling' is derived
from that.

> What should be the East Iranian form of the root we discuss?

*zaim-/*zyam-/*zim-

Piotr