Eric Hamp, The Position of Albanian
According to Hamp: Çabej points out (VII Congresso intemazionale
245) that Latin + CC is regular, a statement I can neither affirm
nor control at the moment.
I will add here: shëgjetë < lat. sagitta, letër < lat. littera,
shenjë < lat. signum, i denjë < lat. dignum, i shtrenjtë (cf. lat.
strictus), enj-te (cf. lat. ignis `fire'), etc. So equation Lissus >
Leshë > Lezhë is quit regular, as meshë < missa. See also Akrolissus
and kryelezha.
Jokl's Illyrian-Albanian correspondences (Albaner §3a) are probably
the best known. Certain of these require comment: Strabo (7.314) &#=
61548;
: lëgatë '=
swamp'. This could be *lug-, but there is also
*lag- 'wet', which might of course also represent *loug-.
I think that Albanian *lug- "to bend" and *lag- "to wet" are
completley different roots.
Ludrum : Tosk lum 'muck', Geg lym, Tosk ler, but there are also
Latin and Greek cognates.
Aquae Balizae : baltë 'mud'. But Krahe (IF 1962:67.151-158) thinks
Balissae is from Bal-is(i)a : *Bal-sa in Balsenz < *Bal-s-antia (:
*Ap-s-antia > Absentia) : Lith. balà 'swamp' : OCS blato, Alb.
baltë. Therefore, for Krahe Balissae/Balizae is "Alteuropaisch" (see
below).
Metu-barbis ~ -barris is ambiguous.
Malo/untum, etc., involve root etymologies and are dubious.
Place names in -V-ste/a/o : kopshtë 'orchard', vresht 'vineyard' :
(Illyrier §4) Lith. -ysta 'membership'.
That Alb. -ínj is a plural-collective is clear, but what about the
meaning of Delminium?
Also an plural-collective and nothing else.
Cimochowski thus believes that Illyrian (-Messapic) shows velars
where uncontested sat m languages do, and that therefore these
reflexes fail to make Illyrian a centum dialect. I agree
provisionally with Cimochowski's conclusion here, but on other
grounds. True, the facts speak against a centum status for Illyrian;
but Cimochowski has too simple a formula for the centum-sat m
dichotomy. In all of his examples, the following environment always
involves a resonant, while the other cognates adduced are sometimes
weak or dubious or susceptible of other explanations: Vescleves, Can-
davia (for which * - is gratuitously reconstructed, but which
points only to * - at most), Acra-banis, Bargulis/Bargilius,
Skerdis, ''. This environme=
nt matches exactly that posited by
me for the merger of palatals and velars in Albanian (KZ 1960:76.275-
280), and on no account depends on erratic matches in the sat m
languages as conventionally understood.
A special feature of Illyrian claimed by Cimochowski is its separate
reflex of the labiovelars (pp. 44-46). Before front vowels, as
Pedersen and Jokl showed, Albanian distinguishes the labiovelars.
Jokl correctly saw that Illyrian distinguished them, too, but tried
wrongly to prove that. (
)Thus, according to Cimochowski, the
evidence for Thracian labiovelars crumbles away. The distinct
reflexes of labiovelars in Albanian and Illyrian form, then, a
capital proof of the Illyrian ancestry of Albanian.
Regards:
Abdullah Konushevci
--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski
<piotr.gasiorowski@...> wrote:
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Abdullah Konushevci" <akonushevci@...>
> To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Friday, March 21, 2003 10:32 PM
> Subject: [tied] Re: Dacian
>
>
> > Accepting the views and results of well-known Croat linguist
Radoslav Katicic, Polish linguist Waclav Cimohovski [Waclaw
Cimochowski -- PG], Albanian linguist Eqrem Çabej, I consider that
any attempt to treat Albanian language as non-descendent of Illyrian
language, is simply an adventure.
>
> Dear Abdullah,
>
> One could just as easily list a number of authorities who doubt or
deny this connection. Can you provide any arguments in favour of
your claim? (We seem at least to agree that Albanian is closely
related to Dacian.)
>
> Piotr