Eva,
Let me begin by stating the obvious:
cross-linguistic similarities are a dime a dozen and in most cases they are
coincidental. For an etymological proposal to make sense, it has to be
sound both formally and semantically; additionally, a plausible historical
scenario must be offered to explain the trajectory of a word in time and space.
The comparanda cited in Vassil's list are gleaned from an odd selection of
languages -- which is probably an effect of the amateurish method used: take
whatever dictionaries or word-lists are available and search for lookalikes. The
compiler of the list evidently had access to a number of Pamir and Dardic
glossaries and used them indiscriminately. The Dardic languages aren't Iranian,
to begin with; the fact that they are Indo-Iranian is irrelevant if you want to
support the influence of _Iranian_ on Bulgarian. If the words in question have
got Iranian counterparts, why use Dardic material? If they haven't, they are
useless, unless you want to suggest that the Proto-Bulgars came from the
Hindukush and were Dardic rather than Iranian.
They are useless anyway if one lists them
without attempting a linguistic and historical analysis. Accidental
pseudo-cognacy is more common than you might think (but old Cybalisters should
know it full well by now). Who hasn't seen a demonstration that Hungarian is a
close cousin of Sumerian, or that Albanian is related to Etruscan, based on a
list of alleged "cognates"?
An additional difficulty with some of the
languages used by Dobrev (?) (for example Munjani, Ishkashmi, Sarikoli and
Pashto) is that they have been affected by massive sound changes in relatively
recent times, so that they differ rather drastically even from their close
relatives. It is not easy to see that e.g. Munjani <yu:> '1', <lu>
'2' and <x^iroy> '3' are inherited Iranian numerals, or that Sarikoli
<c^Ewg> is a regular reflex of *karta- 'done'. To understand such
relations, you must do some elementary reading on the historical phonology of
the Iranian languages first. The mere _surface_ similarity between the listed
items and a hypothetical Iranian source of Bulgarian words can't be taken
seriously. I completely agree with your last sentence, but I don't see any
promising pattern emerge from this random collection of words.
I have no Bulgarian etymological dictionary
to hand, but I suspect many of the would-be Iranianisms aren't all that
mysterious and have perfectly ordinary and generally accepted etymologies. For
example, <kUs^ta> is certainly Slavic (< *ko~tja, cf. SCr. kuc'a,
Maced. kuk'a). It's sadly evident that Dobrev (or whoever is the culprit
here) did not control his "evidence" in any way, and that Vassil also
failed to verify it. This is not the way to do lingusitics
professionally.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2003 4:32
PM
Subject: [tied] Re: Yers
Kaka is a word used in Northern India, for
example. You will find
"kaka" from mundzhani in Vassil's list
(I presume, compiled from
Dobrev's books).
bulg. lelja - Dardic
lola "aunt"
bulg. sholjo - Dardic shuli "small"
bulg. bulka - Mundzhani
"wula" "woman, wife"
(Slavic - nevesta, the word is not often used in
Bulgarian, sounds
a bit strange if someone says where is your
"nevesta")
And how about others, connected with everyday
life:
bulg. kUshta, pashto kUshtaj "house", dardic ghosht
bulg.
kUrpa "towel", ishkamiti kUrpa, sarikoli kUrpa
The list potentially
contains a lot of mistakes (e.g. words that
have parallels closer - in
Slavic or in Greek). But I think the only
solution will be to look
for regular patterns.