Re: [tied] Enclosed Places (was: The unexplained link between Greek

12-07-03 23:44, alex wrote:

> This is a posiblity. Against this posiblity is the meaning. For a
> borrowing from Slavic, there are not semantical differences or
> semantical developments. As far I know there are not such deviation for
> borrowign from Slavic, the loaned words having the same meaning as in
> Slavic.

First, you are wrong about there being no cases of semantic change upon
borrowing from Slavic into Romanian. I can supply example, if needed,
though the exercise is pointless: semantic change can _always_ happen.

> If there is in Slavic the meaning "fence" then it can be a loan
> from Slavic. If not, then it is not.

Wrong (see above), also because there might have been a specialisation
of meaning in _Slavic_ after the word had been borrowed into Albanian
and Romanian. (The meaning of Germanic *gardaz was also fairly general,
but has become narrowed down in Modern English <yard>).

> Do you have in Slavic the word
> "gardU"= fence? Not simmilars like " umgezeunte platz, stadt, usw usw.
> Simply, fence. Is it?

The existence of the verb *gorditi 'enclose, protect with a fence', and
of derivatives like *ob-gordU 'garden' (which have nothing to do with
towns but much to do with fences) makes early Slavic *gordU 'fence,
palisade' at least a well-supported possibility.

Piotr