Re: Crows and Garlands

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tolgs001" <george.st@...> wrote:

> >'crow' seems to be in most FU languages.
> >
> >Hung. - varja'
>
> varjú ['vOr-ju:] "crow;" holló ['hol-lo:] "raven"
>
> >*k-? Pokorny (root #919) has a nice set of 'magpie' words, e.g.
> >Sanskrit _sa:rika:_
> >
> >This appears in Finnish as 'harakka' magpie. presumably
> >borrowed from Baltic.
>
> Hungarian szarka ['sOr-kO], Rumanian tzarca ['tzar-k&], assumed
> to be a loan from Hungarian (Spread chiefly in Transylvania and
> Moldavia).
>
> Another of the Corvidae family:
>
> Hungarian csóka ['tSo:-kO] "jackdaw", Corvus monedula
> (cf. German Dohle), black and grey.
>
> As for Engl. jay and Fr. jai (< late Lat. gaius?), I wonder
> if there's any link to Rum. gaie ['ga-je] (which is not a
> Corvidae group member, but a red kite, cf. Germ. Rotmilan).
>
> But, AFAIK, the Rum. word for "jay" is gaitza ['ga-i-...]
> (Garrulus glandarius), i.e. etymologically gaie + the suffix
> -itza. In Hungarian it is called mátyásmadár, i.g. verbatim
> "Matthias(') bird."
>
> >Peter P
>
> George

************
I am afraid that Hungarian <szarka> and Romanian <tzarka> are derived
from Slavic _šarka_ 'colored bird' (cf. šara 'spot' with big family
of derivatives, <šaren> 'spotted, colored', _šarolik_ 'id.',
<šarolikost> 'full-coloredness', etc.). To this conclusion leads also
Albanian _laraskë_ 'magpie' < larë 'spot' + -skë (adjectival suffix).
The same meaning has also <sorrëshkinë> 'spotted bird, magpie'.

Konushevci