[tied] Re: Pre-Germanic speculation

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski
<piotr.gasiorowski@...> wrote:

> 29-10-03 13:36, tgpedersen wrote:
>
> > ... Borgund (Borgundærholm > Bornholm) ...
> >
> > For some weird reason they have same suffixes (-s, -ind, -und) as

the

> > supposed Anatolian placenames in Greece (-ssos, -inthos, -unthos),
>
> They are not necessarily Anatolian. <-(i)sso-> can come from more

than

> one source and <-inthos> could well be Thracian. In either case

we're

> dealing with IE suffixes. Germanic *-und- comes from PIE *-n.t-ó-,

i.e.

> a thematised present participle.

These suffixes are not necessarily Anatolian. But they are surely of
non-IE origin and very widespread in pre-IE toponymy. They are
substratum item. In Etruscan they were still productive in common
words such as am-inth, calu-s (pl. calu-s-ur, adject. calu-s-na, all
derived from calu), etc...
Also the Thracian suffix -intho- is a substratum feature.
Germanic *-und- comes from IE *-ntó- in IE words such as Gothic
fijands, frijonds, and so on, but in toponyms it may derive from
different sources.

> > but the roots of the names are not recognizably IE (or anything),
> > except for the Wanderwort *burg- (Greek pyrgos) (according to

EIEC),

>
> It's the indubitably IE root *bHerg^H- 'increase, grow strong',

with

> derivatives like *bHerg^Hos 'rock, mountain, barrow' (Gmc. *berga-

),

> *bHr.g^H-u-, *bHr.g^H-(o)nt- 'high, tall, lofty, large'. The name

of the

> Burgundians corresponds _exactly_ to that of the Celtic Brigantes

(both

> derive from *bHr.g^H-n.t-, and both are cognate to Skt. bRha(n)t-)

The

> meaning is something like 'big guys'.

The root *bHerg^H- is indubitably IE, and I think the Burgundians
correspond exactly to the Brigantes. We can add also OHG Purgunt, a
feminine person name, corresponting exactly to Celtic Briganti: (See
Pokorny). So I see no necessity of considering Borgundarholmr a
substratum item.
For Borgund I am more skeptical. I'm not sure that this toponym is
directly connected with Burgundians.
Forms like burg-, similar to IE *bHerg^H- are found also in Urartian
burgana > Aramaic burgo:n, Armenian burgn. Maybe an ancient IE
loaword in Neolithic cultures.

> > and possibly *sam- of Samsø, which might be taken, together with

the

> > Samland peninsula of East Prussia, to be related to Suomi and

Saami,

> > and therefore Finno-Ugric (Saami?) relic areas?
>
> Why do you insist on *sam- being non-IE? And if it's related to

Suomi,

> why does it have a historically short vowel?

This *sam- may be unrelated with Saami, Suomi, due to phonetic
difficulties, but this doesn't imply that this *sam- is IE.
What IE cognate do you have for Sams ??? Your arguments suffer of
severe difficulties.

Greetings

Marco