Re: Celtic and Baltic

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "CG" <sonno3@...> wrote:

> > The Lithuanian word seems to be related to Slavic *c^IlnU 'boat,
> canoe',
> > but not to the Celtic ethnonym *kelto-/*kelta:-, I'm not sure

what

> the
> > latter "means" in the sense that it has no obvious etymology.

Maybe

> > Chris Gwinn can help us.
>
> On the face of it, Gaulish *Celtos, pl. *Celti/*Celtoi (the source

of

> Greek Keltoi, Latin Celtae) seems to be derived from one of the
> various PIE *kel- roots (*kel- 1. "to strike, cut", 2. "cover,
> conceal, save", 3. "to drive, set in swift motion", 4. "to be
> prominent, hill", 5. "to prick", 6. "to deceive, trick"). Not all

of

> these various *kel-'s survive in Irish or Welsh, but that does not
> mean that most (if not all) of them couldn't have existed in

Gaulish -

> so it's hard to say precisely which one might have been the root

of

> the ethnic name. "Prominent One" of "Swift" seem attractive choices
> to me.

If so, the connection with Lith. <kéltas> 'ferry(-boat)' offered by
Egijus still can't be excluded. It's hard to believe the only
connection between <kéltas> and <kélti> (< PIE *kel(h1)- 'lift; set
in motion') 'lift, raise, wake up, put up (also figuratively -- 'put
up a fight' etc); take across (by water); carry, transfer, move
(somewhere else)' is a folk-etymological one. Cf. also <kilnóti> (<
*klh1-n-) 'carry, transfer, move (somewhere else);take across (by
water);lift' and <kelnas> 'ferry-boat' (quoted by Vasmer, I must
admit I've never heard the word); also <ke~lias> 'road, way'. So
probably *Celtos could mean something 'having crossed a river' (like
Hebr. <'ibri:> ?) :).

Sergei