Re: Rag (was: Craciun, Romanian for Christmas)

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...>
wrote:

> At 10:15:22 AM on Tuesday, December 30, 2003, Richard
> Wordingham wrote:
>
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski
> > <piotr.gasiorowski@...> wrote:
>
> >> Gk. hrakos comes from older *wrakos, I think (and
> >> certainly not from *krak)
>
> > Pokorny concurs - k-extension of *wer 'tear', root #2168,
> > and cites Aeolian <brakos>. Any chance of it being related
> > to English _rag_, from Old Norse ro,gg 'tuft or strip of
> > fur'. I don't know whether Norwegian and Swedish _ragg_
> > 'rough hair' tell us anything about whether an initial /w/
> > has been lost.
>
> ON fem. <ro,gg> has gen.sing. <ro,ggvar>, so it should be
> from *rawwo:-. I believe that Swedish usually reflects
> /wr-/ as <vr-> (e.g., Sw. <vräka>, ON <(v)reka>; Sw.
> <vränga>, ON <(v)rengja>; Sw. <vrist>, ON <(v)rist>).
>

Actually, Da., Sw., Norw. have vr- for PGmc *wr-, where ON has r-,
which shows ON is not their direct ancestor. Low German and Dutch
preserve *wr- too (<wraak>), High German has r- (<rache>).

Torsten