[tied] Re: PIE's closest relatives

Hello, Glen

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Glen Gordon" <glengordon01@...>
wrote:

>
> Marco:
> >However, it is wiser to consider Sumerian /girgir/ as derived form

an

> >expressive form.
>
> Reduplication was typically used in Sumerian for plurals, but yeah.
> Sadly, things never change and we had this discussion before more
> than three years ago:
>
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/5201

Reduplication is not only used for plurals.

> >The match between Sumerian /urudu/ and IE /*roudh-/ is almost
> >certainly valid (and I have read about it long time ago), even if
> >there are some phonetic difficulties. But, I'm sorry, attempt to

derive

> >Sumerian /urudu/ from Afro-Asiatic are idle and worthless.
>
> Perhaps the debate would be more productive if you directly
> confronted how a Semitic form like *weru:-?arDi meaning "earth
> metal" is unlikely for the source of the "copper" word. I admit
> to still being unsure of what underlies Akkadian /eru:/. Is it
> *weru: or something similar? Or am I wrong -- Is it not even
> a Semitic word at all?

The word /*weru:-?arDi/ is a coinage, it is artificial. I have
limited knowledge of Afro-Asiatic languages, but I've never seen
something similar. Akkadian /eru:/ is not from /*weru:/.

> If /urudu/ is derived from /ur/ "bright", then what is /-udu/?
> Your solution could never hope to be indisputable until you can
> at least explain the word in toto. Otherwise, it's amateurish
> slice-n-splice etymology that doesn't fly in the real linguistic
> world. I don't think we can seriously relate "copper" from a
> compound meaning, say, "bright sheep" (ur-udu). How
> about "bright sun ten" (ur-ud-u)? Obviously, this etymologizing
> is awkward. So, I don't see where you can go with this.

It's not a "bright ship" nor a "bright sun ten". It is simply /ur
(u)/ "bright object" + /du/ "to mould", as seen in Halloran's lexicon.
Quite credible. Separing /urudu/ from /urum/ and from /ur(u)/ makes
little sense, until you or someone else can specify a credible
source. Surely it has nothing to do with Austronesian.

> Even if you could, you still are presented with the expansive
> problem of positioning IE anywhere near Sumer or Sumerian
> anywhere near the Ukraine. Again, this was all explained
> against some three years ago but either people haven't been
> paying attention or new people haven't read old posts.

I never said that Sumerian and IE were in direct contact. Proposed
matchups, if valid, must be secondary. We find an Afro-Asiatic word
for "silver" in Slavic, in Baltic and in Germanic. Wanderwo"rter are
very moble. It seems impossible to reconstruct the real voyage of
Sumerian cultural loanwords in unknown intermediate languages and
then in Proto-IE or in historical IE languages. It's thorny and
marasmic.
To read all the infinity of messages posted in several years is
simply an absurdity. I can make some search, but I've no time and
energy to read all this, also because many and many messages are idle
and focused on useless topics (sparse etyma of sparse words, absurd
crackpot connections with Austronesian, genetics, ethanol tolerance -
I prefer to drink it than to discuss about it!, etc...).

> >I have read many inconsistence about linking Sumerian items with
> >something else, due to erroneous analysis of word structure.
> >Examples: /a/ "water" is not from /ab/ ( /ab/, "ocean", "sea",

etc...

> >is merely a reduction of /aba/ < /ab/ "hole, cavity"

+ /a/ "water"!!!).

>
> That could only be John A. Halloran's dillusions at sumerian.org.
> There's no need to even go on about him although his sumerian
> glossary is impressive, even if suspect at times. However, this

shows

> exactly why these lazy etymologies, including yours on /urudu/,
> don't work.

The proposed etymologies are sometimes strange, but in most cases
valid. It is not a suspect lexicon: the only thing I suspect is that
nobody read it.

> >Now, I recomend you a deep study of Sumerian, supported by good
> >vocabularies that can be found on line.
>
> I recommend the same for you. There are even better resources in
> a library which have been subject to much scrutiny by the publisher
> before being printed.

Once again libraries! I have already told you that we have no similar
resources in libraries: I searched for many years and I found very
little.

Marco

>
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