Re: [tied] IE words for monkey,ape : Ke:pos, Kapi, Apan, Opica,

From: Joao
Message: 32973
Date: 2004-05-30

There are no monkeys in Caucasus or Anatolia. If PIE had a PIE word for monkey, this place would be somewhere at Himalaya, Tibet, or Northern India. That's why I agree with you.
The origin of Celtic abranas must be some place from Northern Africa or even Gibraltar (cf. Macaca sylvanus). Where are the Pithecousa islands mentioned at Kekropes vs. Herakles legend? 
----- Original Message -----
From: enlil@...
To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Saturday, May 29, 2004 11:27 PM
Subject: Re: [tied] IE words for monkey,ape : Ke:pos, Kapi, Apan, Opica, ABranas

Joao:
> Is there any explanation for the IE words for monkey?
> Germanic apan
> Old Russian opica
> Celtic (Hesychius) abranas
> Greek ke:pos, ke:bos
> Sanskrit ka:pi
>
> A loanword? *Ha:p-, *Xa:p

Gamrelidze and Ivanov reconstruct a word for 'monkey' in IE
but I've already mentioned my distrust for their reconstructions.
Personally, I'd say that it's more likely that the word entered
these languages independently after the fracture of the IE language
area, although I don't know precisely from which language or
languages offhand. Anybody else know a possible foreign source of
the term?


= gLeN