Re: IJzelman- ?

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "elmeras2000" <jer@...> wrote:

>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@...>
> wrote:
> >
> > Bearing in mind Venneman's attempt to relate Germanic *i:s-
> "ice"
> > with a proposed Basque stem iz- "water" (izurde "water-pig"
> > ie. "dolphin" etc) and his finding that iz- stem in European

place

> > names all over the place (eg. Ismaning in Bavaria, Isala > IJsel
> in
> > Holland) I decide to look it up in Celtic languages.
> > I found in Welsh:
> > Isalmaenaidd "Dutch"
> > Isalmaeneg "Dutch language"
> > Isalmaenwr "Dutchman"
> >
> > Odd.
> [etc.]
>
> Not really: is- is 'low' as you correctly say, and the second part
> is Yr Almaen 'Germany', Almaeneg 'German' of obvious etymology.
> Dutch is a variant of Low German.

Pow! That was the end of that baloon. Damn!

> is-, OIr. ís 'down, sub-' (W. isnormal 'subnormal') is believed to
> reflect IE *pe:d-su 'at the feet', which is also the basis of
> Albanian për-posh 'down; under'.

To get at least something out of my expedition, let me propose that
Romance bass- "low" reflects the same. That might give us a hint
where to look for IE cognates of Latin 'mots populaires' (with -a-).

>Theoretically, Celtic *i:ssV can
> have older i: or e:, and the consonantism can be from *-st-,* -ts-,
> or *-t(s)t-.
>

To make matters worse the Irish dictionary I consulted says
contrariwise that 'is' is a contraction of 'i (in)' + article (in the
German style).


Torsten