Re: [tied] Thracian place-names

--- Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:

>
> That particular theory (Golab's, not mine) holds
> that "Borysthenes" was
> originally the name of the estuarine part of the
> river, and something
> like Danu-apira- referred to its course above the
> estuary (not just what
> we would refer to as the upper Dnieper today).

****GK: The second part of the hypothesis has to
overcome the "short a" problem. This does not exist if
one holds that the Slavs got the river name from the
Thrakoid population they assimilated in this area, and
with which they were immediate neighbours
earlier.*****

>
> A plausible Iranian etymology is certainly possibkle
> here, with Boru-
> being the Hellenised version of *vauru-/*voru- <
> *varu- < *wr.h1u-
> 'wide' (Av. vouru-), and -sthe:ne:s possibly of
> *sta:na- 'place, area,
> room' (Av. sta:na-): the place where the river flows
> wide.

*****GK: Stryzhak and Bilets'kyj mention this view
(op. cit., p. 14-15) but feel that the expected
Hellenized version should have been *ouru. Cf. A.O.
Bilets'kyj, "Borysthenes--Danapris--Dnipro", in
Pytannja toponimiky i onomastyky, Kyiv: Akademija Nauk
URSR 1962, pp.54-61. *****




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