Re: [tied] "Niggers of India"

----- Original Message -----
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, December 15, 2005 1:45 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] "Niggers of India"


> Daniel J. Milton wrote:
>
> > Patrick, explain your interpretation of <niger> ("etym. dub." in
> > the references I have handy).
> > For a start, is there any reason to believe that the word
> > primarily referred to persons, dark or thin-haired? The adjective
> > seems to have gone with dark skies, woods, plants, etc. just as readily.
>
> It means 'black' or 'dusky, gloomy, mournful, unlucky, bad...', and
> almost always refers to "other things" rather than humans (except when
> used as a surname). It is often contrasted with <albus> or <candidus>
> (never with, say, <pilo:sus> or <villo:sus>) and treated as a synonym of
> <ater> or <umbro:sus>. As for its derivatives, see <nigror> 'blackness',
> <nigresco:> 'turn black, grow dark', etc. Surely, <nigrescentes dentes>
> means 'teeth going black', not *'teeth losing hair'.
>
> Piotr


***
Patrick:

PIE had words that properly (originally) meant 'black' (*mer-) or 'gray'
(*k^er-).

I was not suggesting that /niger/ meant 'hairless' or 'scantily haired' in
Latin - ever.

But rather that the term _originated_ as a designation for people
_incapable_ of growing a 'mane', loosely falling hair behind the head:
'locks', which was subsequently applied to black Africans, many of whom are
notable in this respect.

In PIE terms, a combination of *nei-, 'no' + *ghai-, '*hairy', abstracted
from *ghai-t-a:-/*ghai-s- (cf. Avestan gae:sa), 'fall of hair, posterior
locks'; then, -ró although it is possible that -*r, a very frequent final
formant for color adjectives, was directly added.

I would ask those expert in PIE if a theoretical **nighis-ró/**nighis-ré
could produce Latin /niger/?

I have speculated that a form like *ghair- should have existed in PIE
(Armenian jar may point in that direction [*g^hEri- from **ghHy-r-y-{?}];
and though Germanic *he:ram comes close, of course, it does not correspond
initially.

Of course, it might be innocent fun to notice the *coincidental* Egyptian
nHsy, 'Nubian'; and H3, 'back of head'.

***