[*tum-l-]
> >bis hin zu rum. tumba 'Purzelbaum'.
>
> Hehe (and neo-Greek at the same time.)
>
> >Die Herkunft der Sippe ist dunkel, doch
> >vermute ich einen Zusammenhang mit aind. tumala- und lat.
> >tumultus 'Lärm' (vgl. mhd. tumel und getümel 'Lärm,
> >Getümmel'). Den Bedeutungskern bilden Tanz- und
> >Akrobatenkünste, und mit ihnen, und das heißt mit dem
> >Gauklerwesen, werden die Wörter sich, von einem
> >unbekannten Zentrum aus, über die Völker und Sprachen
> >ausgebreitet haben (vgl. Gamillscheg, Etym. Wb. d. frz.
> >Sprache 2, 852).
>
> Perhaps, in connection to drum/tamburà/tambourine,
> Rum. toba, Hung. dob; perhaps these too: Hung. doromb,
> Rum. drâmba "Jew's harp".
>
As for the infixed(?) -r-,
Vennemann
Etymology and Phonotactics, in
Europa Vasconica - Europa Semitica, p. 695-697
"
20.2.7.2. Gm. Strunk, Lat. truncus, Bq. unkhü 'tree stock, trunk'
Gm. Strunk 'stalk, stem, tree stump', according to Kluge/Seebold
(1995), is only attested in Late Middle High German (strunc) and in
Dutch (stronk). Outside Germania the only comparison ("vielleicht") is
Lith. strùngas 'cut back, trimmed'. "Weitere Herkunft unklar." Finn.
runko 'stem' is a Germanic loan-word.
For Lat. truncus, -i: m. 'stem, trunk (of a tree, of a human body),
block, blockhead', related words can only be found in West
Indo-European languages (cf. Walde/Hofmann 1982: s.v.); and
considering that in Latin there is an adjective truncus, -a, -um
'mutilated, stripped of one's branches, dismembered' (also a verb
truncare 'to maim, mutilate, cut off which is, however, of more recent
attestation than the nominal forms and thus probably not their base),
they do not all fit well semantically: Lith. trenkiù, treñkti 'heftig,
dröhnend stoßen' ('to push violently, resoundingly'), î-tranka
'Anstoß' ('push'), trankùs 'holprig' ('rough, bumpy'), trañksmas
'Gedränge' ('throng, thronging'), trìnkis 'Anstoß' ('push'), trìnka
'Haublock' ('chopping block'), OPruss. pertrinktan 'verstockt'
('obdurate, stubborn'), Welsh trwch 'verstümmelt' ('maimed,
mutilated'); further, "mit vokalischer und Auslautvariation", Lith.
strungas 'gestutzt' ('cut back, trimmed'), striùgas 'kurz' ('short'),
striubas 'kurz'. Possible connections with Gm. Strunk and with the
family of Gm. dringen 'to penetrate', drängen 'to push, press, throng'
are mentioned; but Kluge/Seebold (1995: s.vv.) only connect with Gm.
dringen/drängen Lith. treñkti, not Lat. truncus. Ernout/Meillet (1985:
s.v. truncus) simply state, "Étymologie incertaine. Peut-être a
rapprocher du groupe de trux ['wild, rough, ferocious, grim, stern'].
Ou bien cf. gr. trúo: ['to rub down, wear out'], etc.? Le lit. trenkiù
'je heurte' est loin pour le sens."
This group to me does not give the impression of a bona fide
Indo-European word family. In particular, Gm. Strunk and Lat. truncus
are suspicious; on one hand they are semantically and phonologically
too close to be separated etymologically, on the other hand the
identical final root plosives are in violation of Grimm's Law. Such
partial formal mismatch is in other instances taken as a sign of
borrowing. One possibility would therefore be mutual borrowing among
the West Indo-European languages, perhaps with influences from similar
words, such as the family of Gm. Stumpf, Engl. stump, also Gm. Strumpf
'sock', which originally meant 'tree trunk' (cf. Kluge/Seebold: 1995:
s.v.), and Gm. stumpf 'blunt, dull' (originally 'maimed, mutilated',
cf. Kluge/Seebold 1995: s.v.), and Gm. Stubben, a Low German loan.
Another possibility is that the entire complex was borrowed from
another language. In view of the limitation of the complex to the West
Indo-European languages a likely source would be Vasconic.
If we assume PVasc. +trunku- or +strunku- 'stem, trunk of a tree
(etc.)', application of the sound changes leading to the phonotactic
restrictions of word-initial syllable heads in Basque would yield unku
in the Eastern dialects, ungu in the Central and Western dialects
(Michelena 1977: § 18.9) First, the word-initial cluster +(s)tr- has
to be reduced to the least consonantal [378 member (cf. section 20.2.6
above), which is r-; second, word initial r- in the resulting +runku-
has to drop (cf. section 20.2.2.1 above). It so happens that de Azkue
(1984) lists a word unkhü '[Span.] tronco de arbol, [Fr.] tronce ou
tronc d'arbre', i.e. 'trunk of a tree', but only for the Zuberoan
(Souletin) dialect of the French Basque country. I do not know an
etymology for this Basque word. Surely Löpelmann's (1968: s.v.)
identification of it as borrowed Lat. truncus is problematical.
Word-initial clusters of voiceless plosive plus r are, to my
knowledge, never simply deleted in the loan transfer but treated in
one of the following ways: (1) In the earlier history of Basque, such
Pr- clusters are adapted by anaptyxis, as shown in section 20.1 above,
while the plosive itself is often voiced or deleted, so that the
result would be likely to be durunkhü or urunkhü. (2) In the more
recent history of Basque, such Pr- clusters are preserved, and indeed
there is, in the Basque Country of France, trontzo, with a variant
form truntzo, meaning 'stem, stump, log, block', which is borrowed
Prov. trons (cf. Fr. tronce), from a variant +trunceus of Lat. truncus
that is rccon-structible on the evidence of the Romance words (cf.
also Cat. tronch, Span. tronzo, Port. troncho 'mutilated, cut back,
trimmed'). Perhaps then Eastern Bq. unkhü is indeed the native remnant
of an old Vasconic word which was borrowed in prehistoric times into
the West Indo-European contact languages and later reborrowed from the
descendants of one of these, the Romance languages, into the one
remaining Vasconic language, Basque.
"
Torsten