Re: [tied] Re: root *pVs- for cat

At 10:18:08 AM on Friday, July 20, 2007, tgpedersen wrote:

>>> You seem to have left out a number of non-foreign pairs
>>> of items in p-/b- in McBain:

[...]

>>> babag "tassle" / pab "shag, refuse of flax"

>> It's distinctly disingenuous to call this non-foreign
>> when you've read the <pab> entry in McBain. <Babag> is a
>> diminutive of <bab>, which may be from ME; <pab> is from
>> EIr <pop(p)> 'a shoot, a tendril (of a plant), also
>> <pap>, which may be from Latin.

> This is McBain's pab-entry:
> "
> pab, shag, refuse of flax, woolly hair, and (M'A.) tassel
> (= bab), M. Ir. papp, popp, sprig, tuft, E. Ir. popp,
> bunch, which Stokes refers to a Celtic *bobbú-,
> *bhobh-nú-, from *bhobh, *bhabh, Lat. faba, bean, Gr.
> pomphós, blister, pémpiks, bubble, Lettic bamba, ball, I.
> E. bhembho-, inflate. Eng. bob, cluster, bunch, appears in
> the 14th century, and Sc. has bob, bab correspondingly ;
> the Gadelic and Eng. are clearly connected, but which
> borrowed it is hard to say. The meaning of pab as "shag,
> flax refuse" appears in the Sc. pab, pob. Borrowing from
> Lat. papula, pimple, root pap, swell, has been suggested.
> "

Precisely: McBain explicitly notes the possibility of ME,
MScots, or Latin origin. (My comment on EIr <pop(p)> is
based on the DIL.) Therefore it is at least disingenuous
(and I would say downright dishonest) to offer <babag> and
<pab> without qualification as 'non-foreign' items when
citing only McBain.

After reading the rest of your post, it occurred to me to
wonder whether 'non-foreign' was an error for 'non-native',
but that doesn't seem to help, since some of your examples
aren't clearly non-native.

> Let's first reiterate our positions:
> I think the Celtic p-/b-words are borrowed from some
> substrate language. You think they, if borrowed, are
> borrowed from a classical language (loans in p- from
> English can only be indirect, since they are foreign in
> Germanic too).

I've not taken a position; I've simply addressed the
shortcomings of most of your evidence. Oh, yes, I also
agreed with someone -- Rick, if I remember correctly -- that
the apparently greater frequency of examples in Sc.Gael.
than in Irish could well be due to the Sc.Gael. realization
of /b d g/ as unaspirated [p t k].

[...]

>> McBain also notes that Thurneysen took the Sc.Ga[e]l.
>> word to be a borrowing from French.

> I am not aware of a Latin pedigree for that word.

That's odd, since McBain gives the Latin pedigree suggested
by Thurneysen.

> If it exists in French, Sc. and Sc.Gael. it must be of
> NWBlock or similar origin.

If it's a borrowing from French in Scots and Sc.Gael., its
presence in Scots and Sc.Gael. tells you nothing about its
provenance.

[...]

>>> biorraid/pioraid "hat, cap"

>> McBain notes that this is from English <biretta>, from
>> Late Latin <birretum>; the DIL s.v. <birrét> makes it a
>> Latin or Romance loanword. In any case it's clearly not
>> native.

And therefore your claim that it is 'non-foreign' in
Sc.Gael. is false.

> Ernout-Meillet:
> "
> birrus, -ï (byrrus) m. (et birrum Gloss.): capote à
> capuchon, en tissu raide et à poils longs, en usage dans
> toutes les classes sous les derniers empereurs. Le grec a
> aussi bírros. Sans doute mot d'emprunt; cf. Hesych. bérros
> beíron dasú, birroks: dasú Makedónes; ou irl. -berr, gall.
> byrr "court", qui irait assez avec la définition de CGL V
> 410,80 byrrus cuculla breuis; cf. Thurneysen, Fetschr.
> Kuhn, 8a. M.L. 1117a. Sans rapport sans doute avec birrus
> "roux", doublet de burrus
> "
> It's clearly not native in Latin either.

So what? Irrespective of the details of transmission, EIr
<birrét>, Irish <bairéad> (also <birréad> and Donegal
<bearád>), Sc.Gael. <biorraid> and <pioraid>, English
<biretta>, etc. are all from late Lat. <birretum>, from
<birrus> 'a hooded cloak'. The b-/p- alternation in
Sc.Gael. is pretty clearly a Sc.Gael. innovation, whatever
the source of Lat. <birrus> (which may in fact be Celtic).

[...]

>>> brosnaich/prosnaich "incite"

>> From EIr <brostaid> 'urges, incites, stirs up', which
>> according to the DIL is a loan from ON.

> Which ON word?

Had I known, I'd have said; the reference is to O'Rahilly,
Ériu, xiii, 169.

Brian