>>>> For instance, Latin <Nerva> appears in Greek as <Nérbas> and
>>>> <Nérouas> in (I think) the 1st century CE. At Pompeii
>>>> <veni> appears as <beni> and <valeat> as <baleat>.
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Tsalam ?t?ob
Could beni not be from *gwen- is osco-umbrian ?
Arnaud
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>>> So Germanic /w/ was adopted into Northern French,
>>> Lorraine and Champagne as /w/ and into the rest of
>>> Western Romance as /gw/ in two separate processes?
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Personally,
I would say that /w/ was borrowed as [w]
but
in some areas with a strong Germanic adstrate,
this was enough to become either /w/ or /v/.
in other areas, [w] is a vocalic component
so that a syllable like 0 + w + vowel
starts with nothing : g is the weakest thing close to w
to make a stable syllabe.
Arnaud
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Seems unnecessarily complicated, since borrowing of Gmc.
/w-/ as /gw-/ is the obvious interpretation of the written
evidence. (And /w-/ > /gw-/ is hardly unnatural.)
[...]
Brian
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