From: alexandru_mg3
Message: 52276
Date: 2008-02-04
>Albanian shtrov& 'covered' < PAlb/Dacian? stra:-wa 'covered'
>
> --- Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:
>
> > On 2008-02-03 20:46, george knysh wrote:
> >
> > > The favourite interpretation of "strava" is that
> > it refers to some
> > > sort of foodfest (indeed some linguists thought
> > the word was Slavic).
> > > I wonder. The activities described by Jordanes
> > need not indicate a
> > > meal, but something else entirely. Any chance that
> > this ordanes
> > > "strava" is related to stra:va above?
> >
> > Slavic *sU-trava 'meal' can be ruled out definitely.
> > The yers were
> > certainly full vowels in the 5th century and would
> > not have been dropped
> > by any foreign borrowers.
> >
> > It can't be related to any of those *str(a)iB- words
> > just discussed,
> > since PGmc. *i, *ei, or *ai wouldn't be reflected as
> > anything resembling
> > "a" in Gothic. The word might be Hunnish (if
> > "Hunnish" means anything in
> > linguistic terms), but perhaps the most reasonable
> > etymology of <straua>
> > is a Gothic one, referring to the verb <straujan>
> > 'strew, cover' (Lat.
> > struo: is from the same root). What they covered the
> > tumulus with is
> > anyone's guess, any kind of ceremonial decoration
> > would fit the bill;
> > some interpreters suggest that it was a funeral
> > pyre.
> >
> > Piotr
>
> ****GK: Jordanes' text is not easy by any means. He is
> describing a series of ritual acts, allegedly
> performed by Huns only. He mentions (1)a silk tent on
> a plain, where Attila's body lay in state. He then
> mentions (2)a tumulus, which is NOT identical to the
> spot where Attila was eventually secretly buried.He
> finally mentions (3)the burial spot, Attila's three
> coffins (what that means I don't know), and various
> objects buried with the warlord. Now the "strava"
> ritual is connected with (2). The tumulus could have
> been some commemorative kurgan, either created for the
> occasion, or already there, and having royal/sacral
> connotation. We don't really know. What seems
> important to determine with respect to the "strava"
> ritual is the meaning of Jordanes' "commessatio
> ingens", which Mierow has translated as "intense
> revelling". What does "commessatio" actually mean? I
> have not found it in my Oxford Dictionary of Classical
> Latin, nor in my admittedly incomplete Dictionary of
> mediaeval Latin. But one on-line dictionary defines it
> as "eating together",i.e. we are back to some sort of
> wake or ritual common feast around a tumulus
> symbolizing the resting place of the dead monarch...
> What kind of "cover" (Gothic or Romance) could be
> involved? I've never heard of such a ritual. But a
> feast is another matter,were it not for the linguistic
> difficulties. Jordanes, a Romanized Goth was writing
> in 552, perhaps quoting Cassiodorus,perhaps someone
> else, perhaps speaking for himself. Might Torsten's
> query ("how do we know what transpired in a Gothic
> borrowing from Slavic?") provide an answer? "Cover"
> just doesn't seem to cut it, somehow, funeral pyre or
> whatever (or piles of swords on the mound)...Finally,
> is there any way "strava" could refer to some Turkic
> root? Somehow I doubt that too.****
>