Re: Alanic horseman

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Francesco Brighenti" <frabrig@...>
wrote:

>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "ualarauans" <ualarauans@> wrote:
>
> > Could someone please tell me what is the most likely

reconstruction

> > of the Alanic word for "horseman". Modern Ossetic has baræg and
> > bæx-dzhyn (lit. "one having a bæx" –- a horse, that is). I'm not

sure

> > these are inherited Iranian and not borrowed from some Caucasian
> > language.
>
> It seems to be the other way round, viz. it was most likely North
> Caucasian that borrowed words for horse, horseman and horse-riding
> from a set of Alanic (Scythian) horsemanship terms derived from

the

> Iranian verbal stem *ba:r- 'to ride (horseback)' -- see V.V.

Ivanov's

> discussion at
>
> http://www.humnet.ucla.edu/pies/pdfs/IESV/1/VVI_Horse.pdf
> (on pp. 84-85 of the pdf document)
>
> and S. Starostin's comments at
>
> http://tinyurl.com/2d272h

Aha!! So, the Northeast Iranian form was *ba:raka-... Now, if we
date the voicing of intervocal voiceless stops with the first
centuries CE (Abaev's idea, if I don't mistake), we get *ba:raga for
Alanic of the Migration period, right? And when were the final
vowels dropped I wonder?

> > And if you can tell me what the Hunnish word was, I'll be

enormously

> > grateful :)
>
> I just know of two possible Hunnic words for the horse, but not of
> words for its rider. Both are based on the linguistic analysis of
> Hunnic onomastic material proposed by O. Pritsak in _Harvard

Ukrainian

> Studies_ 6 (1982) at
>
> http://www.huri.harvard.edu/pdf/hus_volumes/vVI_n4_dec1982.pdf
>
> The two proposed Hunnic words for the horse are:
>
> 1) *donát, corresponding to the Turkic generic word for the horse
> yonat ~ yont/yond ~ yunt/yund etc. (see discussion on p. 437 of

the

> paper);
>
> 2) *xará-to:n 'black-clad', an elliptical designation for the

horse

> formed, in all probability, as a compound of the Turkic word qara-
> 'black' and the Saka loanword in Turkic, thauna (> *taun >
> to:n) 'garment, clothing' (see discussion on p. 437-38 of the

paper).

Then all we lack is the Hunnish word for "man" :=)
Any guesses (except "khun" properly)?

Thanks a lot, Francesco! You helped me greatly!