--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@...>
wrote:
> I seem to remember reading that the term [arya] was also used by
> the Tokharians -- but it may have borrowed from Iranian. I think
> I read it in the context of arya/orya meaning "slave" in some
> Uralic language -- the idea being they got it from Tokharian,
> which according to what I read is the IE language most affected by
> interaction with Uralic.
As far as I know, the Finnish word for 'slave' (presumably captured
in raids into southern territories), orja-, is considered one of the
many loan words from *Proto-Indo-Iranian* (not from Proto-Tocharian)
into Uralic which would indicate that:
1. the early habitat of Proto-Indo-Iranians was in an area close to
the Central Asian steppe-taiga interface, e.g., near the Urals;
2. these Proto-Indo-Iranians called themselves *arya-.
Other Uralic loan words from Proto-Indo-Iranian *arya- are Pre-Saami
*orja- > oar'ji-'southwest', a%r'jel- 'southerner'; Estonian ori-,
Udmurt var-, Komi ver-, Mordovian ur/a"- 'slave'.
The case is different with Tocharian languages, which borrowed the
term a:rya- from Indo-Aryan, most likely via some Iranian language.
Thus, we have Tocharian B a:rs'e- (prob.) 'monk', Tocharian A a:rs'i-
(prob.) 'ordained beggar monk' (as a noun) and `Aryan' (as an
adjective relating to Buddhist religiousness). The noun a:rs'i- has
occasionally been claimed to be an indigenous designation of the
Tocharian A language or an ethnic self-designation of its speakers,
but this interpretation does not seem to be correct. H.W. Bailey,
for instance, rejects it. Cf. the entry in D.Q. Adams' Tocharian B
dictionary at
http://tinyurl.com/38xhgf
Hope this helps,
Francesco