Re[2]: [tied] Gemination in Celtic

At 9:52:24 PM on Saturday, March 29, 2008, Anders R.
Joergensen wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "fournet.arnaud"
> <fournet.arnaud@...> wrote:

[...]

>> lu?k "hiccup"
>> Gaelic aileag
>> Greek lug-mos

> Some additional details would be helpful in figuring out
> what you mean. Is your Gaelic _aileag_ taken from
> MacBain's etymological dictionary? Unfortunately, I don't
> have LEIA and DIL here with me, so I can't check earlier
> attestations and the possible etymology. Anyway, the word
> has final /-g/, so I'm not sure I see the relevance.

MacBain identifies <aileag> with OIr <fail>; the DIL has
both <fail> and a diminutive <faileóc>, which I assume
matches <aileag>; the citation is for <faileog> from Peter
O'Connell. Dwelly says that <aileag> is always preceded by
the definite article; my (inexpert) conjecture is that as a
result the /f/ was almost always lenited and eventually
disappeared. At any rate, Arnaud appears to have
mis-segmented <aileag> rather badly.

By the way, DIL is now online, at <http://www.dil.ie/>.

Brian