From: tgpedersen
Message: 57202
Date: 2008-04-13
> The cat itself might come from Africa, but looking for the word thereI was wondering what the last element of the ON ígul-köttr was Brian
> is a dead end. None of the three Coptic words for 'cat', including
> the one used in the Coptic version of the Epistle of Jeremiah,
> resembles <catta> at all. My best guess is that Latin <catta> in
> both its senses, 'certain Pannonian bird (the wagtail?)'
> and 'domestic cat', is borrowed from Messapic (or related Illyro-
> Japygian) *katta, a hypocoristic form of a compound whose first
> element *katt- is cognate with Lat. <quassus> 'shaken', and whose
> second (unidentifiable) element means 'tail' or 'rear end', the
> compound meaning 'having a shaken tail' or 'shaking its tail', much
> like Greek <ailouros> 'waving-tailed'. It is near my bedtime, so
> details of this hypothesis will follow later.