--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@...>
wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> Although Etruscan had no voiced stops, or at least its
> alphabet did not, there are Latin words with voiced
> stops that purportedly came from Etruscan. Off the top
> of my head, I can think of balteus, the source of
> English belt. Would these words have been more likely
> to have originally been aspirated or non-aspirated
> stops in Etruscan or would it have been impossible to tell?
<balteus> is a bad example because the ancients oscillated between
Etruscan and Sabine in assigning it. In my opinion <barginna> and
<balatro> are probably of Etruscan origin, <batillum> possibly. But
the initial Etruscan sound here was /w/, which we transcribe <v>. In
some dialects of Late Etruscan and Tuscan Latin, the approximant closed
down to the voiced fricative [B] in initial position, represented as
Latin <b>, while ordinary Latin still had [w]. Thus while Volaterrae
(Etr. Velathri) is still Volterra, Volsinii Novi (Etr. Velznal) has
become Bolsena, Vettona Bettona, and Visens Bisenzio. A stream in the
Arno valley is called Biesina, from Etr. *Vlesina 'Vlesi's creek'. And
a Latin inscription from Etruria, of the 1st cent. BCE, has Baleria for
Valeria.
In recent Etruscan, there is no doubt that intervocalic simple stops
had voiced allophones; we have Lat. Pabassa beside Etr. Papas^a, Grebo
beside Crepu, Spedo beside Spitu, Gargossa for Carcus^a, etc. Lat.
<agaso> 'donkey-driver, groom, lackey' is best understood as a recent
loan from Etr. *acasu 'one who brings across' (the perfective
<acasce> 'brought across' is attested). In archaic Etruscan, however,
these stops were apparently unvoiced. Lat. <alapa> 'slap on the ear;
paddle of a mill-wheel' is best understood as an archaic loan from Etr.
*alapa 'palm of the hand'; we have recent derivatives <alpan>, <alp(a)
nu> rendered 'libens, willingly', i.e. 'with palms out'.
None of this is likely to help us with PIE voiced aspirates, however.
Douglas G. Kilday