--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "stlatos" <stlatos@...> wrote:
> [re: http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/59599%5d
> Obviously there were no variants [the reference here is to
> M. Witzel's proposed two variant forms of a supposed prehistoric
> Central Asian or Near Eastern proto-word for 'speckled animal,
> panther/leopard', viz., **pard- or **parth- vs. **pand(h)-], only
> one language (at least) with metathesis (borrowed into G panthe:r,
> Skt pun.d.ari:ka-).
Skt. pun.d.ari:ka- in the Rgveda means 'lotus flower', and only
later (in the Mahabharata) it is used as the name of a Naga
(serpent) king. Later Skt. lexicons also give the gloss 'tiger'. In
his Old Indo-Aryan etymological dictionary, M. Mayrhofer expresses
strong doubts about the nineteenth-century etymology which derives
Gk. panthe:r- from Skt pun.d.ari:ka-. Instead, he considers an
eastern origin for the Gk. word and hypothesizes a proto-form
*parthe:r- with connection to pardalis- (cf. Witzel's **pard-
/**parth- variants), and the formation of a folk etymology resulting
into panthe:r- (see Beekes at
http://tinyurl.com/5ow6js ).
In my previous message in this thread I forgot to mention that the
Hittite word for 'panther/leopard', pars^(a)na-, probably derives
from the same root. Cf. also Hattic ha-prassun 'of the leopard',
which, according to Gamkrelidze & Ivanov (p. 500ff.), would reflect
a non-IE Near Eastern noun root *prass- 'leopard' borrowed into
Hittite as pars^(a)na-. Other scholars have reconstructed the
Hittite word as *pers-no- < PIE *p(o)rs-neh2- 'speckled', with this
presupposing that the root in question is purely IE.
Regards,
Francesco