--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> At 3:53:38 PM on Saturday, September 13, 2008, Arnaud
> Fournet wrote:
>
> > By the way, as you are talking about Germanic homeland,
> > you can check in Starostin's databases the word "child",
> > Yeniseian zi-l < g^il
>
> You won't find either form in his Yenisseian etymology
> database at
>
<
http://starling.rinet.ru/cgi-bin/query.cgi?root=config&morpho=0&basename=\data\yenisey\yenet>.
Or
http://preview.tinyurl.com/574cgl to get directly to the entry,
which I would have written as *Z1l if I, like Arnaud, had more
confidence than Starostin in the vowel to reconstruct. (I'm afraid I
didn't realise that 'i-' was meant to be a vowel symbol.) 'z^_l
(vowel unclear)' is probably the best way to cite it. 'Vowel unclear'
actually makes the etymology look less weak, for then one can include
the possible Swedish and Danish cognates. If you insist on the vowel,
all you have for Germanic cognates is Gothic _qilþei_ 'womb'. English
_child_ is not a word for which one can confidently clain a
Proto-Germanic origin.
Richard.