Re: Neigh

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen" <tgpedersen@> wrote:
> >
> >
> > I came across this mess
> >
> > http://www.woxikon.com/swe/gn%E4gga.php
> > French hennir
> > Dutch hinniken
> > Italian nitrire
> > Swedish gnägga
> > DEO:
> > No. kneggja
> > Icel. hneggja
> > OE hnægan
> > Engl. neigh
> > and (?)
> > Spanish, Portuguese relinchar (? < *-ninch-)
> >
> >
> > Is there any way to connect them?
> >

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "jonatas9" <jonatas9@...> wrote:
>
> Latin has both hinnio - neigh, whinny, which gives you French (&
> Spanish/Port - through a diminutive formation - hinnitulare
> (although Portuguese also has rincho - neigh, whinny - which could
> have developed from relincho, but seems more likely to me to have
> derived from hinnitum
> and nitrio - whining, yelping of dogs - which gives you Italian.
>
>
> Pokorny has a one-line reference to Walde-Hoffmann's Latin
> etymological dictionary on p. 301 - for hinnus mule - also cited as
> linked to Gk ginnos.

Thank you for the information. Now I am confused at higher level.

Ernout-Meillet:
'hinnio:, -i:s, -i:re: hennir. Ancien, M.L.4136.
Dérivés et composés:
hinnitus,-u:s m.;
adhinnio:;
hinnitat: khremetízei (Gloss.);
hinni:bundus, -bilis (tardif).
L'aspiration de hinniō a sans doute été transportée dans hinnus,
emprunt au gr. gínnos, ínnos "mule", produit d'un mulet et d'une
jument (cf. Plin. HN 8,174), et ses diminutifs
hinnulus (M.L.4138a), hinnuleus (confondu avec inuleus), cf. Varr.,
L.L.9,38.
Certaines formes romanes supposent hinnitula:re, M.L.4138.'

Well, yes, if we suppose that the forms are loaned directly from Latin.

The whole series of words with alternants in Germanic in kn-, hn-,
gn-, sn- (gnaw/nag/snag, nit/Da. gnide) sticks out and needs some
systematization.

Venneman proposed Fr. canif, Eng knife as Vasconian.


Torsten