From: tgpedersen
Message: 60115
Date: 2008-09-18
>Found in de Vries: Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch at the
>
>
>
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Joao S. Lopes" <josimo70@>
> wrote:
>
> > From a Brazilian dictionary of Italian surnames:
> > BRIGHENTI = regional variation of BRIGANTI
> > BRIGANTI = plural of BRIGANTE
> > BRIGANTE = < Latin brigantis (see Bergantino)
> > BERGANTINO = < Celtic briga "mount, hill"; brigantes [were]
> > mercenaries who have hidden themselves in the mountains, later
> > building Castrum Bragantini, the city Bergantino.
>
>
> Many thanks, Joao.
>
> You may recall I had pointed to this proposed etymology for the It.
> noun brigante in an earlier message:
>
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/60051
> > I have also seen an etymological attempt at connecting the It.
> > term brigante with Proto-Celtic *brig- 'hill' (from the same root
> > of the goddess-name Brigantia, see above), which would make of
> > the original briganti a troop of highlanders, but I think this is
> > the weakest among the hypotheses I have taken notice of.
>
> The fact is, that a derivation of brigante from the verb brigare
> seems almost inescapable. 'Brigante' looks, under all aspects, the
> regular present participle of 'brigare', being formed by adding the
> accusative/ablative ending of the Latin present participle, -nte(m)
> to the thematic root of the said (Vulgar Latin?) verb, briga-.
> If 'brigante' was formed on a Celtic loan word *brig- 'hill' (a
> noun), why is that it has this present-participial-looking ending?
> (In English, it would sound something like 'the hilling'.)
>
> As I already wrote, the problem is that the etymology of the It.
> verb brigare is opaque. Its earliest attested meaning is 'to deal,
> to frequent (s.o.), to meet in small groups, to intrigue (secret
> plans)', while the meaning 'to strife, fight, brawl, quarrel' is
> attested only (slightly) later. This makes it difficult to derive
> this verb from a posited Proto-Celtic root *bri:go- 'strength' as
> proposed, among others, by Calvert Watkins. On the contrary, the
> derivation of the It. noun briga 'strength, vigour' > 'strife,
> quarrel, controversy' > 'nuisance, harassment, difficult problem'
> from Proto-Celtic *bri:go- doesn't appear to be disputed.
>
> I am still wondering whether briga and brigare, though their
> semantics converged at a certain point in time, could not have had
> two different etymological origins.