On 2008-10-30 08:26, Anatoly Guzaev wrote:
> Hello to everyone!
> I am the new one here and I want to thank you for allowing me to join
> your group.
>
> Maybe this link could be of some help:
> http://www.encyclopediaofukraine.com/pages/M/O/Mokosh.htm
Thanks for the link, Anatoly, but the "mati kota" etymology is
nonsensical. There's no way of deriving anything like <mokos^I> from the
'mother' and 'cat' words (unless the Proto-Slavs already used syllabic
abbreviations like "kolkhoz":)).
The same, incidentally, goes for the association with <kos^> 'carriage'.
With this meaning, the word is a modern loan from French, cf. Eng.
coach. The name of the vehicle ultimately derives from the Hungarian
town of Kocs, where heavy carriages were manufactured. In the meaning
'military camp' it's a borrowing from Turkic. Only the meaning 'woven
basket' is native Slavic. But even so, anyone who'd like to analyse
Mokosh as "mo-kosh" would be obliged to explain the meaning of "mo-".
Seriously, though Mokosh seems to be an authentic deity, we know
precious little about her functions. Based on the folkloristic material
referring to <Mokos^a>, associations with sheep-shearing, spinning and
textile preparation have been proposed -- which would presumably make
her a popular household spirit rather than one of the chief gods in the
Slavic "pantheon" (a questionable notion in first place). There is no
solid basis for connecting Mokosh with fertility of good fortune, let
alone identifying her with one of the representations on the Zbruch idol
(as Rybakov did with much imagination and nothing tangible to back it
up). With so little information, any etymology must be considered
tentative. A connection with the root *mok- as in *mokrU 'wet',
*moknoNti 'get wet' and *moky/*mokUve 'wetness, wet ground' (with some
Baltic cognates) is formally possible but also uncertain.
Piotr