On 2008-12-06 00:37, tgpedersen wrote:
> You forgot 'ever' (of course of different origin)?
Not entirely different. Practically all writers on the subject derive OE
(n)æ:fre in one way or another from PGmc. *aiw- < *h2aiw-. If Anatoly
Liberman's analysis (a late comp. of <a:, a:wa> 'always, ever') is
correct, the -r- comes from the *z of the comparative suffix *-izan-
(incidentally, it seems to me the variant <a:wa> contains two *aiwa-'s =
'ever-ever'). The etymology is surely imaginative and thought-provoking,
like most of Liberman's ideas, and explains the strangely late
attestation of <æ:fre>. Still, I wouldn't say that it is definitely
superior to the older etymology, æ:fre < *æ:-feore (*aiwi- plus the
dat.sg. of <feorh> 'life'), a compound corresponding to the
well-attested phrase <a: to: feore> 'for evermore' (also <a:wa to:
feore> and even <æ:fre to feore>). If the second etymology is correct,
the *r is part of the noun feorh < *ferxWu- 'life', not a suffix at all.
Piotr