Re: My version

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@...>
wrote:

> > > >
> > > > [...] [DGK]
> > > >
> > > > The form <ausula'> 'to listen
> > to' in the
> > > > dialects of Rieti and Teramo
> > > > appears to be a Sabinism, as opposed to
> > <ayosa'>
> > > > (from *adausa:re vel
> > > > sim.) in Naples and the Abruzze, which is an
> > Oscanism. I
> > > > would guess
> > > > that Sabine used the diminutive *ausula
> > 'ear' (cf.
> > > > Lat. <o:ric(u)la>)
> > > > but Oscan retained *ausis, with neither
> > rhotacizing -s-.
> > >
> > > So Spanish escuchar, auscultar, Italian ascoltare?
> > >
> > Those are from Latin <ausculta:re>; the second Sp.
> > form is obviously
> > a learned Latinism;
>
> True, but I was thinking that the Latin form was from P-Italic <

*auscula < *ausos (vel sim)

I suppose that might work; if it was a diminutive, we wouldn't have
to worry about *kwel- at all. To get <ausculta:re> as a
frequentative, we would need *auscultum, not *auscula:tum, as the
participle of the simple *auscula:re. That is not out of the
question, we have <domitum> from <doma:re> and a few others;
*auscolitum or *ausculitum could have been syncopated. This is
leading into an embarrassing wealth of hypotheses.

> > the It. form has regular dissimilation
> > of
> > au...u... to a...u... before the merger of /u/ with /o:/.
> > The Latin
> > verb is peculiar and probably a Sabinism; the difficulty is
> > that the
> > 2nd element *kwel- is not labialized.
>
> If not from *auscula, could it be a compound word < aus- +

cultura ??, referring to some ritualized form of medicine

Augh! Ear-candling! Seriously, I don't know whether <ausculta:re>
is based on an earlier Latin noun. Perhaps *auscultum 'a pricking up
of the ears'. But I think a Sabine protoform is required in any
case, otherwise we should expect *auri-. Anyhow, this is one of
those Latin words not restricted to the original P-Italic area.

> > I suspect that in
> > Proto-Italic
> > the zero-grade in a closed syllable *kwl.-to- lost the
> > labial
> > component and became simply *kl.-to- before the separation
> > into Q-
> > Italic and P-Italic; there is some parallel evidence from
> > the Umbrian
> > for 'cake' which I cannot reconstruct without my
> > notes. Old Sabine
> > *ausi-kolta:- 'to pay attention with one's
> > ears' vel sim. would have
> > syncopated the connecting vowel; a parallel formation in
> > Latin would
> > have rhotacized the -s- and would start with *auri-. I
> > suspect that
> > L. <aestuma:re> is a similar Sabinism originally
> > meaning 'to cut the
> > bronze' (in payment for something), hence 'to
> > assess the value', here
> > again a native Latin parallel would start with *aeri-.
>
> Now, would this have any bearing on the root of equal --could you

see it as the result of an act of weighing??

>

Hmm, <aequus> and the tribal name <Aequi>, <Aequicoli> have not to my
knowledge been satisfactorily explained, but I do not see how to tie
them in with <aes>. On the other hand Lehmann did write something
about how <aeger> could be related to <aes>, something about smiths
getting sick from the fumes. I'll have to look that one up.

DGK