Re: Latin re:ne:s 'kidneys'

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

>
> --- On Fri, 6/19/09, dgkilday57 <dgkilday57@...> wrote:
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> --- In cybalist@... s.com, Octavià Alexandre <oalexandre@ ...> wrote:
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> > --- In cybalist@... s.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@ > wrote:
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> > > --- In cybalist@... s.com, Octavià Alexandre oalexandre@
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> > wrote:
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> > > > This is why I regard *sreneh2/4- 'hip' as more adequate to explain
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> > > > the Latin word. Futhermore, Basque has errain, errein- 'kidneys'
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> > (with
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> > > > protetic e- because Basque doesn't allow for rhotics at
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> > > > word-initial) from a lost IE language (Italoid aka IE-Ligurian) .
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> > > > Perhaps the liquid *s- was simply dropped. In that case, the root
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> > should
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> > > > be *(s)reneH2/4- . It still seems to me the most likely etymology for
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> > > > Latin re:ne:s.
>

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>
> > > Why would Ligurian *rena: lengthen its stem-vowel and become an
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> > /i/-stem (gen. pl. <re:nium> several times in Plin.) upon borrowing by
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> > Latin? What parallels do you have for the semantic transition 'hip' >
>
> > 'kidney'?
>

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> > IE *sre:neH2/4- (with long /e:/, sorry for the misquotation) is
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> > reflected in Iranian (Avestan ra:na- 'the outer part of the leg, thigh',
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> > Persian ra:n 'thigh') and Baltic (Lithuanian stre:na 'loin, hip, leg ',
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> > pl. stre:no:s 'both hips, both thighs; cross, lumbar, hip area, the
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> > cross, (for horses) croup, crupper; (dialectal) hip or sacrum, back, or
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> > dorsal fin').
>

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>
> All right, no problem with the ROOT-vowel (which I misnamed). But the words above all refer to skeletal/structural parts, not internal organs.
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> > The Basque forms are errain 'kidneys, loins', errein-ezur 'sacrum' (a
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> > compound with ezur 'bone').
>
> If Latin <re:ne:s> had been borrowed into Basque, would we expect *errene? Is remodeling into <errain> possible by analogy with some other lexeme? If your Ligurian *re:na: had been borrowed into Basque at an earlier date, is there evidence that it could have produced <errain> without remodeling?
>

The problem with *errene and *rena is that Basque tends to swallow /-n-/. Something needs to account for the /ñ/ of <errain> /errañ/ instead of expected *errei. Would an intermediate *errenese > *errense work?

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I'm not sure, being a newcomer to Basque phonology. I suppose such a form could have arisen from a Latin derivative *re:ne:(n)sis. I don't follow Octavia's objection about Latin /a/. Larry cites Bq. <lege> 'law', <errege> 'king' from Lat. <le:gem>, <re:gem> so it appears that Lat. /e:/ in root-syllables does produce Bq. /e/ in loans. Given Bq. <ahate> 'duck' from Lat. <anatem>, I would expect *errehe from <re:ne:s>, then *errei. One possibility for getting <errain> is crossing *errehe or *errei with <uztain> 'crupper, hindquarters' (one of several variants) from Lat. *postelinam, in which the ending was lost before /n/ could be reduced, and /r/ from /l/ between the vowels was lost. Another possibility, I suppose, is that Basque borrowed some derivative like *re:na:linam which led to *erreharin(a) vel sim., then *errain. Still another would be a compound formed within Basque shortly after borrowing <re:ne:s>. As a newcomer, I'm in no position to assess any of these. At any rate, if <errain> comes from a borrowing at all, it makes more sense to me to get it by some means from <re:ne:s>, rather than an otherwise unknown Ligurian word (and so far Octavia has not given evidence for Lig. *r- < PIE *sr-).

DGK