Re: Afro-Asiatic substrate (re "folk" "polk" "pulkas")

--- On Mon, 7/27/09, tgpedersen <tgpedersen@...> wrote:

> Vennemann gave a convincing Semitic etymology for 'folk'
> http://tech. groups.yahoo. com/group/ cybalist/ message/48772
> http://tech. groups.yahoo. com/group/ cybalist/ message/48897
>
> GK: There are attested presences of this term in three language
> groups: Germanic, Slavic, and Baltic (nothing in Iranic?).

Not AFAIK.

> Now if it came from Semitic to all three, what is the time line of
> the borrowing?

Time of the Sea Peoples in Egypt. Bronze Age.

****GK: I don't suppose there is any connection between the Gr "pelekus" and the Egyptian designation of the Philistines ("Peleset")(with the latter being some sort of satemized variant: is the Hebrew link "Plishtim" totally secure or just a folk version?). The time frame would be adequate enough, and the archaeological evidence plausible (since migrating people of the Zrubna right bank steppe area culture of Ukraine participated in the "peoples of the sea" invasion along with more Western elements). But if so why would it be the "k" form which appeared in Balto-Slavic (unless there was a later secondary borrowing). Probably an incorrect hookup but very tempting esp. in view of later Scythian connections with Ashkelon and their "viper woman" + Targitaus myths which all have clear links to the middle east.*****

> On the other hand if the Slavic and Baltic terms are borrowings
> from Germanic, this would imply a time before the Grimm shift.

Actually, most traditional treatments of traditional loans from Germanic to Baltic Finnic presupposes a reversing of Grimm in the process, probably because Grimm was once placed very early. Most linguists now place the Grimm shift around the begin of CE, so do I, seeing it as caused by contact with an Iranian language (Ossetic has something similar). But since I'm beginning an Umwertung aller Werte anyway, I'll get this straight too: it was loaned from Semitic into the ar-/ur- language.

*****GK: As "plg" (as Piotr implies?) with the "g" later changing to a "k"?****