Re: Uralic Loanwords in Germanic

> < *so:-ma: is certainly not "nearly certain" in the sense of being the accepted option, nor in the sense of being problemless (no regular process based on this etymology explains the final *-i, and Finland Proper is not particularly swampy).
>
> > > The stem is Suoma-, and several Finnish words ending in -i
> > > have stems with -a- (this is because of an old nom -y
>
> > No, words from *-Vj have stems with -i- (but may derive from a
> > root in -a, which I suppose you meant).
>
> That's not what I meant. The nom. of a-stems was -a-j,

There's no nominativ marker, ancient or modern.

> For example, all words ending in -mpi '-er' have stems in -mpa-.

IIRC that's been analyzed as analogy of the superlativ, or as a sound change *a > i word-finally in -CCV suffixes (perhaps extensible to all CC_# environments when in 3rd or later syllable.)

And at any rate, it's only a single morpheme. Any other examples?

> The analogy you suggest in suoma-lainen seems unlikely considering my explanation exists and explains more words (-aj > -ej > -e; analogy in most stems to all-a or all-e, -e > -i).

An assumption this strong certainly can explain a lot, but predicts nothing. What decides whether a word was analogized to the form without *-j or to one with it? What of duplicates where both variants occur as distinct roots? Why don't we see any actual roots that have an -a- stem against an -i nominativ? If it walks like a suffix and it talks like a suffix, you'll need more than an ad hoc appeal to analogy to argue for it not being a suffix.

> Also, some Finnish words in -i correspond to other Uralic words that are a-stems (in Hungarian, etc.);

Certainly the change *aj > ej > i exists. But you need to keep in mind there is an observable distinction between words with final -i that derive from *-V-j, and those that derive from original *-i (this can also be corroborated against other Uralic languages), and "Suomi" belongs in the latter declension class. Perhaps an example helps:
*kota-j > *kotej > koti "home", gen. *kota-j-n >> kodin
(note also retention of the original root in kota, kodan "hut"; Samic *koaté)
*käti > käsi "hand", gen. *käte-n > käden (Samic *kietë)

Even if we go with *sooma regardless, explanations such as loaning from a pre-Samic *saamaa << *sämä remain contesting possibilities.

> > > (corresponding to Old Japanese words in -e with compounds in
> > > -a-)).
> >
> > Are you bringing this up as a parallel or as some sort of a
> > Ural-Altaic scenario?
>
> Broader than that.

Oh, leave it hazy if you want.

> but since suoma-lainen means 'Finnlander' and suo-maa-lainen would mean 'fenlander', I'm not willing to accept coincidence.

Even if it's not, it doesn't mean those are correct etymologies: given "Finn" for northern barbarians in general (attested much before "Finland"), and a tribe "suomalaiset" who call fens "suo", there's a good motivation to then link the two, regardless of the actual etymologies.

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but that we have no i-variants of "fen" also supports the conclusion that the association of fens and Finns is a folk etymology.

Did I mention yet that while "suo" is the most general word for a swamp, "fen" is not? "Suomaalainen" would *not* literally translate as "fenlander", but "swamplander". Given that "fen" rather translates as "letto", perhaps you should be arguing for an identity of Latvians and historical Finns ;)

(I'd switch this to Uralica, but there's no option for anything like that from the www interface...)

John Vertical