I'd risk to guess that Amphitrite, Poseidon's wife, has links to Ugaritic 'Ttrt (Phoenician As^tart), that was depicted as the wife of river/sea-god Yam, and it's not impossible that Aphrodite's name had the same origins (although Egyptian Wadjet cannot be ignored).
***R If so, then my guess is that it would seem to be from *Amphi-Astarte(Ttrt) with *amphi either as a qualifier or a folk etymology for some Semitic qualifier
A shift Proto-Semitic *T > Greek *ph : plausible? Another examples?
PS *Tin- "two" could be a Greek equivalent *phin-, for example; PS * Tawr- "bull", something like *phaur-, pho(:)r- .
Are
Arabian Tuban (thuban) "dragon, snake" and Typhon cognates?
JS Lopes
De: stlatos <stlatos@...>
Para: cybalist@yahoogroups.com
Enviadas: Quinta-feira, 23 de Setembro de 2010 4:32:18
Assunto: Res: Res: Res: [tied] Re: 'dyeus'
--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Joao S. Lopes" <josimo70@...> wrote:
>
> Aphrodite has, in fact, many
> common traits to PIE Dawn-goddess. I think there's some fading solar traits, of
> Semitic origin (cf. Ugaritic Shapash, torch-bearing messenger of gods) in
> Hekate, Iris and Hestia.
> What we know about Dione is so poor that it's hard to speculate much more...
>
Although some mixing with non-Greek goddesses is possible, it's clear that Amphitrí:te: = Aphrodí:te: (a goddess of the sea < PIE goddess of a river / fertility).
If Dió:ne: = Divona = Ju:no: / Hé:ra: (and I see no reason why not) then < PIE goddess of the moon.