Re: floor

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "stlatos" <stlatos@...> wrote:

>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@> wrote:
>
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@> wrote:
>
> > > Possibly borrowed from <Fortis> used effectively as a cognomen. I suspect that <malmutz> 'sly' was similarly borrowed from the cognomen <Balbus>, during the time when Late Latin /b/ was approximated by Old Basque /mb/, later reduced to /mm/ and then /m/.
> > > ***R The b/m dichotomy is common in Ibero-Romance
> >
> > Unlike some scholars, I do not regard this as a Whalenesque "optional soundlaw". I regard the Basque borrowings with /m/ from Latin /b/ as characterizing a particular temporal stratum. I provided some details in discussion with Tavi, who refuses to look at the REW.
> >
>
> Doesn't it make more sense that an alt. like:
>
> zakur = big dog , txakur = (little) dog Gip Bq;
>
> is the result of opt. dissim. of * ks.akur > ks.akur \ s.akur rather than a borrowing from an unknown l., then a later borrowing from the same l. after very few changes, and thus little time? Which language would it be, why would the meaning of changed (then or later), why would another borrowing occur when the borrowed word would so closely resemble a now-nativized word, etc.?

I never said that I thought these words were borrowed. I regard Basque <txakur'> as inherited from West Mediterranean. The only plausible cognates which I have seen are those cited by Hubschmid, namely Corsican <ghia'garo> 'hunting dog' and Sardinian <g^a'garu> 'id.'. These point to a WMed base *gjak- (perhaps 'hunting, chasing' vel sim.) which has taken different suffixes: *-urra in Vasconic, atonal *'-ara in Paleo-Corsican and Paleo-Sardinian (thematized in Latin/Romance). For the phonology, cf. Bq. <etxe>, <etxa-> 'house' from Celtic *tegja:, but <-tegi> 'storage place, proper place' (in some dialects extracted as a stand-alone <tegi> 'shed') from Celt. *-tege (e.g. Gaulish *su:tege 'pigsty' which has Romance reflexes).

As (e.g.) <txori> was regarded as the diminutive (properly hypocoristic) of <zori>, so has <zakur'> been formed in Basque as the augmentative of <txakur'>. These have largely displaced the old generic term for 'dog', namely <(h)or>, now quite rare apart from the compound <oralano> 'Great Dane, Dogge'.

> There's even a PIE possibility for origin in:
>
> * xYuL.-kW�+
> >>
> * xYuL-kW�+k�+ (dim)
> * xYuL-kWe+k�+
> * xYuL-kWe-k�+
> * xYuL-kWa-k�+
> * s.YuL-kWa-k�+
> * s.YkWu-La-k�+
> * s.Y... [etc.]
> * sku-La-k�+
> >
> sk�lax G;
>
> and so, * s.kulak+ >> ks.akul > ks.akur > ks.akur \ s.akur > etc.

Loose phonology allows many possibilities!

DGK