--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:
>
> W dniu 2011-10-24 00:12, george knysh pisze:
>
> > Would that root also be traceable in any Indo-Iranian speech? Given PEI
> > *ken-
>
> Possibly the root of PIIr. *kani-Han- 'young', cf. Gk. kainós 'new'.
Burrow, in "A note on the Indo-Iranian root <kan-> 'small' and on the etymology of Latin <canis> 'dog'" (TrPhS 81:155-64, 1983), rejects the assignment of Sanskrit <kanÃ:nas> 'young, youthful' and related words to Pokorny's *ken-(3) 'frisch hervorkommen' usw. (IEW 563), under which we find Greek <kainós> 'new, fresh'. Noting that Skt. <káni:yas-> and <kánis.t.ha-> mean 'younger' and 'youngest' only when referring to a brother, son, or the like, otherwise 'smaller, less' and 'smallest, least', Burrow deduces that the original sense of In-Ir *kan- was 'small', not 'young'. This is reinforced by Skt. <kanÃ:nika:>, <kánis.t.ha:>, <kanÃs.t.hika:> 'little finger' and Khotanese <kanaiska-> 'id.' Obviously the little finger is no younger than its handmates, only smaller.
Since Burrow has no problem with Proto-Indo-European */a/, he extends *kan- 'small' back to PIE and derives from it Middle Irish <cana>, <cano> 'wolf-cub', Welsh <cenau> 'wolf-cub, dog-whelp', Latin <canis> 'dog' (on the theory, earlier 'whelp'), the first element of Maeonian <Kandaúle:s> 'Dog-Strangler' (epithet of Hermes, Hipponax fr. 3 Masson), and Slavic <konI> 'horse' (on the theory, earlier 'foal'). The semantics are not difficult, with Umbrian <katel> 'dog' against Lat. <catulus> 'young animal, whelp' providing an illustration, but for those of us who lean toward Lubotsky in avoiding PIE */a/, the phonology and morphology pose a challenge. In prevocalic zero-grade, PIE *ken- should yield *kn.nV- by Sievers-Edgerton, whence *kanV- in In-Ir and Italic. (The latter is argued from the P-Italic negative prefix <an->, apparently generalized from prevocalic position while Q-Italic extracted preconsonantal *en-, Lat. <in->.) I will leave the Celtic words aside, since I no longer have access to recent etymological material. If the Maeonian epithet is related, presumably it underwent syncope of the first element's stem-vowel, for whatever that may be worth.
Varro cites <cane:s> as the old nom. sg. of <canis>, and the gen. pl. <canum> shows that it is not an /i/-stem. Latin has several other nouns of this type for which Burrow, following Pedersen, assumes elision of -e:- in the weak cases. He cites <pántha:s> m. 'way, road', gen. sg. <pathás>, as the Sanskrit parallel, a word with its own difficulties. The corresponding Avestan forms are nom. sg. <panta:>, gen. sg. <paþo:>, and Burrow correctly notes that the aspiration originated in the weak cases and spread to the strong ones in Sanskrit, but the old distinction is preserved in Avestan with /þ/ reflecting In-Ir */tH/. However, his explanation that elision of the suffix *-e:- is responsible for this aspiration is untenable. Instead, */h2/ following */t/ in the root should be invoked. From PIE *steh2- 'to place, stand, establish' we have Skt. <tÃs.t.hati> 'he stands', <ástha:t> 'he stood', etc., with aspiration acquired from the participle <sthitás> (*sth2.tós, Grk. <statós>) and generalized throughout the conjugation of the verb. Moreover, the other strong forms of <pántha:s> (nom. pl. <pántha:nas>, acc. sg. <pántha:nam>) are morphological suppletions modelled after /o:n/-stems like <grá:va:> m. 'stone'. The weak cases apparently belong to a laryngeal-final root-noun from the root *penth2- 'to find the way, make the way, travel' (cited by most simply as *pent-). These are phonetically regular, e.g. gen. sg. *pn.th2ós > Skt. <pathós>, inst. pl. *pn.th2.´bHis > Skt. <pathÃbhis>. The nom. sg. *pn.tó:h2 would have lost the final laryngeal (yielding Skt. *patá:, had this form survived), resembling an /o:n/-stem, and encouraging the replacement of the other strong cases. At some point, conflation with a related thematic noun (Skt. *pánthas, identical to Grk. <póntos> 'high sea') must have occurred, producing recessive accent in the strong cases, and adding -s to the nom. sg. The agreement of Avestan on gradation suggests that the noun-conflation occurred back in Proto-In-Ir, but the disagreement on aspiration indicates that this final step happened later in Indic. (Several scenarios are possible for this morphological mess. I have outlined what I consider plausible.)
Now, if Burrow's parallel actually applies to the Old Latin nom. sg. <cane:s>, it must be a laryngeal-final root-noun which acquired -s by analogy with more usual nouns. The protoform would have, as strong cases, nom. sg. *kn.né:h1, acc. sg. *kn.né:h1m, and nom. pl. *kn.né:h1es; voc. sg. *kn.´neh1; as weak cases, gen. sg. *knh1és, acc. pl. *knh1n.´s, gen. pl. *knh1ó:m, etc. From these, the Lat. nom. pl. <cane:s> and acc. sg. <canem> are regular, since OL *cane:m would have undergone vowel-shortening before final -m. Not surprisingly, the strong stem <can-> has been extracted and used to create new oblique cases, replacing those with *cn-. I am not aware of a distinct vocative being preserved. I would expect OL *cane: to become Lat. *cane by iambic shortening, but the replacement of nom. sg. <cane:s> by <canis> may well have killed the distinct vocative, if indeed it was still in use.
If the speculations above are correct, the PIE root in question is *kenh1-, and since the basic sense of the zero-grade is 'small', the meaning of the root could well be 'to compress' or 'to pinch' or the like, agreeing more or less with Pokorny's *ken-(1) and *ken-(2) (IEW 558ff.). Both of these lemmata are grab bags of mostly Germanic words having a wide variety of morphology. Without detailed investigation I cannot say whether a significant number of them are derivable from *kenh1-.
Most Sanskrit comparatives in <-i:yas-> have full root-grade. Corresponding Greek comparatives in <-i:on-> usually have /e/-grade, but a few have zero-grade (e.g. <takhÃ:o:n> 'swifter' beside the more common <thá:sso:n>; <kudÃ:o:n> 'more glorious'). It should also be noted that Skt. <káni:yas-> and <kánis.t.ha-> have no positive in use, but function as the suppletive comparative and superlative to <alpa-> 'small'. Therefore, they may have been based on a noun *kaná: meaning 'small animal or person', from PIE *kn.né:h1 and cognate with OL <cane:s>, and formed like Greek <kúnteros> 'more doglike, more impudent' and <kúntatos> 'most doglike, most impudent' from <kúo:n> 'dog'. A noun <kaná:> 'girl, maid' is cited twice from the Rgveda, but the usual word is <kanyá:> in Vedic and later Sanskrit. If <kaná:> indeed came from *kn.né:h1, it is not surprising that it would shed its unusual cases and join the /a:/-declension.
This brings up another possible base, a PIE noun *konh1Ãs meaning much the same thing as *kn.né:h1, 'compressed or pinched entity, small entity, small animal or person, young offspring', etc. Since the laryngeal would have blocked Brugmann's lengthening, *konh1Ãs would yield Skt. *kanÃs, which could then produce <kanÃ:nas> 'young, youthful' (RV) and similar words, and an adjective *kanyá-, without vrddhi and substantivized in the feminine as <kanyá:> 'girl, maiden'. And perhaps this base is identical to Slavic <konI> 'horse' as well.
DGK