Re: squirrel

At 7:26:49 PM on Friday, March 16, 2012, Torsten wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> <bm.brian@...> wrote:

>> At 6:18:45 AM on Thursday, March 15, 2012, Torsten wrote:

>>> However, Norwegian 'ras'. It can't be Slavic liquid
>>> metathesis(?); is it Schrijver's bird lnguage?

>> It's ON <rass>, metathesized from earlier (attested)
>> <ars>.

> Obviously it is ('ars' still in jysk), but why? That's not
> a regular rule.

Why should it be? Neither is <bridd> ~ <bird>, not to
mention a number of other /rV/ ~ /Vr/ metatheses. De Vries
s.v. <ars> suggests taboo deformation, which could certainly
be a(nother) contributing factor.

Brian