--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Marco Moretti" <marcomoretti69@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Joao" <josimo70@...> wrote:
> > Is there any explanation for the trend *c->g- present in some
> Romance words?
> > 1- Latin cattus > Romance *gattu > Portuguese gato
> > 2- Latin crupta (<crypta) > *grupta > Portuguese gruta
> > 3- Latina crassa > *grassa > Portuguese graxa
> >
> > Joao SL
>
> Something similar is found extensively in Romance languages and
> also in Italian:
>
> Latin /cattus/ > Italian /gatto/
> Latin /crassus/ > Italian /grasso/
> Latin /crupta/ > Italian /grotta/
> Latin /cavea/ > Italian /gabbia/
>
> and also /pr-/ sometimes > /br-/
>
> Latin /prui:na/ > Italian /brina/
> Latin /pra:vus/ > Italian /bravo/ (with semantic
> shift "cruel", "fierce" > "brave" > "able", and cfr. also the old
> meaning of "hired assassin").
>
> Perhaps ancient dialectal variants?
>
> Marco
A different story for each example:
1. 'Cat': Italian <gatto>, Spanish/Portuguese <gato>, Provençal/Catalan <gat>, Logudorese <battu> (*gattu-), etc. against French <chat> (*cattu-), Late Latin <catta> (epicene, Vg. Baruch 6:21, ca. 250; later fem. against masc. <cattus>, e.g. Placitus, 4th c.).
The origin of this word has been much discussed. Several years ago I posted an attempt to explain <catta> as a borrowing from Q-Pannonian, but this etymology is plausible only for Martial's Pannonian bird, not the cat. It also fails to explain Kiliaen's Early Modern Dutch form with initial /h/, which could however be regarded as the remnant of a pre-Grimm's Law borrowing from Celtic *katto-. The usual Germanic /u/-stem *kattu- would then represent a later reborrowing from Gallo-Latin <cattus>. This does not explain why <catta> would be used in Baruch 6:21 to render Greek <aílouros> (LXX Ep. Jer. 21) in a passage where the gender is immaterial. It also provides no etymology for *katto-, and given the problems with my earlier Pannonian theory, it will be necessary to empty out the litter box and start from scratch.
Nevertheless, the voicing discrepancy may be explained by assuming that <cattus> was established in central Gallo-Latin as a popular word, continuing Gaul. *katto- of unknown origin. Elsewhere <catta> and <cattus> belonged to literary Latin, and Late Greek *káttos (from Gaulish or Gallo-Latin) was regularly borrowed into Vulgar Latin as *gattu-, like other LGrk words with initial /k/ before a non-front vowel, apparently because the VL dialects had more aspiration with initial /k/ than Greek, so an unaspirated /k/ sounded like an allophone of /g/ to VL ears. A modern parallel, mentioned earlier, is the borrowing of French <cabaret> and <cabriolet> into Milanese as <gabaré> and <gabriolé>; French is noted for allowing very little aspiration with initial tenues. Other Romance examples are Sp. <gazafatón> 'balderdash' from LGrk *kakemphatón 'poorly enunciated' (also Sp. <gazapatón> and back-formations apparently contaminated with <gazapo> 'young rabbit'); Calabrian <galipu> 'decency, politeness' from Grk. <kalópoios> 'doing nice'; Fr. <galoche> 'galosh' from LGrk *kalópous, acc. *kalópoda 'wooden shoe'; Venetian <garofolo>, Fr. <girofle>, It. <garofano> (with perceived suffix-substitution), etc. 'clove; clove-tree' from Grk. <karuóphullon>.
2. 'Crass': It. <grasso>, Fr./Prov./Cat./Rumanian <gras>, Sp. <graso>, Pg. <graxo> (back-formed from <gra(i)xa>, VL *grassia 'fat, grease, slush'), Log. <rassu>, etc. against Picard/Walloon <kra>. As mentioned, this can be explained by assuming VL *grassus, resulting from contamination of <crassus> with <grossus>, spreading through most of the Empire, but stopping short of the northwest corner, which retained <crassus>.
3. 'Crypt': It. <grotta> (borrowed in the 16th c. into Fr. <grotte>, Cat./Sp./Pg. <gruta>), Log. <grutta>, etc. against Old Fr. <croute>, Prov. <crota>, etc. This is of Greek origin, and the /kr/-forms must reflect Lat. <crypta>. The /gr/-forms reflect *grupta, probably a reborrowing from LGrk into VL, but possibly the continuation of an early borrowing from Epirote Greek which was displaced by <crypta> in literary Latin. Epirote loanwords into Latin include <Burrus> 'Pyrrhus' (Enn.), <buxus> 'dogwood', <buxida> 'dogwooden box' (whence It. <busta> 'case, envelope', against literary Lat. <pyxis>), <guberna:re> 'to steer' (Grk. <kubernân>), <go:bius> 'gudgeon' (Grk. <ko:biós>). Presumably the Epirote dialect, spoken by Pyrrhus and his men, allowed minimal aspiration with initial tenues.
4. 'Cage': It. <gabbia>, Prov. <gabia>, Cat./Sp. <gavia>, etc. against Ven. <keba>, OFr <chage>, Wall. <c^ef>, etc. Much has been made about the discrepancy within French between <cage> (Lat. <cavea>) and <geôle> 'jail' (OFr jaiole, VL *gaveola). Obviously however <chage> has been replaced by <cage> from a dialect retaining /ka/ unpalatalized, and French has borrowed <gabie> 'ship's lookout perch, crow's-nest' from Prov. <gabia>, so <jaiole> could represent an earlier interdialectal borrowing, given the mobility of these words. More importantly Venetian contrasts <gebo> 'river-bed' with <keba> 'cage'. This suggests that a second root is in play, *gab- or *gaw-, whose semantic overlap with Lat. <cavus> led to confusion and substitution in many of the Romance dialects.
V. Bertoldi, "GAVA e derivati nell'idronimia tirrena" (Studi Etruschi 3:293-320, 1929), extracted an element *gava 'watercourse' vel sim., which he presumed to be pre-Indo-European, from hydronyms, toponyms, and appellatives in the Alps, Liguria, and the Pyrenees. Skeptics are free to dismiss B. as a "substrate romantic", and at times he did go too far. I am not pleased with his attempt to lump *gab- and *gamb- together with *gaw- in hydronyms. Nevertheless he made a good case for a pre-Roman element *gaw- distinct from Lat. <cavus>. He argued that Pliny's <gavia> 'gull' (HN 10:91) is a derivative; VL extensions such as *gavia:nus underlie the Romance words for 'gull', It. <gabbiano>, <gavina>, OFr <gaverial>, Prov. <gavian>, <gabian>, <gabino>, Sp. <gaviota>, Pg. <gaivâo>, <gaivota>, etc.
I am not convinced that Bertoldi's *gava must be pre-IE, since it could represent Illyrian *gawa:- 'outpouring, drainage' vel sim., from *g^Howeh2-, from Proto-IE *g^Heu- 'to pour'. At any rate the semantic development 'watercourse' > 'river-bed' > 'trough' > 'hollow trough-like object' would bring derivatives of *gava into the same semantic field as those of <cavus>. It is not implausible that confusion would arise with certain words in certain dialects, leading at times to /g/-forms substituting for expected /k/-forms.
5. 'Frost': It. <brina> against Lat. <prui:na>. As with *crassu-, we might suppose that expected It. *provina was contaminated by a semantically close word. In North Italian and South Alpine dialects we do have such words: Friulian <brise>, Istrian <brizéna> 'frost'; Fassatalish <briz^a>, Bormese <sbrîsa>, Nonsbergish <brizöl>, Vegliotese <bressaina>, etc. 'light snowfall which barely covers the ground'; Metaurian <sbrish d'acque> 'very short light rainfall'; also dialectal Slovenian <briz^a> 'short fall of fine hail'. I regard the sense of Fass. <briz^a>, etc. as the original among these, meaning '(light) dusting of snow', from which sense 'frost', 'fine hail', and 'slight precipitation' are easily derivable. I take the protoform as Gaulish *bri:sja 'dust, debris', from earlier *bri:usja:, from PIE *bHreh1us- 'to break into pieces, pound, crush, pulverize' vel sim., seen also in Gallo-Latin <Bri:sia:cus> '(Mount) Breisach' (Itin. Ant.) and *Bri:sia:cum, now Breisach-am-Rhein in the Breisgau, whose principal soil is loess, i.e. compacted dust. Also we have Gallo-Latin *bri:sia:re 'to break, dash to pieces, crush' (Fr. <briser>, etc.). From the Celtiberian cognate *bri:(u)sja(:) we have Ibero-Latin <bri:sa> 'grape-residue, debris from wine-pressing' (used by Columella, who was from Gades, and continued in Aragonese/Catalan/Valencian <brisa> 'id.').
It seems best to suppose that Gaul. *bri:sja yielded *bri:sa 'dust, dusting (of snow)' in North Italian dialects of VL, and that this *bri:sa, as the basic word, was contaminated with <prui:na> to yield *bri:na 'frost' in some VL dialect, from which it eventually found its way into Italian.
6. 'Brave': Medieval Latin <bravus> 'wild, untamed', Old Sp./Pg. <bravo> 'id.', etc. against Lat. <pra:vus> 'crooked, misshapen, improper, perverse'. This connection was argued by R. Menéndez Pidal (Orig. del Esp. 331) on the grounds that 11th-c. documents opposed <pravus> 'unbuilt, undeveloped' (of land) to <domitus> 'developed' (of land), thus establishing <pravus> as an antonym of <domitus> 'tamed'. However, W. Meyer-Lübke (REW 945) argued that <bravus> appears earlier than <pravus> in this sense, that Lat. <rectus> is the correct antonym of <pra:vus>, and that Lat. <barbarus> 'wild' is the true antecedent of <bravus>.
I find this equally unacceptable, since Lat. <barba>, <barba:tus>, <barbitium>, <barbus>, <barbulus>, and <barbula> all have Romance reflexes and nowhere can I find *brab- or *brav- arising from <barb->. Instead I regard ML <bravus> as extracted from LL <brabi:um>, in manuscripts usually <brauium> 'prize of victory', this from Grk. <brabeîon> 'id.', from <brabeús> 'arbiter, judge of a contest'. I take the sense-development of <bravus> (and the Romance words) as 'befitting a victor' > 'courageous' > 'ferocious' > 'untamed, wild'. In this view Fr. <brave> (with the English borrowing) is closer to the original sense than the attestations of <bravus> and <bravo> as 'wild'. I cannot say with certainty why some 11th-c. scribes would have substituted <pravus> for <bravus> when describing land. Perhaps <bravo> had a positive sense in their vernacular dialect, conflicting with the notion that unbuilt land had little worth.
Douglas G. Kilday