Re: Ir. cas(s) and IE models (was: Ligurian)

2012/5/11, Tavi <oalexandre@...>:

>> Tavi:
> AFAIK, Irish is a Celtic language, so as a matter of internal
> *coherence* we should first reconstruct a Proto-Celtic etymology before
> doing that for "PIE".

Bhrihskwobhloukstroy:
I'd have expected such a statement by a Neogrammarian. Such
statements always imply models. In my model (as in yours, I suppose),
PIE had split into hundreds of palaeodialects; some of them later
coalesced into Irish IE, which in turn came to be part of
Proto-Celtic.
Your objection, on the contrary, implies that PIE first split into
Proto-Celtic and then into Goedelic and so on.
So, your objection is relevant to a discussion about models, but
cannot per se affect the properly etymological discussion.

> Tavi:
> In the case of your proposed etymology, we lack
> evidence a labiovelar in Celtic.

Bhrihskwobhloukstroy:
No, because we don't know a priori the meaning of Cassi-. Both you
and I adhere to Birkhan's proposal, but this is crucially based on an
Irish-Germanic comparison. Within Celtic, we can suppose, but not
prove, that cas and cassi- are cognate. It's just like conn and
penno-: they may be connected (Pederson), but they don't necessarily
need.

>
>> I've proposed (and indeed already published in 2009) that Irish cass
>> can represent the regular merger of both *kwös-to- (: *kwös-lo-s
>>
>> Lat. qua:lus) and *közdh-to- (: *kozdh-o- > Germanic *hazda-).
>> Tavi:
> According to Schrijver (quited by De Vaan), after a labial consonant
> Proto-Italic /o/ was unrounded to /a/, but only in *open* syllables
> (e.g. *mori > mari), so *kWos-lo- would give regularly Latin co:lum, but
> not qua:lus, which must be either a loanword or have a different
> etymology (De Vaan chose the latter).

Be careful: I've written *kwö-, with Schwa secundum

> Tavi:
> To the best of my knowledge, the Irish word would correspond to Latin
> cassis 'hunting net'. Also besides the masculine *xazd-a-, Germanic has
> the feminine *xizd-o:n- (Old English heord 'hair', Middle Dutch herde
> 'flax fibers'), which corresponds to Greek kíste: 'basket' (> Latin
> cista).
>

Bhrihskwobhloukstroy:
Since I firmly believe in multiple etymology, this is the kind of
reply I most appreciate (if it matters). Thank you indeed