Re: frisgo

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "dgkilday57" <dgkilday57@...> wrote:

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> Old French <fregon>, now <fragon> 'petit houx, houx-frelon, pungitopo, butcher's broom, knee-holly, Ruscus aculeatus', along with Norman <frégon>, Poitevin <fringon>, and dialectal forms in Charente [frego:], Vienne [frgo:], and Haute-Vienne [fre^gú, fre.ge:], continues Gallo-Latin <frisgo(:)> attested in glosses. Another gloss <brisco> (for *brisgo:?) is represented by Limousin <bregou>, in Basses-Alpes [bre.gu:], in Charente again [brigu:]. A protoform *grisgo: is indicated by <grigon> along the Soudre (North Gironde), [gri:gu:] in Gironde, and [grisku:n] in Les Landes.
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> I believe that what we have here is a very important isogloss indicating the linguistic situation in Gaul before its conquest by the Gauls. If the protoform of <fregon> and the rest involved *gWHris-, we expect Celtic to have *gris-, Ligurian to have *bris-, and *fris- is presumably Venetic. The attestations of *bris- do indeed occur in Liguria Transalpina, and those of *gris- are consistent with Gallicization proceeding from the southwest.
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What possible reason is there to assume an unknown *gWHris- instead of the widely-seen form for root/branch/plant that was discussed earlier (such as * wrizga: > * gW- > gwrysg = branch W; * wrizga: > * wirzga: > virga = rod/shoot/twig L; etc.)?


If simply Celtic, in some dia./lng. w- > v- (borrowed as either f or b , just as the sounds in Osc.-Umb. >> Latin), and in others (sim. to Welsh above) w- > gW- (borrowed as g-). Only one group of languages is needed; one already known and w speakers known to have lived there: Celtic.