Re: bidet

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

>
> But all your examples involve Latin/Romance f-, not p-, so this single
> word <oilo> requires an ad-hoc assumption. That is why I prefer to

see

> a borrowing from the Gaulish equivalent of <pullus>.
>
> > This is very unlikely. Spanish pollo gives Basque oilo just as

Romance

> > fongo gives onddo (with expressive palatalization).
>
> I rejected that etymology before, and believers in "expressive

palatalization" need to explain why a mushroom would produce such a
demand for expressivity in speakers that only palatalization could
satisfy it. Are we talking about a MAGIC mushroom?

>

Although not widespread, palatalization of velar stops (especially at
word-initial) is no way uncommon in Basque: kipula > tipula, kortika >
tortika, kupa > tupa, *kapel > txapel, coloma > txoloma, *gaus > deus,
etc.

> (presumably used to explain on 'good' from Romance bono),
> >
> > Most Vascologists agree in considering Basque on a native word, as
> > it's attested in Aquitanian inscriptions as BON-, HON-, -PON.
>
> I see no reason to equate these onomastic elements with each other, or

with Bq. <on>.

>
> > See Gorrotxategi (1984), "Estudio sobre la onomástica indígena

de Aquitania".

>
> When ONE GUY invokes an array of optional Aquitanian soundlaws that

would make Sean Whalen blush, forgive me for not jumping aboard the
bandwagon. Schuchardt was polemically opposed to the Neogrammarian
school and yet he came NOWHERE NEAR Gorrotxategi in allowing such
arbitrary variations in interpreting onomastics.

>

You seem to ignore that "Aquitanian" is an epigraphic corpus
representing more than just one linguistic variety (probably a dialectal
continuum), as shown by lexical isoglosses like this one. Another one is
t-/h-, a particular case of Martinet's Law by which fortis plosives at
word-initial got aspirated into /h/ or zero.

> Obviously I have nothing against "submerged languages" (i.e.
> substrates), but <borondate> is not some oddity in Basque. Its
> importance in ordinary speech suggests that it was adapted directly

from

> Latin by bilingual speakers.
>

In my view, along Paleo-Basque there were other linguistic varieties
with different soundlaws, and which finally merged with Paleo-Basque in
the High Middle Ages ("Vasconization").

> > This is actually Church Latin from the late (8th century or later)
> > Christianization of Basques. The suffix -(i)tate can also be found

with

> > a "indigenous" root in the dialectal form pegorritate (LN) 'extreme
> > misery', from pegor (LN) 'sterile, poor'.
>
> Mariner dates the beginning of Christianization to the 3rd-5th cc.,

with <aingeru> from <angelus> reflecting the onset of palatalization of
/g/. Solar disks on tombstones and pagan characterization in the
Chanson de Roland tell us nothing about the date of the FIRST churches
in the Basque Country.

>

But this doesn't mean these Christians were Basques or spoke
Paleo-Basque, but rather their own dialect was replaced by Basque.

> Anyhow, whatever century it comes from, the fact remains that

<borondate> has initial bo-.

>

Comming from an earlier *p- as in poz, ponte, putre, palatu, pago, etc.

> So does <bortitz> 'strong',
>

Also attested as portitz.

> I prefer to consider on 'good' ancient,
>
> > See above.
>
> and gizon 'man' (against giza-), which occurs in Aquitanian

onomastics, to be originally 'good man, bonhomme'.

>
> > IMHO Basque gizon is a loanword from Celtic *gdonjo- 'man', most

likely from Gaulish.

>
> I would expect an initial affricate or sibilant in Basque, not

anaptyxis,

>
> > Why so? Even Iberian adapted the Latin ahtroponym Flaccus as

/bilake/.

>
> Mute plus liquid is different.
>

This is your opinion, not mine.

> and such borrowing still fails to explain the combining form <giza->,
> which I regard as the original unmarked 'man', not 'good man', though
> semantic devaluation has erased this distinction, as with <gentleman>,
> <caballero>, etc.
>
> > Although ther form giza- remains unexplained, there's no such
> > connotation in the Basque word.
>
> The form is explained by MY theory, and as explained, the distinction

in connotation has been levelled out.

>

That is, it was erased without leaving any traces. This again speaks
against it.

> Two lenes produced a fortis (as in apais < abbas, zapatu < sabbatum)
> which is hard to reconcile with any theoretical view failing to regard
> consonant strength as the primary feature.
>
> > Please explain.
>
> Martinet said that ancient Basque opposed initial [pH]
>

= fortis /p:/

> to [b],
>

= lenis /p/. I think you didn't read him well.

> and since Latin [p] was unaspirated, it was heard as [b] in <bake>

'peace' and other words.

>

Not exactly. It was heard as a lenis /p-/, which was rendered as [b] in
the std variety of Basque. I think Proto-Celtic had a similar system,
except for the absence of /p:/ [pH], which was spirantized into /F/.

> I think ancient Basque opposed [PP] to [P] (i.e. fortis/geminate

against lenis/simplex), so that Lat. [bb] was heard as [PP], reflected
in modern Basque as [p].

>

Not only from Latin but also from other sources, as in *s'abbo (Semitic
*s^abb-) > Spanish sapo, Aragonese zapo, Basque (z)apo, afo, apho
'toad'.

> This distinction applied to other consonants, so Lat. <anno:na> yields

Bq. <anoa> 'provisions', and <castellum> yields <gaztelu>, not *-eru.

>

Actually, this was postulated by Mitxelena more than 40 years ago.