--- In Nostratica@yahoogroups.com, "Richard Wordingham
<richard.wordingham@...>" <richard.wordingham@...> wrote:

> --- In Nostratica@yahoogroups.com, "John <jdcroft@...>"
> <jdcroft@...> wrote:
> > Gerry asked
> >
> > Actually it might be the other way around, with Sumerian loan

words

> > in PIE. Some have suggested that IE *kweklo (wheel - circle)
>
> IE *kWelkWlo, surely?
>
> > comes
> > from Sumerian *gigir.
>
> Why the asterisk?
>
> And Hebrew g-lg-l, meaning 'to turn', 'wheel' also fits in here.
> (Torsten has these words in the 'bend, turn' set he invited us to
> discuss a few weeks ago.)
>
> Richard.

I will continue the tale from here.

Michael Witzel:
Early Sources for South Asian Substrate Languages

mentions loans into Vedic from the supposed Austro-Asiatic Para-
Munda, identifiying them by their prefixes, which are typical of
Munda, but neither of Burushaski nor Dravidian.

He mentions the following present Munda prefixes:

p-, k-, m-, ro, ru-, ma-, a-, o-, u-, ka-

example: Khasi prefixes
m. u-, f. ka-, pl. ki-

corresponding to the ka- prefix he mentions in Vedic

ka-, ki-, ku-

but what he finds more interesting are the double prefixes of Munda:

ie. ka- + -n- or -m-, or -l- or -r-, or -s-

which he finds reflected in Vedic, presumably loaned, as

C&n-, C&m-, C&r-, C&l-, C&s-

eg.

jar- tar-, nar-, par-, bar-, sar-, sr- [j&r, t&r-]

all this from Munda kaC- ? Burushaski has the same k/s^ alternation
in these loanwords. No s^a- in Munda. All seems to point to Para-
Munda as the source of the words (although etymologies haven't always
been found).

Which gives me a nice solution for ca-duceus.
BTW a long time ago I read an analysis of Odysseus (note Ulysses; d/l
alternation): hypochoristic of a name composed with o- + duk-, the
latter the otherwise unattested Greek cocnate of Latin duc-.

One horrible consequence of this is that the international wheel
*kWel- and the internatinal dog *kWon- get eaten up by the prefix. If
these are Sundalandese in origin, and had a prefix *kVr/n- where is
the rest? (I hasten to add that in the Austronesian group someone has
proposed Austro-Asiatic as a subbranch of Austronesian). But on the
other hand, here's a good explanation for the reduplication of
the 'wheel' word *kWekWel-/gilgal- and of the the crab word: Greek
karkaros etc. As for the connection between "crab" and "wheel": in
the churnng of the ocean story, crab crawls under the mountain to act
as a pivot for turning it.

A few more for the collection: "Sudanic" kòrekore "sphere",
Sandawe /koro, /huru "twirl, bore a hole", Kpelle k&l& "skin"

Torsten