Re: CHAT: Directions

Christophe Grandsire wrote:
>         I like them! Very poetic. I find them reastic enough (by the wa=
y, does
> anybody know where the names of the cardinal points come from in our
> natlangs? - it seems that they have a common origin in Romance language=
s
> and English -).
The Romance languages borrowed their directions from the Germanic
peoples.

According to my etymological dictionary:
East < Proto-Germanic *austo- < PIE *aus- which meant something like
"rising", and is also the source of Latin aurora; *austo- was also the
source of *Austron, a prehistoric dawn-goddess, whose festival occurred
in Spring, the Old English form was =CAastre, generally considered the
source of Easter

West < Proto-Germanic *westaz < PIE *wes, meaning something like "going
down", source also of Latin vesper and Greek h=E9speros

South < Proto-Germanic *suntha-, which may have been derived from
*sunn=F4n (sun) - since the Sun is in the southern part of the sky, as
seen from the Northern Hemisphere

North unknown, but possibly related to Oscan-Umbrian (an Italic
language), nertro-, meaning left, if so, it would mean "left, when
facing the rising sun"

--=20
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