Re: Eastre & *Aus-

At 22:15 27.4.2000 +0100, Raymond Brown wrote:

><groan> Sorry I didn't quote all the recorded Greek forms.
>I'll try again (all given in the nominative singular form):
>
>Homeric     he:ó:s
>Ionic       e:ó:s
>Attic       héo:s
>Corinthian  ha:wo:s
>Doric       a:o:s  (also: a:bo:r)
>Aiolic      aúo:s (prob. = /a:wo:s/)
>Boiotian    a:a:s
>
>(We know the pitch accents only of the Homeric, Ionian (incl. Attic) and
>Aiolic dialects).
>
>The Greek forms could derive either from *sa:wo:s or *a:wso:s.  The Greek
>makes sense if and only if the _first_ a- was originally long.  It is
>assumed that *a:wso:s is cognate with the Latin form; if this is so, the
>only reconstruction that makes sense is *a:uso:s-a:
You might add Sanskrit _u.sas_ (f. s-stem) and the related verb _vas_
"shine", and perhaps also _u.s_ "emit heat".  Combining all this evidence
the IE root must have been *h2ews/*H2wes.  These roots whose middle grade
can have either a falling or a rising diphthong are aptly called
_samprasaara.na_ "floating" in Sanskrit.  Note that the Greek h- has
nothing to do with the I.E. h2-, but is an assimilation from the medial
-s- > -h- > -0-.  Preconsonantal initial h2- became a- in Proto-Greek (e.g.
*h2ne:r > Gk. _ane:r_, Skt. _nar(a)_; cf. Gk. _euandros_ Skt. _suunara <
*h1(e)suh2ner-, where *h2 lengthens the _u_ in Skt.), while prevocalic it
colored a following e(:) to a(:) as seen in the forms of *h2e:usos- in
Greek and Latin.  The variation in length seen in the root vowel is due to
ablaut.  WRT the -a in aurora: the adding of a theme vowel to consonant
stems is so common that difference in this respect between different IE
lgs  don't rise any brows among IEnists.  Sometimes we find doublets in the
same language, like Skt. _nar/nara_ or Gk. _ane:r/euandros_.

I'm afraid only Ray can follow this.  If you can't just yell, and I shall
elucidate!




/BP

 B.Philip Jonsson
mailto:bpj@netg.se
mailto:melroch@my-deja.com
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