Re: Language naming terminology (was Re: Finno-Ugric languages)

Nik Taylor wrote:

> Tom Wier wrote:
> > (Most of these were also, BTW, Roman calques of what the tribes calle=
d
> > themselves:  the Teutones were people of one tribe (from PIE *teuta-,=
 "tribe"),
> > the Alemanni were a "unified group of men" (cf. ModGer all-, "all", a=
nd Mann,
> > "man"); as for the Germani, I'm not sure how that name came about, it=
 might
> > have been a founding member's name)
>
> I think that Germani comes from the Latin _Germanus_, neighboring (?),
> also, thru a slight sound change, the ancestor of Spanish _hermano_
That sounds like a good answer.  I looked up the etymology of it, and it
says just that, "neighbor", but there is an identical word <germ=E2nus>
which means "from the same race".  It says that this word comes from
PIE *gen-men-, somehow thence to Lat. germen "fetus, offshoot" (though
they claim that it's through dissimilation, even though a nasal dissimila=
ted
to an /r/ somehow strikes me as very odd). I'll ask my professor about
this.


=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D
Tom Wier <artabanos@...>
ICQ#: 4315704   AIM: Deuterotom
Website: <http://www.angelfire.com/tx/eclectorium/>
"Cogito ergo sum, sed credo ergo ero."

"Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre;
But al that he myghte of his freendes hente,
On bookes and on lernynge he it spente"
    _Canterbury Tales_, Chaucer (Gen. Prol. 298-300)
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=
=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D=3D

=0D