Re: Etymology of _insula_ (was Re: Thoughts on Word building)

On Thu, 8 Dec 2005 16:16:15 +0000, R A Brown <ray@...>
wrote:

>I have seen them related to PIE root for "swim" also, but your etymology
>is easier as regards the sound changes, I think.
Plus, the semantics are way off -- how can one derive 'nose' from 'swim'
(or vice-versa)?

> > Latin _na:ris_ (< *na:sis) 'nostril', _na:sus_ 'nose' (however, we
> > should expect _na:rus_ here, so this may be a loanword (from Greek?))
>
>Um - the vowel is OK, as the earliest Latin borrowing from Greek were
>from the Doric dialect (spoken in southern Italy) which preserved /a:/.
>But the meaning is against it, I think. The meaning 'nose' had long been
>forgotten by the Greeks (whose word for 'nose' was _rhis_ (gen:
>_rhinos_)). I suspect it is from a Italian dialect form.
It could be.  Or, the original Greek form was *na:ssos -- see below.

> > Greek _na:sos_ / _ne:sos_ 'island'
> >
> > Sanskrit _na:sa:_ 'nose'
> >
> > English _nose_ < Old English _no:su_ 'nose', possibly _snore_ if from
> > *sna:re
> >
> > German _Nase_ 'nose'
> >
> > Russian _nos_ 'nose'
> >
> > All of these forms seem to point to an IE root *nexs- (> *na:s-).
> > However, some descendants show a short vowel (Germanic, Slavic) and
> > others a long one.  Reconciling these different 'grades' has been an
> > ongoing problem. Anyways, it seems to me like the word for 'nose' could
> > be metaphorically extended to mean 'island' (after all, they often look
> > like "noses" of land poking up out of the water).  Then with a feminine
> > diminutive, we'd get *nxsláx > *nslá: 'little nose'.  Add the sound
> > changes from IE to Latin and we should get _insula_.
>
>Interesting theory. I wonder if McBain's *n=ss could be cognate also.
>Interesting that, like Greek, the Celtic langs do not retain a
>derivative of *nexs- to denote 'nose'.
There's another slight problem, actually.  Intervocalic */s/ becomes /0/
(via */h/) before Greek.  So, either the original Greek word was *na:ssos,
or */s/ became */h/ before */x/ (= 'h2') was lost.

Also, interestingly enough, both West (Insular) Germanic and North Germanic
retain a long vowel in their words for 'nose'.  This suggests to me that
Old High German (_nasa_) shortened the root vowel in the nominative, either
through analogy with the weak cases (which would have preserved a short
vowel, AFAIK) or through independent sound change.  I also think that this
was the case with Slavic, since the Lithuanian word for 'nose' is _nósis_,
with an acute (i.e. long) /o/.  Furthermore, both Germanic and Balto-Slavic
appear to have continued the root noun, which would have had a declension
like this (in IE):

nom sg. néxss pl. néxses
acc sg. néxsm pl. néxsns
gen sg. nxsós pl. nxsóm
dat sg. nxséi pl. nxsbhyós
abl sg. nxséd pl. nxsbhyós
loc sg. néxsi pl. néxssu
ins sg. nxséh pl. néxsbhis ~ nxsbhéis

For most IE descendants, this would have quickly become:

nom sg. ná:s pl. ná:ses
acc sg. ná:sm pl. ná:s
gen sg. nasós pl. nasóm
dat sg. naséi pl. nasbhyós
abl sg. naséd pl. nasbhyós
loc sg. ná:si pl. ná:ssu
ins sg. nasé: pl. ná:sbhis ~ nasbhéis

So, you can see, most IE descendants would have had a paradigm for 'nose'
with alternating long /a/ and short /a/.  In the Germanic and Balto-Slavic
descendants, these diverged, with one preserving a-timbre and the other
acquiring o-timbre (Germanic and Baltic have /a:/ > /o/, Slavic has /a/
> /o/).  There are still problems with the Germanic languages (at least),
but I think that has to do with later changes in those languages.  Mainly,
English 'nose' shows an historically long /O/ (normally spelled with <oa>)
which could only come from earlier long /a/.  That clashes with "Old
English" (probably West Saxon) _nósu_ which reflects IE */a:/ > Germanic
*/o:/.  It can't be the inherited form, because we would then expect *noose
in Modern English.  So, how did the /a/ in (presumably) East Anglian _nasu_
get lengthened?

>Breton: froan
>Welsh: ffroen
>Gaelic & Irish: sròn  (sro`n)
>
>These are apparently derived from a Proto-Celtic *srogna-
>The Breton and welsh words mean 'nostril' rather than nose. the normal
>welsh word for 'nose' is _trwyn_ (Cornish _trein_), and the Breton is
>_fri_.
>
>--
>Ray
It looks rather tempting to try to link the Celtic words for 'nose' with
Greek _rhî:s_, _rhinós_ (if from something like *srign-), but it's probably
too good to be true.

- Rob

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