Reconstruction talk:Proto-Indo-European/h₁élem
Don't think it's worth having this reconstruction, this looks to me more like a loanword or Wanderwort Dghmonwiskos (talk) 22:47, 17 December 2018 (UTC)
- @Dghmonwiskos: Agree, plus I think it's just an awful reconstruction, *h₁élmos would be much more suitable, but it wouldn't explain all the Slavic and Celtic descendants anyway. I'd delete it. Tom 144 (𒄩𒇻𒅗𒀸) 04:59, 18 December 2018 (UTC)
- I wonder if it could have been one of the few m-stem nouns, along with *ǵʰéyōm (“winter”) and *dʰéǵʰōm (“earth”). It might have had nominative *h₁élōm, accusative *h₁lémm̥, and genitive *h₁l̥mós before being thematicized in the various languages. Proto-Italic *olmos can also come from zero grade *h₁l̥m-, right? —Mahāgaja · talk 19:01, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
- Well that certainly makes a lot more sense. – Tom 144 (𒄩𒇻𒅗𒀸) 23:03, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
- Or maybe the textbook we're citing just made a mistake by forgetting to type out the -os suffix? I see no reason to assume that it was not there. Our second source,a blog, doesn't even mention the word in PIE. I'd think if we can find at least one other mention of this word in an academic publication somewhere, with the suffix on, that we should assume that the Oxford book simply made a careless mistake. —Soap— 14:25, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
- Also commenting to point out that many of the tree names in the Oxford book are given as stems, e.g. *dhergh-, so it's not necessary to assume the author forgot to type out the -os; he could have simply forgotten to type the dash. —Soap— 17:16, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
- An English translation of Pokorny's dictionary, at least, treats it like a normal -os root, but also says that the -m- is a suffix of some kind based on assumed connections with other tree names such as alder. —Soap— 16:45, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
- Or maybe the textbook we're citing just made a mistake by forgetting to type out the -os suffix? I see no reason to assume that it was not there. Our second source,a blog, doesn't even mention the word in PIE. I'd think if we can find at least one other mention of this word in an academic publication somewhere, with the suffix on, that we should assume that the Oxford book simply made a careless mistake. —Soap— 14:25, 11 November 2022 (UTC)
- Well that certainly makes a lot more sense. – Tom 144 (𒄩𒇻𒅗𒀸) 23:03, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
- I wonder if it could have been one of the few m-stem nouns, along with *ǵʰéyōm (“winter”) and *dʰéǵʰōm (“earth”). It might have had nominative *h₁élōm, accusative *h₁lémm̥, and genitive *h₁l̥mós before being thematicized in the various languages. Proto-Italic *olmos can also come from zero grade *h₁l̥m-, right? —Mahāgaja · talk 19:01, 2 July 2019 (UTC)
What has been going on in the Near East
[edit]Since there is variation final n ~ m in Iranian, can one well explain rw ~ l or ~ ś? I finally want to write an etymology for نَشَم (našam, “elm”), but for this purpose Indo-European is remote and one wonders what is in between in Iranian. @Calak, you justed added translations for elm. It turned out that the same word as for elm, نارون (nârvan), is attested as “pomegranate tree” early, seemingly a comparable tree, making its etymology transparent – this discovery was actually to perhaps solve the Arabic term, if not the Indo-European term, better than just to connect it loosely to the Indo-European like that blogger, but I do not succeed in finding cognates or variants that could explain away anything. I weened it to be either this transparent compound or نَشَم (našam) could be through some vagary borrowing path cognate to Arabic رُمَّان (rummān), the same variation without the “tree” part. Is “elm” actually pomegranate? Or was it mistaken in the first place to equate “elm” and “pomegranate”? Then again, the Kurdish words you added for “elm” are reminiscent of this Indo-European and Arabic from the middle (z ~ ś ~ l?), but allegedly Proto-Iranian *wizw-, suspected cognate to Proto-Slavic *vęzъ (“elm”), a synonym of *jьlьmъ. It would be odd if these two words were ultimately the same word, but a wanderwort is more likely than inherited cognateship. Fay Freak (talk) 04:49, 24 March 2021 (UTC)
- @Fay Freak: According to Hassanpour statement, nâr means "tick, mosquito". He compares nârvan with Arabic "شَجَرَة البَقّ", German Mücken-baum, French arbre de moucheron, Armenian մոծակի ծառ and Central Kurdish دارتۆفانە (dartofane, “Caucasian elm, Zelkova carpinifolia”, literally “mosquito tree”).
- For more information about Kurdish bûz, read this article: The Kurdish Elm (by W. B. Henning).--Calak (talk) 19:30, 31 March 2021 (UTC)
citing a blog
[edit]I think we should remove the notes about the possible links to Semitic unless we can find a better source. The author of the blog certainly knows his stuff, but even the best among us don't put in-depth research into everything we write, so I think it's quite likely he was just wondering aloud about a possible connection, as he even closes his post saying it's unusual that the word is found mostly in northern IE and thus that it might be a coincidence after all. He may not even know we're citing him. —Soap— 14:35, 11 November 2022 (UTC)