enech

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Old Irish[edit]

Alternative forms[edit]

Etymology[edit]

From a compound of *h₁én (in) and *h₃ekʷ- (eye).[1] The Proto-Celtic noun is usually reconstructed as *enīkʷom, but Matasović departs from the norm to reconstruct *enekʷom instead, leaving the raising in the dative inchaib unexplained.

Oddly, the n seems to be unpalatalized in the Milan glosses, even though its palatalisation is both expected and more amply attested elsewhere.

Noun[edit]

enech n pl (genitive enech)

  1. face
    • c. 760 Blathmac mac Con Brettan, published in "A study of the lexicon of the poems of Blathmac Son of Cú Brettan" (2017; PhD thesis, National University of Ireland Maynooth), edited and with translations by Siobhán Barrett, stanza 48
      Fo·cresa saile – gním col – i n-einech in dúilemon.
      Spittles were cast – deed of sins – in the face of the creator.
  2. front
    • c. 800–825, Diarmait, Milan Glosses on the Psalms, published in Thesaurus Palaeohibernicus (reprinted 1987, Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies), edited and with translations by Whitley Stokes and John Strachan, vol. I, pp. 7–483, Ml. 100b2
      tarsainniu .i. ní [i]na n-enech ro·bitha, acht is inna ndrummai.
      opposing, i.e. it is not in their faces that they had been wounded, but it is in their backs.
  3. honour, dignity

Inflection[edit]

Neuter o-stem
Singular Dual Plural
Nominative enechL
Vocative enechL
Accusative enechL
Genitive enechN
Dative inchaib
Initial mutations of a following adjective:
  • H = triggers aspiration
  • L = triggers lenition
  • N = triggers nasalization

Descendants[edit]

  • Middle Irish: enech, einech, ainech

Mutation[edit]

Old Irish mutation
Radical Lenition Nasalization
enech unchanged n-enech
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every
possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

References[edit]

  1. ^ Matasović, Ranko (2009) “*enekʷo-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Celtic (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 9), Leiden: Brill, →ISBN, pages 115-116

Further reading[edit]