Poety to translate?

[Fredrik]

Hi!

The word seems to be a reduplication of a word meaning flutter, from 
IE pol or pal. This is related to latin papilio but with the germanic 
suffix -ðr- from IE -tr-.
The german word Falter (from OHG fîfaltra) is of same origin and not 
related to falten but with flattern.
Another thing I think could be important to notice is that OHG and OE 
has long i. Cf. fîfaltra and fífealde. Also the old nordic languages 
seems to have a long i. I dont know why and if this is a later 
development. But if it was like this in pgmc gothic should have 
*feifaldrô instead.

(facts based on runeberg.org)

/Fredrik

*Fifald(r)o is great! Talking about this, is the first syllable a 
reduplication? If so, the spelling should be *faifaldro (with ai [e]) 
perhaps. But as far as I know (and that's not a long distance) there 
are no nouns with a (vivid) reduplication attested in Gothic, are 
they? And how is it (if it is) connected with the stem represented in 
Gothic falthan (cf. nhd. Falter : falten – maybe a later 
association?). The verb at least IS a reduplicative one (Past tense: 
faifalth).







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