Was the word "kunig/kunigas/kunigur" a gothic word?

[Francisc Czobor]

Hi, Michael and Urba,

I apologize, it occured to me twice to push by error the "Send" 
button before the message was ready...

What I write bellow is commonly accepted by linguists, and will take 
the examples from two sources:
- Koebler 
(http://www.koeblergerhard.de/germanistischewoerterbuecher/gotischeswo
erterbuch/GOT-K.pdf), and
- Online Etymology Dictionary (http://www.etymonline.com/index.php),
both these sources reflecting the commonly accepted viewpoints.

The Gothic word _kuni_ "clan, tribe, race, generation" is cognate with
other Germanic words like Old High German _chunni_, Old Norse _kyn_, 
Old English _cyn_ > Modern English _kin_, the reconstructed Proto-
Germanic (PG) form being *kunja-n, which comes from the Proto-Indo-
European (PIE) root *g'en- (g' = palatal g) "to produce, to beget, to 
be born", with the variants g'en at -, g'ne:-, g'no:- etc. From the same 
PIE root (and with the same Germanic sound shift, g' > k) are also 
Germanic words derived otherwise, like Old English _ge-cynd_ > 
English _kind_, _cynn_ "family", _cennan_ "beget, create", Old Norse 
kundr "son", German _Kind_ "child", and the suffixes Gothic -kunds, 
Old High German -kund.
Outside Germanic, other Indo-European examples from the same root are:
- Latin: genus "race, stock, kind", gi-gne-re "to beget", gna-sci "to 
be born", gens (Genitive: gentis) "race, clan", etc.
- Old Irish: ro-genar "I was born"
- Welsh: geni "to be born"
- Greek: genos "race, kind", gonos "birth, offspring, stock", gi-gne-
sthai "to become, happen"
- Lithuanian: gentis "kinsmen"
- Sanskrit: janati "begets, bears", janah "race", jatah (from PIE 
*g'n-to-) "born"
- Avestan: zi-zan-enti "they bear"
Regarding the derivatin of "king" from "kin", I thing that there is 
no doubt that this is the case, with the remark that the derivation 
happened not in Modern English, but in PG: *kuni-(an) + *-ingaz = 
*kuningaz.
I don't know what connection could be between Gothic _kuni_ and 
Lithuanian _kunas_ "body". In any case, the Gothic word for sure 
doesn't come from Lithuanian: it is a common Germanic word coming 
from PIE *g'en-, and the shift g' > k occured in Germanic, but not in 
Baltic; in Lithuanian g' > "z^" ([zh], French "j") or sometimes > g, 
like in the above example _gentis_, or in _gyvas_ "alive". Thus, kuni 
and kunas are not even cognates at the Indo-European level.
Only two alternatives remain:
1. chance resemblance, no connection;
2. Goth. kuni > Lith. kunas, but the meaning shift "clan, tribe" 
> "body" doesn't look very plausible.
 
Francisc

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "urba_kestutis" <urba_kestutis at ...> 
wrote:
>
> --- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, Michael Erwin <merwin@> wrote:
> >
> > I still think 'king' comes from 'kin' or  for the Gothic.
> > 
> > Of course one C-Gmc root can yield two Gothic words, as with mawi 
> and  
> > magatha, (or two English words, as with churn and quern, shirt 
> and  
> > skirt, ship and skiff, etc.) so that kindins and *kunig-- might 
> come  
> > from the same root. IIRC, mawi and magatha reflect changing word- 
> > formation patterns within C-Gmc and Gothic, while shirt and 
skirt  
> > reflect internal borrowing among Germanic languages.
> >
> 
> In lithuanian (neighbors of goths) there is the word kunas 
> (pronounciatin is like eng. koonus) with a meaning BODY and  
latvian 
> language has the simmilarity. So, Gothic 'kuni' is possibly related 
> to  lithuanian kunas, because 'kuni' has the meaning from the same 
> body, too but in prussian there is no koonas but kermenis. How to 
> explain this puzzle?
>







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