Deer and Yellow words

[X99Lynx at aol.com]

Regarding the posts from Hans-Werner Hatting and Brian M. Scott below, I
think I need to mention some things:

1. Note that I used "cf." in (... deer is "jelen" (cf., Pol.,"zielony",...).
In law, cf. in a citation means "compare".  It is somewhat noncommittal,
meant to note a parallel that may be relevant in some indirect way.  In
paleontology and taxonomy, "cf." refers to a tentative identification, one
that may not be correct.

Obviously, both of these correspondents feel that the etymologies here are
settled and there is absolutely no connection between the words.  I prefer to
think this is something about which reasonable persons can differ reasonably.

2. Based on some good evidence, I have an honest belief that there were no
independent color words in *PIE.  All such words were similes, metaphors or
by analogy with particular objects, materials or processes.  As some early
Classicists pointed out, there was no word for "color" in Homer.  The idea of
independent colors was probably a later invention.  There were only very
specific colored objects of specific hue to use by analogy, along with
specific stains and natural pigments, few or none of which were modern
primary colors.  References to reflected color waves, surface textures and
brightness were all combined.  (The possible exception is the black/brown
color word that may have been a modern-style color word in the Iliad.)

Even Berlin & Kay, who I think go much too far in assuming consistency in
pre-Newtonian color terms, say that Homeric Greek was a mere "3b stage level"
language, with only four "basic color terms" versus more modern languages
with as many as 14.  My assumption is that the Greeks were more advanced in
standardizing color terms than PIE speakers and their dispersed immediate
descendants.  From the Aegeanet and elsewhere, I've help collect large
folders of notes over the past two years where serious analysts verify again
and again that color terms cannot be identified with any confidence in Near
Eastern and Linaer B texts

3.  Because of the above, I must honestly find such etymologies as "*el2-)
originally" meaning "red, brown" and *g'hel- "originally" meaning "green,
yellow" as unsatisfactory and dubious.  But once again this is the type of
thing that reasonable persons may differ about reasonably.  When these terms
eventually, due to some material process or by analogy, came to mean colors,
they were probably originally based on specific things or actions - not on a
concept of independent colors.  What those objects were is a different
question.

And of course I do not know how it would affect these reconstructions if for
example "*el2-" and *g'hel- originally referred to the same thing - e.g., a
deer hide - or different parts of a deer - antlers and hides.  Again, I
suspect it is likely that these words refer to by-products as to the live
animal.  Homer never mentions an elephant using the elephant word.  The word
is only used to describe ivory.

4. The reason that I cf'ed - Pol.,<zielony> - was because it sent to me with
a group of other words - <jalos-sko>, cow; <gala:z:> (?), branch;
<jalow-iec>, barren or withered field or forest; BUT SEE <plowa>, flaxen,
yellow > <plowa zwierzyna>, red deer - and together with other examples
including some Hebrew el- words that do seem somehow to connect antlers and
branches, if I understand correctly.  That connection does make sense.  Wood
and antler were worked in much the same way and some start out looking
structurally pretty much the same.  Antlers branch.  Wood branches. Both can
be colored brown- yellow- green (unripe) - red.  Thus, maybe, elms and elks
together, as mentioned below.

I originally wrote:
(BTW, in Slavic, deer is "jelen" (cf., Pol.,"zielony", green, definitely not
red; cf, Greek, "chalkeios") which might connect it to the "yellow deer"
which is what the fallow is called in Iran. "Fallow" might even suggest the
same color connection.)

In a message dated 5/22/2001 11:37:40 PM, bmscott at stratos.net writes:
<<Aren't <jel-> and <ziel-> here just the expected reflexes of PIE *el-
and *g^hel- resp.?  And if so, how is Pol. <zielony> relevant?>>

In a message dated 5/25/2001 6:42:05 PM, hwhatting at hotmail.com writes:
<< Slavic "jelen'" is not connected to Polish "zielony". "jelen'" is originally
an n-stem formation (Proto-Slavic *el-en-) of the root PIE *el- (whither "elm"
and "elk"), which Watkins (AHD of IE roots s.v. el2-) quotes with an original
meaning "red, brown", while "zielony" goes back to a Slavic "zelenu0-" ("u0" is
to denote the back yer) belonging to the PIE root *g'hel- "green, yellow". >>

Steve Long