[gothic-l] Re: april (ja-stem)

[llama_nom]

Hails Manie,

Maybe.  Of course there are also Go. words ending in short -is, e.g. 
the former neuter es/os stems that have gone over to the a-
declension in Gothic (agis, etc.).  On the other hand, looking over 
the list I made during our discussions a while back, I see that all 
the other month names could well be interpreted as masculines:

http://www.oe.eclipse.co.uk/nom/calendar.htm

So *Apreileis might come about by analogy with *Januareis & 
*Faibruareis.  Your point about the accent in OHG is an interesting 
one.  I didn't know that.  Apparently in Old English even borrowed 
words conformed to the native pattern of initial stress (so says 
Campbell).  I'm not sure, but by the time the Latin month names were 
adopted by the Goths, Popular Latin like Greek may have lost the 
distinction of short/long vowels, except as it related to stress--
although the difference between previously long/short vowels was in 
some cases preserved as a qualitative difference.

I've been assuming, for no very good reason that I can remember, 
that Gothic kept the native pattern of initial stress.  I wonder if 
there's any evidence either way on this matter.

By the way, the main update to my chaotic calendrical rambings was 
that I found in Cleasby & Vigfusson's Icelandic Dictionary an 
etymology for misseri, namely Gmc. *missa + *jærjam (from 
*jæram "year"), i.e. "one of the two _divisions_ of the year".  
Which if right suggests Go. *missajeri.

Llama Nom




--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "Manie Lombard" <manielombard at c...> 
wrote:
> Háils
> 
> Assuming that the Gothic language stuck to the Latin accent (as 
did OHG in 
> Biblical names, for instance Adám, Israhél,.) and seeing that 
nouns of the 
> ja-stem with a long open stem-syllable take on the form -eis, 
would not 
> "april" become *apreileis?
> 
> (cf.: lekeis, siponeis,..)
> 
> 
> 
> Manie





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