Dolgopolsky's new book

[Wolfgang Behr]

----------------------------Original message----------------------------
Larry Trask wrote (at 09:26 03.04.98 EST):
 
LT| Also, I note that Dolgopolsky cites Sanskrit <simha-> `lion' and
LT| Armenian <inj> `leopard', plus Tocharian <sisak> `lion', to justify a
LT| supposed PIE *<singho-> `lion, leopard'.  It's news to me that the
LT| Sanskrit/Armenian link is generally accepted, though I have certainly
LT| seen it mooted, and the Tocharian form is new to me (and not obviously
LT| convincing).
 
Roots with the meaning lion/leopard are rather diverse in IE, leaving
ample space for all sorts of Lehn- & Wanderwort-speculations. While
Arm. _inj_ and OI _si.mha-_ would indeed seem to point to a derivation
from (Proto-Indo-Armenian, *not* PIE) *sin<gj>o-, as first pointed out
by Meillet (_Esquisse d'une grammaire compare'e de l'arme'nien classique_,
Wien 1936, p.142), and accepted, among others, by Gamkrelidze-Ivanov
(1984, II: 507, who reconstruct *sin<gj>[H]o-, with "virtual" aspiration
[H] under the glottalic theory), the PIE root *lew-, posited by GI as
underlying Gr. _le'o:n_ (cf. also Lin.B _re-wo-te-jo_ "lion-like"), Lat.
_leo:_, *as well as* Germanic +liuwaz > OHG _le:o-_, _lewo-_, MHG _lewe-_,
OE _le:o_, is seen as problematic by more traditional IEists, who would
account for the Gmc. forms in terms of late loans from Latin and Greek.
The common IE character of this root, however, is strenghtened by a Hitt.
reading _walwa-_ (=Luw.) of the Sumerogram/s UR.MA_H-as^/-is^ "lion"
(cf. GI, II: 508) and the fact that it has possible extra-IE connections
with Egyptian _rw_, Coptic _laBoi_, Akkad. _la:bu_, Ugaritic _lb'_,
OHebr. _la:bi:'_, Arab. _labwa_, and, possibly, Kartvelian *lom- and
its derivations (GI, II: 508).
 
As for Dolgopolsky's attempt to drag Tocharian A _s'is'@k, B s.ecake
"lion" into the Indo-Armenian root (does he have to say anything about
external ralationships of *his* *singho-?), the idea of a regular
correspondance with OI _si.mha-_ (going back to, at least, Schrader-
Nehring, _Reallexicon_ II: 19) has long been given up in favour of
the following six competing proposals:
 
        (a) Toch.A loan <-- Skr. _sim.ha-_ or _sim.haka_, B <--
            Skr. *kes'aka- "maehnig" (Schwentner, IF 1939, p. 59)
 
        (b) Both Toch. A and B loans ("transcriptions") from Chinese
            shi1zi3 "lion" (Pelliot, _T'oung Pao_ 1932, p. 449)
 
        (c) Both Toch. A and B, *as well as* the Arm. and Greek
            forms loans from "quelque langue asiatique" (Van
            Windekens, _Orbis_ 13, 1964, p. 226 seq.)
 
        (d) Toch. AB related to the IE root *kais- "hair, mane", as
            evidenced by OI _ke:sara-_ "hair, mane" and Lat. _caesa-
            rie:s_ "hair on the head" (Pokorny, IEW, p. 520)
 
        (e) Toch. A s'is'@k derived from PIE *si:t-e-qo- (var. A _s'is'ak_
            < *sit-e-qo-) and B _s.ecake_ < *se:t-e-qo, cf. Lat. _saeta_
            "soies, crins, poil (rude) d'un animal, piquants crinie`re",
            i.e ultimately from PIE *se:(i)-/*s at i-/si- "bind", with
            proposed semantic extension -->  bound" --> "band" -->
            "bristle of an animal" (Van Windekens, _Le Tokharien confronte'
            avec les autres langues indo-europe'ennes_, I, p. 480-481)
 
        (f) Toch. A _s'is'@k_ (through assimilation/contamination with A
            _s'is'ri_ "mane") < *sis'@k < *s at ys'@ke- < *s at ns'ake- <
            *s at nkj@ke- < * sing'heko- vs. B s.ecake (through loss of nasal)
            < *s.encake < prototoch. ablaut variant *sjeens'@ke. The
            word would thus be indirectly related to Sanskrit _sim.ha_
            (D.Q. Adams, KZ 97.2, pp. 284-286).
 
As was pointed out to me by Don Ringe in a discussion of the Toch words on
the Indo-European list a couple of years ago (which I will try to find,
if you're interested), the fact that the only parts of the Toch. words
that match by regular sound laws are A - at k- = B -ak-, i.e. that the
comparison of all other segments involves a plethora of analogies,
back-formations etc. which are hard to justify, and usually entirely ad
hoc, would strongly seem to point in the direction of borrowings from
different source languages (or at least from dialects of the same language).
The most likely candidate for such a source language is certainly some
variety of Middle Iranian and I would be most happy to hear from other
people on the list if they could enlighten me in that direction or
about any other theory on the etymology of the Tocharian lions.
 
Cheers, WOlfgang
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
The idea of
a rela
What does Dolgopolsky relate *singho- to outside PIE? While IE *lew- and
its
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  Wolfgang Behr, Research Fellow, Int'l. Inst. for Asian Studies
     wbehr at rullet.leidenuniv.nl | w.behr at em.uni-frankfurt.de
         http://iias.leidenuniv.nl/fellows/fellows.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~