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Global Etymologies and Alfredo Trombetti

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Global Etymologies and Alfredo Trombetti MOTHER TONGUE Journal of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory • Issue XVIII • 2013 50th Anniversary of J.H. Greenberg’s The Languages of Africa (1963) Global Etymologies and Alfredo Trombetti Shamil Nafiqoff Russian Academy of Sciences A b s t r a c t The article offered presents a brief outline of the contribution the famous Italian macro- comparativist Alfredo Trombetti has made in the field of the so-called Global etyma, being among the first who studied and practiced this approach at the turn of the XIX-XXth centuries. A number of comparanda are demonstrated to be research subjects of the subsequent long-range linguistic scholars with particular instances presented. Foreword. It is common knowledge that the great Italian comparativist A. Trombetti is often referred to as ‘father’ of long-range research, and of the so-called ‘global etymologies’ in particular. He was a predecessor or precursor of such noted long-range linguists as Vladislav Illich-Svitych, Morris Swadesh, Aharon Dolgopolsky, Joseph Greenberg, John Bengtson, Merritt Ruhlen, Vitaly Shevoroshkin, Sergei Starostin, to name but a few. Many of the above mentioned scholars have cited Trombetti in their sources or references. This is the case with Illich-Svitych 1971, Swadesh 1960, Bengtson and Ruhlen 1994 and in other works. A. Dolgopolsky for one had employed the technique of certain lexical and/or grammatical types as Trombetti had used starting with his earliest published works. The purpose of the present rather sketchy review is to acquaint readers of the Mother Tongue commemorative issue with global etymologies present in such publications as [Trombetti 1902, 1903; 1905, 1920, 1923, 1925] that have become rarities, despite such modern digitized versions as [Trombetti 1905] by the Google company.1 In his famous long-range studies, mostly in his native Italian, our scholar was wont to use such terms as voci universale, tipi diffusi/diffusissimi but not anything containing the term ‘global’. As regards taxonomy Trombetti operated with notions of ‘languages of the Old World vs the New World, further with the realm of the Boreal (Northern part of the Globe) languages (Italian ramo boreale) and Southern (part of the Earth)’ tongues (ramo australe in Italian). Throughout the works by Trombetti one also comes across the nine fold partitioning of all the world’s languages. Examples thereof follow: IV Indo-European languages, V Ural-Altaic tongues, VI Dravidian and Australian languages, VIII Munda-Polynesian tongues, IX languages of the Americas. This taxonomy of his demands a more detailed explanation and review, but for the purposes of the present article I mostly stick to the taxa — albeit hypothetical — current in the long-range research Russian Academy of Sciences, Senior Research Fellow (Oufa local branch, Bashkortostan). [email protected] 1 Free e-book: http://books.google.com/books/about/L_unit%C3%A0_d_origine_del_linguaggio.html?id=pBRZAAAAM AAJ 1 MOTHER TONGUE Journal of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory • Issue XVIII • 2013 50th Anniversary of J.H. Greenberg’s The Languages of Africa (1963) of our day, viz. Nostratic, Nilo-Saharan, (Congo-Saharan in some instances) Austric or Amerind super-stocks or macrophyla. The global etymologies researched by Alfredo Trombetti are truly voluminous. This being so, I have selected but a small sample, chiefly following the Swadesh standard 100 word list, with some asides occasionally made from his original 216 word list. This article consists of the factual data section, some parts à la discussion genre, followed by conclusions and the sources and references section. Now we commence with the l e x i c o n fragment. Global type NEG ‘see/eye’ [Trombetti 1920:325] This particular lexical type was first mentioned in [Trombetti 1903:165, № 639], the earliest of the macro-comparative studies that I am cognizant of. The scholar calls this item tipo diffusissimo and in the sense of ‘see’ (v.) referring to nak, nag and the like as one of the more diffused types in [Trombetti 1905:193]. Note: henceforth the rendering from Italian is by the present author. The Global etymology is to be inferred from: I. Nostratic and Sino-Caucasian: Georgian and Laz na, Athapascan naga, naal and similar glosses, Coptic nau; Berber enh – Tamil nōkka – Uralic näge; Nivkh nju ‘see’, nax ‘eye’. [Note: in Trombetti’s taxonomy Nivkh, with the other ‘Paleo-Siberian’ languages, forms a part of the ‘American Indian tongues’ macrophylum – this author]. Bodo nai ‘watch, observe’, nu ‘eye’, Chinese m-in ‘face’. II. Austric: Ainu nak-aru, cf. Melanesian nago ‘viso’… III. Australian [chiefly Paman-Nyungan, this writer’s note] nakk; nak. IV. Amerind: Algonkian ene-, new ‘see’, Carib enu, Costano inu ‘eye’, Wappo nao ‘see’, Yurok neγwo ‘see’; … From here on the samples I have picked are far smaller than Trombetti’s comparanda. Type TI(G) ‘see/eye’ [Trombetti 1920: 267-269] I. Nostratic: Svan the, Georgian dial. tho-l ‘see’; Latin tue ‘guard’ v. Ia. Sino-Caucasian: Kuki mi-t ‘eye’. II. Austric: Dayak, Bugi, i-ta, mi-ta, Tagalog, Bisaya ki-ta; Khmer pre-ta ‘see’; Thai ta ‘see’. IV. Amerind: Chinook tai, Seri i-to ‘eye’; Aztecan itta < ite-wa ‘see’. V. Indo-Pacific: Andamanese: Bea i-tā, Bale i-toa ‘see’, Juwoi re-tau ‘faccia’; Papuan: Gaima tao ‘eye’ v. VI. Nilo-Saharan: i-to ‘see’, etc. Global type GI, GU ‘eye’ [Trombetti 1920:163-166] [Left out by this author for MT readers to see for themselves.] The Roman IV here stands for Trombetti’s number IX, by and large the Roman numbers for the taxa are specific to this writer. 2 MOTHER TONGUE Journal of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory • Issue XVIII • 2013 50th Anniversary of J.H. Greenberg’s The Languages of Africa (1963) Global type LAP, LA(M)B ‘lick’ [Trombetti 1920: 288, 289]. The lineage of this word may be glossed from the following extracts of the work being cited: I. Nostratic: Dinka2 låp, perfective lap ‘lick’, Somali lēf ‘lick’; Indo-European: laph- : Armenian laph-em ‘lecco’, Albanian l’ap ‘lick water’, Russian dial, lopa-tj ‘fressen’; Indo- European [again]: lab-: Old German laff-an ‘lick’, Saxon lap-in-an ‘drink’ v., Old Icelandic lep-i- a ‘like a dog’, Old Slavic lobūzū ‘kiss’ n., Latin lambo ‘lick’. III. Austric: Dayak djelap, Bisaya dilap, Bugi lēpa ‘lick’. VI. Congo-Saharan [after E. Gregersen]: Bantu lamba ‘lick’, ‘lambire’ : Swahili, Pokomo lamba, Sukuma ramba, Sotho lapa ‘lick’ … Zulu lamba signifies ‘be hungry’ , Duala laba means ‘bite’ v. Global lexical type LE, LEME, LEBE ‘tongue’ [ex Trombetti 1920: 289] By its appearance this type is similar to the one above, with occasional identity in semantics quod vide infra. I. Nostratic, the Afroasiatic branch: Saho an-rab, Afar ar-rabā, Somali ar-rab, Galla [Oromo] al-lābo; Nandi nge-liep, Bari ngé-dep, Dinka liéb, liép; Ia Sino-Caucasian [branch of the hypothetical Borean ‘super-macro-family’]: Udo [Udi] lam- ‘lick’, etc. VI. Congo-Saharan: Kanuri lam, dial. ta-lam, te-lam, Maba de-lmi-k, ta-lme-k; cf. Fur dā-li, Wolof lamei, Mose zi-lam-de; Bantu: -leme ‘tongue’: Sotho le-leme, and so forth. The root is also fairly discernable in the samples adduced by A. Trombetti earlier [Trombetti: 1903: 163]: Sino-Caucasian: Thuš [Batsbi] lew-ar ‘speak’; Nostratic: Finnish lan-sa, Manchu leo – ‘idem’; Austric: Vietnamese loi, kai-loi ‘discourse’; Thai lāu; Karen lau ‘speak’. In Trombetti’s words “la medesima radice anche nell’ Oceania” (loc. cit.). The concept of ‘tongue’ as a somatic term may be expressed by a number of roots, as is well known. This is exemplified in many long-range studies by A. Trombetti, say in his most famous monograph which saw print in 1905 [Trombetti 1905, passim]: I. Nostratic, Altaic branch: Turkish dil ‘tongue’. II. Austric: Austronesian family: dila ‘tongue’, Iloco dil-dil ‘lick’. III. Australian: Walookera ū-tala ‘tongue’, etc. IV. Amerind: Wintu talal; Chon tāre, k-tal, del (dial.) ‘tongue’. V. Indo-Pacific: Bale aka-atal, some other Andamanese languages – tal. VII. Khoisan languages: Bushman [//Au//en] tari ‘tongue’. Sino-Caucasian macrofamily: Garo telai, etc. By the end of the twentieth century the reader comes across similar comparisons in works of several macro-comparativist scholars. Here is a sample published in [Blažek 1979: 34, 40]: Proto-form *tal: ~ dali ‘tongue’ Sino-Caucasian macrofamily: Sino-Tibetan *dlag ‘tongue’. Austric: Austronesian *dilah ‘tongue’. 2 For Trombetti Dinka and other Nilotic languages were included (as “Hamitic”) with Afroasiatic [Ed.]. 3 MOTHER TONGUE Journal of the Association for the Study of Language in Prehistory • Issue XVIII • 2013 50th Anniversary of J.H. Greenberg’s The Languages of Africa (1963) The Congo-Saharan superstock’s Nilo-Saharan branch *dali/mi/ ‘tongue’; Kordofanian: Tumtum djāro ‘idem’ , etc. The comparanda presented reflect a substantial refinement over Trombetti’s parallels with the selfsame root, namely scholars of our day insist on comparing proto-forms wherever available, though certain attempts in this directions had been made by A. Trombetti himself, quod videt supra. Worthy of note are frequent cases of direct continuity one observes in works of Trombetti and some later long-rangers: compare global roots KAP-, KOP- ‘capere’, KAP-, KAB- ‘afferare col denti’ [Trombetti 1920: 125, 127] with Eurasiatic *kap ‘seize’ [Greenberg 2002: 142, № 331]. In the well-known work [Bengtson & Ruhlen 1994] we come across the global etymology of KUNA ‘woman’. This widespread ancient root had been first explored by A. Trombetti. In his early research [Trombetti 1903: 155] he wrote about the universal spread of the type γυνή containing the word in question. In the famous book that produced a veritable sensation [Trombetti 1905: 179-100] the scholar present the following: according to his opinion the Ancient Greek word for ‘woman’ and the like present a composite name KU (kui, kua: see ‘man’) and NA (nai).
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