Proto-Uralic Homeland (VII): Kinship & Numerals

This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

12. Kinship Terminology

12.1. Immediate Family

PU? (Saa.?, Fi.?, Md.?, Ma.?, Kh.?, Ms.?, Hu.?, Smy.?) *äććä?/*eć(ć)ä/*ić(ć)ä/*äjćä ‘father’ (UEW Nº 35). PSmy. was was borrowed into Yukaghir ečē ‘father’. Samoyedic form borrowed into Yukaghir ečē ‘father’ (Aikio 2014: 57)

NOTE. Pre-PSmy. *äjćä? could reflect an earlier Pre-PIIr. *eićo- or PIIr. *aića- ‘to control, to own’. An underlying Pre-PFi., Pre-PSaa. (based on PSaa. *e̮ćē from Skolt and Kildin Saami) and PMa. *ićä could reflect PIIr. … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (VII): Kinship & Numerals”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (VI): Mythology & Metallurgy

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

10. Metallurgy

PU (Saa., Fi., Md., Ma., P, Ms.?, Kh., Smy.?) *wäśkä (*waśki?) ‘copper; ore, brass’ (UEW Nº 1123; Kallio 2006: 6). Irregular cognates suggest it might have been borrowed during the split-up of Proto-Uralic (cf. Aikio 2015: 42). However, compare potentially regular cognates from *wäskä in PFi. *vaski ‘ore, copper, bronze; brass’ (Kallio 2012: 167; Zhivlov 2014: 115), PSaa. *weśkä ‘copper; brass’, Md. Kazhlodka viśkä ‘chain’ (Häkkinen 2012: 18), and possibly Hu. … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (VI): Mythology & Metallurgy”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (V): Technology & Trade

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

8. Technology

8.1. Pottery

PU (Fi., Ma., Kh., Ms., Hu.) *pata ‘pot’ (UEW Nº 710) has a striking resemblance with NWIE *pod-óm, cf. PGmc. *fatą ‘vat, vessel’, Lith. púodas ‘pot’ (Kroonen 2013: 131; Dérksen 2015: 372). However, a Pre-PGmc. origin of a PFU stem seems unlikely – based on the lack of any other case with such a large distribution. Assuming that an unattested PIIr. **padá- underlies the PU form (cf. Parpola … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (V): Technology & Trade”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (IV): Animal Husbandry

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

7. Animal Husbandry

7.1. Milk

PFU (Saa., Fi., Md., Ma., P, Kh., Ms. Hu.) *waji ‘butter/grease’ (UEW Nº 1156).

NOTE. Aikio (2019: 48) contra Häkkinen (2009: 28-30) considers an original meaning ‘grease’ more likely than ‘butter’. Indeed, a more general meaning is always the most conservative approach. In fact, it was possibly borrowed from Smy. into PTurk. *bań ‘fat, grease; edible oil, butter; lubricant’ (Czentnár 2015: 9-17). What is striking about Aikio’s comments … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (IV): Animal Husbandry”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (III): Agriculture & Apiculture

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

5. Apiculture

5.1. Honey and honeybees

PU (Saa. ← Fi., Md., Ma.?, Hu., P → Smy.) *meti ‘honey, nectar’ (UEW Nº 539) ← PIE/Pre-PIIr. *medʰu ‘honey, mead’.

NOTE. The specific source PIE stage is impossible to determine with precision. For supporters of Indo-Uralic, the dental could represent the divergent evolution in both dialects (Kümmel 2019). However, the substitution of PIE *dʰ for PU *t and final PIE *-u for PU *-i are regular … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (III): Agriculture & Apiculture”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (II): Forests & Climate

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

3. Forests

3.1. Regular terms

PU (Saa.? Fi., Md., Ma., Ms., Hu.? Smy.) *kojwa ‘birch’ (UEW Nº 334).

PU (Saa., Fi., Ma., P, Kh., Ms.) *ćänä ‘bracket fungus’ (UEW Nº 995; Aikio 2020: 115 with references).

PU (Md., Ma., Hu.) *ćalV/*će̮li/*ćälV ‘elm’ (UEW Nº 926), from PMd. *śäľǝŋ, PMa. *šolǝ, Hu. szil (Aikio 2020: 101 with references).

PU (Saa., Fi., Md., Ma., P, Kh., Ms., Smy.) *kowsi/*kusa ‘spruce; fir’ (UEW Nº … Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (II): Forests & Climate”

Proto-Uralic Homeland (I): Foraging & Animals

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This post is part of a draft on palaeolinguistics and the Proto-Uralic homeland. See below for the color code of protoforms.

1. Foraging

1.1. Hunting

PFU (Fi., Ma., Md., Ms., Hu.) *lewi- ‘to shoot’ (UEW Nº 482; Aikio 2019: 47).

PU (Saa., Fi., Md., Ma., Kh., Ms., Hu., Smy.) *je̮ŋsi/*joŋsi ‘bow’ (UEW Nº 190; Aikio 2020: 71 with references).

PU (Saa.? Fi., Ma., Kh., Ms., Hu., Smy.) *jänti(ni) ‘sinew; (bow)string’ (UEW Nº 169; Aikio 2019: 47 with references).

PU (Saa., Fi., Md.., Ma., P, Kh., Ms., Hu., Smy.) *ńe̮li (*ńōle) ‘arrow’ (UEW Nº 622).… Read the rest “Proto-Uralic Homeland (I): Foraging & Animals”

Slavs in the Making – History, Linguistics and Archaeology

Florin Curta strikes again with the early release of an unpublished book, Slavs in the Making. History, Linguistics and Archaeology in Eastern Europe (ca. 500 – ca. 700), Routledge (2021), freely available now at Academia.edu.

Interesting excerpts (emphasis mine, minor stylistic changes for clarity):

Migration

Much has been made of the supposed conservatism of the Slavic ceramic repertoire. In reality, the fossilization of pottery forms and, occasionally, patterns of decoration, are typically indications of maintaining pottery-making and its appearance “as remembered.” As such, conservatism (leading to the treatment of pots as heirlooms, a material reminiscence of life

… Read the rest

Early Uralic – Indo-European contacts within Europe

One of the most interesting aspects for future linguistic research, boosted by the current knowledge in population genomics, is the influence of Uralic – most likely spread initially with Corded Ware peoples across northern Europe – on early Indo-European dialects.

Whereas studies on the potential Afroasiatic (or Semitic), Vasconic, Etruscan, or non-Indo-European in general abound for ancient and southern IE branches (see e.g. more on the NWIE substrate words), almost exclusively Uralicists have dealt with the long-term mutual influences between Indo-European and Uralic dialects, and often mostly from the Uralic side.… Read the rest “Early Uralic – Indo-European contacts within Europe”