Indo-European ‘stones’

Authors

BLAŽEK Václav

Year of publication 2022
Type Article in Periodical
Magazine / Source Journal of Indo-European Studies
MU Faculty or unit

Faculty of Arts

Citation
Web Webová stránka časopisu
Keywords Indo-European; stone; etymology; semantic motivation
Description This article concentrates on Germanic *halluz / *halliz / *hallaz ‘rock, stone’ along with its closest derivatives within Germanic, from the perspective of the broader discussion of their relatives in Indo-European. Three etymological solutions proposed during the 19th and 20th centuries are discussed in detail, with a special stress on word formation, internal etymology and semantic motivation. The most convincing solution seems to be the oldest one, based on the root *kelH3- ‘to raise’, which implies the primary meaning ‘the protruding one’ --> ‘rock’. Besides the traditionally accepted cognates in Greek, Latin, Baltic and possibly Slavic, comparanda from Iranian are included, recognized already by Morgenstierne in 1927, along with newly added Indo-Aryan, Anatolian and Celtic cognates.
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