Language and Etymology

The work presents etymologies of the Turkic names for the seven most important cereals: barley, corn, millet, oats, rice, rye and wheat. Altogether, 106 names are discussed.
As yet, this subject has not been dealt with as a whole. Propositions for etymologies of various names in single languages are scattered in dictionaries and articles, usually only accompanied by a brief explanation. Here, the author tries to provide a possibly comprehensive commentary.
Each entry presents a list of phonetic variants of the word, an overview of previous etymologies and the author’s standpoint expressed as exhaustively as possible but without loquacity.
The work closes with an enumeration and brief commentary of the most common naming patterns and semantic types which can be distinguished in the presented material.

The article examines series of Slavic denominations of potato containing reduplicated clusters of sounds. A hypothesis for sound-symbolic origin of the words is presented. Тhe following data were taken into account: the formal and semantic parallelism between words with reduplication expressing the same meaning, their formal and semantic variation, formal irregularities , contamination.

The paper discusses etymology of some stems, among them, stems m-kh-i-ar-ul-i ‘cheerful’ and sa-kh-el-i ‘name’. It is supposed that the both stems are participles derived from the verb kh-ev-a ‘to sound, to talk aloud, to recite’. The same root occurs in verbs kh-ed-v-a ‘to see’, kh-eb-a ‘to touch’. The original meaning of the root kh- must have been expression of physical contact. The similar shared origin of different perception verbs is attested in wide range of languages .
სტატიაში განხილულია რამდენიმე ფუძე, მათ შორის, ფუძეები მ-ხი-არ-ულ-ი და სა-ხ-ელ-ი. მიჩნეულია, რომ ამ ორივე ფორმის ამოსავალია ხ-ევ-ა ზმნა, რომლის მნიშვნელობაც უნდა ყოფილიყო `ხმიანობა, ხმამაღლა ლაპარაკი~ ან `სიმღერა~. დასმულია საკითხი იმის შესახებ, რომ თვითონ ხ-ევ-ა, კერძოდ,  ზმნის ძირისეული ხ-, დაკავშირებული უნდა იყოს ფიზიკური შეხების გამომხახტველ ხ- ძირთან (ხ-ებ-ა), აგრეთვე მხედველობის გამომხატველი ზმნების ძირისეულ ხ-სთან. ხ- ძირი მიჩნეულია ცალთანხმოვნიანი ზმნური ძირების რიგის ზმნად, რომლის  თავდაპირველი მნიშვნელობა უნდა ყოფილიყო `ფიზიკური შეხება~, საიდანაც აღქმის სხვადასხვა მოდალობის გამოხატვა განვითარებულა.

Trading Advisor's reference book of eighteenth century with a phrase book of colloquial russian greetings, farewells etc. This application is a compilation of already existed at his time russian phrase books and diaries, written by travellers to Russia  in the 16th and 17th centuries. Most of these phrase books became the property of science now and therefore Marperger's copy of them with plenty of mistakes in the transcriptions and interpretations looks rather inconclusive.

This article deals with the history and word formation of the Icelandic word for ‘police’, i.e. lögregla. The word constitutes an interesting case of word formation in that said lexeme is a dvandva compound whose creation is related to the expression að halda uppi lögum og reglu ‘to maintain law and order’. Moreover, it is argued that the word has arisen in the wake of the Icelandic purist movement in the first half of the 19th century, and that its creator is Konráð Gíslason, who was at the time a
member of the Icelandic Literary Society (Hið íslenzka bókmenntafélag) and editor of the journal Fjölnir. According to the sources, the word, lögregla, cannot have been formed as an independent lexical item. In fact, the word appears first in a compound with maður ‘man’, meaning ‘policeman’ or, more precisely, ‘a man who is in charge of maintaining
law and order’. It is argued that lögregla has in fact been created in order to gradually substitute the Danish loanword pólití, first in compounds such as pólitímaður and pólitíþjónn ‘policeman’, and then as a single lexeme. The Danish loanword pólití had a twofold meaning: ‘policeman’ and ‘police’. Moreover, it is argued that lögregla, as an unbound lexeme, was initially a shortened form for lögreglumaður, and later assumed
the general meaning ‘police force’ by means of synecdoche (pars pro toto).

This articles summarises the various types of island-names in the Northern Isles of Scotland. The vast majority of names are of Scandinavian origin, with a substantial number of  Insular Scots coinages. Only a handful of island-names can be judged to be of pre-Scandinavian origin.

Ethiopia is the cradle of coffee culture, yet early evidence for it is scant. Does the Ge’ez word for coffee reveal clues? I propose an etymological link to the Zorastrian Emperor of Persia, Khosrow I (or II), reflecting contemporaneous Aksumite ‘anti-coffee’ sentiments.

Ge’ez, used in Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo liturgy since the fourth century, is traced to the first century emergence of Aksum(1). Ge’ez for coffee is Etse Kusra/Khusra (Etse=plant)(2). Few early manuscripts exist(1). The fifteenth century Dǝrsanä Ṣǝyon probably reflects earlier traditions: coffee is described as ‘a devilish evil tree’; kusra as traded with Moslems but strictly forbidden for Christians(3).

Tadesse(2) links kusra to Asian words, including eunuch. In Persian, kusra can mean ‘the habit of drinking much wine’(4). Semantic shifts from ‘wine’ to ‘coffee’ are noted in other languages. Alternatively, or concomitantly, the origin could be a name. Likely an enemy: kusra shares the Ge’ez consonants of ‘abominable’(3).

Khosrow I ‘Anushirvan’ was a powerful enemy in the sixth century, so was his grandson Khosrow II ‘Parviz’ in the seventh. Transliterations of Khosrow include ‘Khusrau’(5) and ‘Khusra’(6). Furthermore, Anushirvan likely knew of coffee. He ousted Aksum from Yemen, and actively sought out medical knowledge from other cultures(5).

Author: REV J. B. HEARD, M.A., THE TRIPARTITE NATURE OF MAN: SPIRIT, SOUL, AND BODY. APPLIED TO ILLUSTRATE AND EXPLAIN THE DOCTRINES OF ORIGINAL SIN, THE NEW BIRTH , THE DISEMBODIED STATE, AND THE SPIRITUAL BODY. EDINBURGH : T. & T. CLARK, 1882

Excellent scholarship, insights, and rare teaching lost to the modern world.

There are always two sides to a door. It has two faces without being two-faced. It is derived by merging two Old English forms: the singular "dor" and the plural “duru."

To be a door is to embrace multiplicities.

To be a door is to make choices all your life. More accurately to be a door is to perpetually unmake the choice that you last made; to choose between being opened, or being closed.

To be a door is to choose without taking sides.

Read more...

"Paprika! is a window into emerging discourse from Yale School of Architecture and Yale School of Art." For the full edition edited by Jane van Velden, Paul DeFazio & Jerry Chow, visit  https://yalepaprika.com/folds/reading-the-room

Cross Reference. See also other elements of architecture in the Articles section:

Door Window Tap Switch
Windows
Balcony

Designed to acquaint both young and old with the familiar shapes of light found within your bodies and in the nature around you. The ancient Letters are called the ALhhim/Elohim, as Strengths of combined Light energies, those in night and day, through which Sounds of Light are uttered. They vibrate through their forms the sounds of spiritual meanings of INfinite. The ALphah Bayit song in the following pages vivifies these characters and makes the alphabet easy for everyone to learn. The LETTERS are Sound Vibrations of LIGHT. They are shared by Peoples of Proto-Canaanite as Phoenicians, Hebrews, Samaritans, Brahmic and Arabic clans emerging in the Mesopotamia cradle of civilizations. They inherently abide together to form all things and appear as patterns of Light weavings. Though through them they are uttered in languages, they are only Heard, not Seen. They are Tools of the Writers, weapons of enemies, and cultivators of Friends. In brief, they are properly known as The ALhhim-the cohesive vibrations of the Faces of Yehu and their sides of Illuminations: Moon and Sun.  An orientation of the Letters of Antiquities deduced by the 22 inner primary assembled energies in the Body. Upon MAN and all species discerning the origins of its body-suit weaving, suspended in stones of faculties, men and species speak their peace as flowing messages in Seed.

Ameno e instructivo recorrido por una larga serie de palabras agrupadas en torno a sus raíces. Cada uno de los treinta y dos primeros capítulos está encabezado por un étimo, a partir del cual hay una relación más o menos larga de palabras en las que figura. El capítulo trigésimo tercero tiene la particularidad de que está dedicado a vocablos surgidos de la liturgia y del mundo clerical. Fomenta el interés por el latín, dado que a cualquiera le gusta tener una idea de la procedencia de las palabras que usa.
No se trata de un libro técnico y difícil de leer, sino que está concebido y realizado de forma narrativa, de modo que hay un hilo que va encadenando las palabras. La diversión puede surgir al comprobar que palabras que se creían muy distantes unas de otras comparten raíz, y otras cosas.
El capítulo décimo comienza preguntando ¿Medias o calcetines?, y luego en el texto se ve el motivo de la pregunta, y también incluye un eslogan muy divertido de 1920.
Respetar el lenguaje es respetar a los demás. Hablar correctamente viene a ser algo parecido, pero mejor aún, que vestir correctamente. Hablar o escribir mal no es una buena carta de presentación. Todo lo que ayude a mejorar esta faceta ha de ser bienvenido.
Al final del libro hay un índice ordenado alfabéticamente con las 1800 palabras y expresiones utilizadas y comentadas.

This article looks at how Scandinavians perceived place-names of non-Scandinavian origin by means of investigating Scottish place-names mentioned in the Sagas. The article pioneers a new methodological approach in place-name research by looking at naming strategies and applying these on a historical material.

Tevazu kelimesi ve-da-‘a (وضع)’dan türüyor. Ko(y)mak, bırakmak anlamına gelen ve-da-‘a fiilinden… İlgimi çekmiştir bu anlama gelen bir fiille, ‘alçakgönüllülük’ de dediğimiz tevazu arasında nasıl bir ilişki olabileceği. Acaba kendimizi yükseklerden alıp aşağı mertebelere ko(y)mak/bırakmak mıydı kastedilen? Veya nefsimizi bir kenara ko(y)mak/bırakmak… Beni tam olarak tatmin etmeyen ve çoğunlukla -insan haysiyeti aleyhine- tek taraflı bulduğum bu tahminî izahlardan sonra tevazuyu, yine ko(y)mak filinden türeyen konum kelimesi ile birlikte düşünmeyi denedim...

The discussion of Uralic theonyms in this 2012 conference paper have been significantlu developed and discussed in more detail in "Language and Mythology" (2017): https://www.academia.edu/35369652/Language_and_Mythology_Semantic_Correlation_and_Disambiguation_of_Gods_as_Iconic_Signs

The discussion of internal developments in Finnic mythology are discussed with emphasis on the epic Sampo-Cycle in "Confluence, Continuity and Change in the Evolution of Mythology" (2012): https://www.academia.edu/3687105/Confluence_Continuity_and_Change_in_the_Evolution_of_Mythology_The_Case_of_the_Finno-Karelian_Sampo-Cycle
and with emphasis on the role of the ritual specialist in "Shamans, Christians and Things in between":
https://www.academia.edu/4049431/Shamans_Christians_and_Things_in_between_From_Finnic_Germanic_Contacts_to_the_Conversion_of_Karelia

Kannada is major Dravidian language spoken by about seven crore people in the state of Karnataka in South India. T Burrow and M B Emeneau were the first to bring out an etymological dictionary for the Dravidian languages amongst which Kannada is one. Then on a tradition of such works is built in the language. Here is a depiction of this tradition.

در منابع تاریخی و جغرافیایی عربی و فارسی، نام سیرجان به صورت سیرجان، سیرگان، شیرگان، السیرجان و الشیرَجان آمده‌است. در یک متن پهلوی به نام «نامه‌های منوچهر» متعلق به اواسط قرن سوم هجری، خطاب به موبد سیرجان و زرتشتیان سیرجان با املای پهلوی، سیرکان نوشته شده‌است. تا کنون پیشنهاد قابل قبولی برای این نام پیشنهاد نشده‌است. به نظر می‌رسد در نام سیرجان یک ریشۀ بسیار پرکاربرد وجود دارد که نه تنها در زبان‌های سنسکریت، اوستایی، سغدی، ختنی، خوارزمی، پارتی، بلوچی، بلکه در زبان‌های هند و اروپایی چون زبان یونانی، واژه‌های بسیاری از آن بر جای مانده‌است. واژۀ سره، به معنی «خوب» و «خالص» را می‌توان با جزء اصلی سیرجان از یک ریشه شمرد. در این مقاله، با تکیه بر دلایل واژه‌شناسی و شباهتی که در نام شهرهای مشابه آن چون شیراز، سیریز و غیره وجود دارد، کوشش شده‌است تا معنایی برای نام سیرجان پیشنهاد گردد.

This article is an interdisciplinary study of berserks which goes beyond the
myths, placing much emphasis on textual analyses and some on archaeology.
It appears that the popular image of the axe-wielding, mushroomeating
berserk warrior of the Viking Age is due to a confusion of facts
and fiction from Old Norse prose but also a misattribution of the term in
legal texts. The article also integrates battlefield archaeology, discussing
whether berserks formed actual military units or not, and explores the
etymology behind the word.

Abstract: This article looks at the development process of two variant of MP. abstract noun suffixes -išn and -išt, also MP. infinitive suffixes -dan/ -tan. Historical considerations and the same origin make it possible to deal with the both -išn and -dan/ -tan simultaneously. Also we take a glance at NP. element شن° in words like پاداشن.

چکیده: در این مقاله به فرآیند شکل‌گیری دو گونۀ پسوند سازندۀ اسمِ مصدر در فارسی میانه، یعنی -išn و -išt و نیز پسوند سازندۀ مصدر، یعنی -dan/ -tan پرداخته می‌شود. نگاه تاریخی و خاستگاه یکسان امکان می‌دهد که به دو پسوند -išn و -dan/ -tan هم‌زمان پرداخته شود. هم‌چنین، نیم‌نگاهی هم به عنصر °شن در برخی از واژه‌های فارسی نو مانند پاداشن خواهیم داشت.

کلیدواژه‌ها: پسوند، مصدر، اسمِ مصدر، اسمِ معنا، اسمِ فعل، هندواروپایی، اوستایی، فارسی باستان، فارسی میانه، پهلوی

Tarihinde ilk kez Eski Uygurcada ‘alçak gönüllü, mültefit (EUTS: 7); freundlich, mild (UW: 92)’ anlamıyla rastlanan alçak kelimesinin etimolojisi hakkında farklı görüşler vardır. Bu çalışmada alçak kelimesine dair fonetik, morfolojik ve semantik hususiyetler ortaya konarak, kelimenin paralel örneklerle takip edilebilen yeni bir etimolojisi yapılacaktır.

In fiction a character says something and means nothing at all. Speaker in a fictional text cannot speak beyond what he/she has already always spoken. The image in a mirror gives an illusion that it speaks but actually it emits no sound.

The reader has no option but to interpret (which is synonymous to misinterpretation)--- the entire exercise is 'fake.'

That is why 'the author ' remains immortal culminating 'the reader's' imminent presence--the result is death of the reader..

This paper is made available at http://joell.in/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/Derridian-Metaphor.pdf

The fortress of the Dnieper-settlement had two names, Kiev and Sambat, because the Persian kaif and the Magyar szombat, derivable from the Hebrew שַׁבָּת shabbath, essentially have the same meaning, namely ‘rest’. Now we are confident that the Kiev – kaif, ‘rest’, etymology may be considered to be definitely set at rest.