The True Story of the Celts
I recently watched a three-part documentary on Curiosity Stream called “Celts: The Untold Story”. Like most Curiosity Stream videos, it is very interesting and entertaining. But like many Curiosity Stream videos, particularly those dealing with prehistory, its fundamental message is simply wrong. One of the major points of this documentary was that the Celts began…
Grassmann’s Law in Greek
UPDATE December 03, 2022: Soon after publishing the post below, the Ancient Greek word pēkhys ‘forearm’ came to my attention. This word is clearly from PIE *bheh2ghjus, other reflexes of which are Sanskrit bahu and Proto-Germanic *bōguz (which eventually became bough in English). If what I explained below were correct, the Greek word should have…
A Celtic Calendar
Below is a PDF featuring my derivative of the Celtic Calendar found at Coligny in France in 1897. For a good article on the Coligny Calendar, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coligny_calendar . And here’s a very interesting page on the Coligny Calendar from Caer Australis – https://caeraustralis.com.au/celtcalmain.htm . The first page of the PDF explains the structure of…
The Word for “Sister” in Proto-Celtic and Proto-Germanic
The following table shows my reconstructions of some of the forms of the declension of the word for “sister” in Proto-Indo-European, Proto-Celtic and Proto-Germanic. I have included only the nominative, accusative, genitive and dative forms (singular and plural). Proto-Indo-EuropeanProto-CelticProto-Germanicnsswesōrswesūr > sweūrswezōr > swestērasswesorṃswesoran > sweoranswezarų > swestrųgsswesrósswerros > sweorosswestraz > swestresdsswesréiswerrei > sweoreiswestrīnpswesoresswesores > sweoresswezarez…
On Proto-Celtic -akos
As I’ve mentioned a number of times in previous posts, I use Wiktionary extensively in the course of my etymological research. I recognize Wiktionary as a most valuable resource for finding reconstructions of Proto-Indo-European, Proto-Celtic and Proto-Germanic words. But I am often annoyed at the many instances of erroneous information presented in these reconstructions, some…
Illyrians and Albanians
In my post called “The Movements and Expansions of Indo-European Language Groups” – https://vellaunos.ca/2021/03/24/the-movements-and-expansions-of-indo-european-language-groups/ , I suggested that there was an Italo-Illyric group of languages that included the Italic languages (such as Latin, Oscan, Umbrian, etc.) and the Illyrian languages. I have since developed the view that the Illyrian languages were not only not closely…
Samain and Samonios
Much confusion reigns regarding the origin of the name of the day called Samhain (traditionally November 1st) in Irish. The Irish name Samhain comes from the Old Irish Samain, which in turn would have developed from Proto-Celtic *Samanis, which in turn reflects a possible Proto-Indo-European *Som-h2nis, this being an o-grade derivative of *sem- ‘single’. Germanic…
The Non-Indo-European Hittites
Wherever the Hittites and their Anatolian relations are discussed, the claim that they were Indo-European peoples is always stated quite matter-of-factly. This claim is based exclusively on the fact that the Anatolian languages had some vocabulary and grammatical forms which were evidently related to Proto-Indo-European in some way. But apart from this apparent Indo-European component…
The Reflexes of Proto-Indo-European h1ensus / h1onsus and h1onsuros
Proto-Indo-European *h1ensus / *h1onsus (i.e. *hensus / *honsus) Proto-Indo-European *h1onsu-ros (i.e.*honsu-ros) Sanskrit asu ‘life, vigor, vital force, breath’ Sanskrit asura ‘supernatural’ [The Asuras were originally primordial forces of Nature in Vedic mythology, not unlike the Titans of Greek mythology, but generally tended to be regarded as evil in later Hindu mythology in opposition to the…
A Cladogram of Simiinae
Below is a cladogram of the Primate subfamily which is currently called Homininae but which I prefer to call Simiinae. See my previous post relating to that: https://vellaunos.ca/2021/10/11/replacing-the-homin-stem-in-primate-taxonomy/ The cladogram attempts to show the evolutionary relationships between gorillas (genus Gorilla), chimpanzees and bonobos (genus Pan), and human beings (genus Homo). It also suggests approximate times…
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