Trino Meseguer Agullo

Hello Angus,

I would not say your reasoning is bad, quite on the contrary. But there is a loophole in your way you have not seen or rather perceived wich is that iberian language, as a grown up language (what language is not grouwn up?) has got a rich vocabulary. That may cause you to take one particular “word” to be ubiquitous. And then we have also homonyms, paronyms, homographs not to mention the academic obsession of seeing personal names (PN) everywhere in the iberian scripts.

I am quoting you now.

“I have a spreadsheet with over 1,000 lexical items on it matched to epigraphic and onomastic sources”.

That is a good list provided you do not mix up PIE lexicon and IB lexicon. Do not think of me as dogmatic. If we are to be efficient “iberianwise” that’s the way I see it.

“The Iberian scripts are difficult, and my reading may not match your own. Those scripts have signs that are multi-aspect, in that they represent more than one sound. For instance, the k-signs can represent the consonants /g/, /k/ and /x/. Where there is doubt, I go with the Roman Script, and failing that, onomastics. For example, it seems as if the personal name compound element, spelled A-R-BA-N in the East Iberian Script, is actually arpan, because that is how it is written in the Roman Script”

I take you are talking about translation. If so and only if you are trying to translate a roman sort of headstone go ahead and proceed bearing in mind that that  though that script may belong to an iberian deceased chap the document is a Roman one. But the moment you are through with it abandon this line of action right away, every iberian script need its own approach.

“Conversely, it looks as if the personal name compound element spelled BA-TA-R in the East Iberian Script may actually be batar, rather than patar, as it is in Basque, because the toponym, Bataragua (Huesca), exhibits /b/ rather than /p/”.

First, I would not say that the iberian phoneme /p/ does not exists as most scholars do but it is extremly unusual. You will need to work on many scripts to decide whether or not a /b/ is actually a /p/. As for A-R-BA-N and BA-TA-R refer to the mails you have received and the confusion among our fellow members.

“I do have difficulty following complex texts in Spanish, and I expect there will be members of this group who have a similar problem with English. The best way round this is to use lists and charts wherever possible”.

I do not agree. I would recommend to use the Untermann MLH volumes for iberian script and iberian readings. In that way you and us will be tuned in and minimize quite a number of misunderstandings. On top of that we will be sharing the same references

“I do apologise for giving Burushaski comparanda cited by Bengtson without actually stating that they are Burushaski. That bit got lopped off in the pasting. Below, the first line is Burushaski, which is possibly the closest language to Basque outside Europe. The Hunza dialect balas is exceptionally close to Basque. It shouts out at you.

balás (H) ~ baláJ (N) ‘(larger) bird’ and

Cauc: Avar ̈álo ‘jackdaw’, Adyge q:¦aaa-± ‘crow’, etc.

You might not find the Caucasian comparanda so convincing.”

As I said I wil not go that way.

Angus j huck

Hello Eduard,

I cannot say with certainty that you are wrong about the theonym, Arpenino.

I will make the following observations:

(1)

The supplicant clearly has an Iberian name: Beleç, son of Beleçkon (I am treating the orthographic X as indicating the sounds represented in Basque by /tx/ and /x/). That does not necessarily mean that the theonym is also Iberian, but there is a very large number of Iberian theonyms recorded in the Roman Script in this sub-region.

(2)

The shift from final syllable /a/ to final syllable /e/ before /n/ is not without parallel in the Pyrenees. For example, Iberian ardan “wine” (<*aran-dan) becomes arden in Ardengost (H-P) (<*arden-ko-ost), and the place in the Embun region of Huesca recorded as Ardenes in 867 and 1070. There is also an Ardanes recorded in Huesca in 1071 and 1086. Is this the same place?

(3)

I very much doubt if Greek xylon is related to Basque zur “wood”. Basque (c) zur, (B-Orozko) zul corresponds rather clearly in my view to Iberian tur (lenis /r/, as in Basque). In Basque (G) i-dul-ki “plinth, pedestal, block of wood”, the earlier initial dental is preserved behind the i-prefix. Perhaps zur is ultimately related to English tree through a global etymology?

(4)

The shift from Basque zaldar “swelling” to Iberian seldar and sildar is paralelled by the shift from Basque sagar “apple” to Iberian segar and sigar.

In the Basque toponym, Saltarain, it is possible that the payload part is zaldar with its secondary (Iberian) meaning.