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kgeisttoday at 8:54 AM1 replyview on HN

>Words borrowed from a Pre–Indo-European language into Mediterranean languages

> [...] Greek μύρμηξ mýrmēx ‘ant’, Latin formica

Must be an error:

  Proto-Celtic *morwos
  Proto-Balto-Slavic: *marwis
  Proto-Indo-Iranian: *marwiš
  Proto-Germanic: *mauraz
  Old Armenian: mrǰimn
Greek murmēx could be an assimilation murw- => murm-, and Latin had dissimilation morm- => form- (although not clear what came first, maybe morm- was the original and morw- came later). Sanskrit also has vamra "ant", which makes it look like the whole thing is a tabooistic distortion of *wr̥mis "worm".

In any way, it doesn't look like it must be borrowed. Historically, some words once labeled Pre-Indoeuropean turned out to have pretty mundane PIE origins.


Replies

kgeisttoday at 9:18 AM

>wine

It could be an original Proto-Indoeuropean word as well, because Greek has ὑιήν "grapewine" (< *wih₁-ēn), which follows PIE ablaut (weyh₁-ō ~ wih₁-ēn), which doesn't usually happen if it's just a borrowing of a foreign word. And the same root is found in Latin vitis "vine", Russian vit'sa "to twist (often about vines)" etc.