The Armenian Elements in the Language and Onomastics of Urartu (original) (raw)

Remodelling the Historical Morphology of the Classical Armenian -eal Participle

This paper offers a different understanding of the historical morphology of the Classical Armenian past participle in -eal, suggesting that, contrary to received opinion, it is unrelated to the aorist formation. The participle is instead derived from a combination of the passive-intransitive suffix *-iya- as found in, e.g., Indo-Iranian languages, and the verbal adjective marker *-lo-; both are added to the bare root of the verb. Participles which are demonstrably formed on the aorist stem (type gnam 'to go', aor. gnac‘i, ptcp. gnac‘eal) are the result of late formations made for reasons of phonological stability, or formed on the basis of secondary verbal stems.

Etymological Hypotheses Between Armenian and Indo-Iranian: New Proposals and Remarks

The publication of the Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon by Hrach K. Martirosyan offers the opportunity to posit new etymologies with the aid of further and helpful investigations not only of linguistic but also of onomasiological and ethnological nature, e.g. astełkʻ molarkʻ, " wandering stars " , astucoy eznak, " ladybird " , babič', " witch-doctor " , cʻncam, " to rejoice ". 1. The publication of the Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon by Hrach K. Martirosyan, which came out in 2010, offers the opportunity to reflect that even in the present day it is by no means unfeasible to embark on a wide-ranging etymological project, and that such an undertaking can be accomplished with the aid of further and helpful investigations not only of a linguistic but also onomasiological and ethnological nature. 2. Martirosyan has the great merit of presenting the headwords in transliteration, thereby enabling those who do not have a good command of the Armenian alphabet to benefit from direct access to the Lexicon, which has been broadened by the inclusion of dialect material. The work thus takes on a completely new aspect as compared to the historical studies of Ačaryan and J ̌ ahukian, who focused mainly on the classical language. In the new dictionary, many of the entries provide a detailed description and a wealth of information, and some of them are actually the first scientifically acceptable and complete treatment of the word involved. The decision to illustrate only the inherited vocabulary inevitably implies a selection upstream, which means that the reader cannot become acquainted with the terms that have been excluded, namely the loanwords from Persian and Syriac. Furthermore, on closer inspection, it may seem that not all the entries are genuinely inherited (echtarmenisch) and, vice versa, that some inherited terms do not appear in the Lexicon because they are classified as loanwords. 2.1. First of all, one may have reservations concerning the inclusion of ampar, " planet " (pp. 51–52), a term which – on the assumption it is not a ghost-word – will be critically reexamined here. The word ampar appears only in an Armenian

Notes on Anatolian loanwords in Armenian

Bridging times and spaces: papers in ancient Near Eastern, Mediterranean and Armenian Studies (ed. by Pavel S. Avetisyan and Yervand H. Grekyan). Oxford: Archaeopress: 293-306., 2017

Two circumstances unite the Armenian and Anatolian languages: (1) a common Indo-European origin, and (2) geographical proximity of their historical homelands, namely the central and western parts of the modern-day Turkey for Anatolian, and the Armenian Highlands (the Armenian plateau) for Armenian. In this paper we will be concerned with loanwords from Anatolian to Armenian, which would have been transferred mainly in the 2nd millennium BCE and possibly also in the early 1st millennium BCE. It has been claimed that only isolated and only Luwian loanwords can be found in Armenian. However, a number of etymologies that suggest borrowing from Hittite are rejected too easily. Rather than give final decisions on the quantitative and qualitative characteristics of the Anatolian borrowings in Armenian, this paper merely aims to rework and supplement some of the relevant etymological material. I conclude that (1) we are not yet ready for the final evaluation of the relevant material and clear-cut conclusions, and (2) the existence of Hittite loanwords in Armenian should not be excluded. Keywords Anatolian loanwords in Armenian, Armenian comparative linguistics, Armenian etymology, Armenian phonology, Presence of Armenian in the Armenian Highlands

Lyc. Pẽmudija (N322.2): Anatolian Onomastics and IE word formation

In: Bjarne Simmelkjær Sandgaard Hansen, Adam Hyllested, Anders Richardt Jørgensen, Guus Kroonen, Jenny Helena Larsson, Benedicte Nielsen Whitehead, Thomas Olander, Tobias Mosbæk Søborg (edd.), Usque ad Radices : Indo-European Studies in Honour of Birgit Anette Olsen. Museum Tusculanum Press/University of Copenhagen, 2017, pp. 695-704. Note: This paper has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie (2016-2018) grant agreement No 705090.

Syntactic parallels between West Middle Iranian and Classical Armenian

This paper discusses three syntagmata of Classical Armenian which have significant formal and functional parallels in the West Middle Iranian (WMIr.) languages, Parthian and Middle Persian; these patterns are taken to be indicators of larger linguistic and socio-historical processes. The usage of Arm. (e)t‘ē as complementiser and quotative marker, including before direct and indirect wh-questions, is typologically uncommon, but finds almost exact parallels in the functional distribution of WMIr. kw /kū/. Similarly, the use of Pth. wxd /wxad/, MP xwd /xwad/ ‘self’ as an intensifier, subject-indexed resumptive pronoun, and switch-function marker is reflected closely in the use of Arm. ink‘n (cf. Meyer 2013). Finally, both Armenian and Iranian exhibit nominal, i.e. verbless, relative clauses, which may (but need not necessarily) be seen as a further indication of syntactic parallels (cf. already Meillet 1899-1900: 379 n. 1; 1906–08:21). It is argued that these parallels are not mere coincidence, but the result of extended language contact between Armenian and particularly Parthian during the Arsacid period; Iranian influence on Armenian is clearly observable in the lexicon (cf. Schmitt 1983), but more difficult to determine with regard to syntax. For such patterns to have been adopted into Armenian, the extent of contact needs to have been even more significant than previously thought. This paper proposes that the replication of these syntagmata, amongst other linguistic and socio-historical indicators, suggests that the Parthian ruling class of Armenia were not only Parthian-Armenian bilinguals, but actively adopted Armenian as their main means of communication at some point between the fall of the Parthian Empire in 224 CE and the end of the Arsacid dynasty in 428 CE. References Meillet, A. (1899-1900) “Recherches sur la syntaxe comparée de l’arménien I,” Mémoires de la Société Linguistique de Paris 11 (6), 369–388. Meillet, A. (1906–08) “La phrase nominale en indo-européen,” Mémoires de la Société Linguistique de Paris 14 (1), 1–26. Meyer, R. (2013) “Armeno-Iranian Structural Interaction: The Case of Parthian wxd, Armenian ink‘n,” Iran and the Caucasus 17 (4), 401–425. Schmitt, R. (1983) “Iranisches Lehngut im Armenischen,” Revue des Études Arméniennes 17, 73–112.