Reconstruction talk:Proto-Germanic/wīnagardaz

RFV discussion: December 2019–March 2020

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Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/wīnagardaz

Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/wīną

In order for this term to be of Proto-Germanic date, the word "wine" must have been borrowed from Latin before the breakup of PG. But Rome was only a city-state at that time, and wouldn't be in contact with Germanic speakers until several centuries later. That makes it improbable that this word is that old. —Rua (mew) 15:51, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Pinging @Holodwig21 as creator, and also @Benwing2 who has been interested in weeding out post-Proto-Germanic words. —Rua (mew) 15:52, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

@Rua: I'm not on board with the idea with the word "wine" dating only to the Proto-West Germanic; because the Germanics could have adopted it from the Romans after viticulture was introduced into the Mosel region, or somewhere nearby. If we considered Proto-West-Germanic to have existed from the 2nd century AD, and since the Romans were in contact with them by the Late 1st BC/Early 1st AD, then it is possible for the Germanic to have adopt the word during the Proto-Germanic period. Although it is also possible for them to have adopted in the Proto-West-Germanic.

"... must have been borrowed from Latin before the breakup of PG. But Rome was only a city-state at that time, and wouldn't be in contact with Germanic speakers until several centuries later." When do you consider PG to have broken up? This seems like a too early date. 𐌷𐌻𐌿𐌳𐌰𐍅𐌹𐌲𐍃 𐌰𐌻𐌰𐍂𐌴𐌹𐌺𐌹𐌲𐌲𐍃 (talk) 18:45, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

Ringe states in volume 1 of his series: "Latin loanwords in PGmc were, by contrast, very few. In addition to *Rūmōnīz ‘Romans’, probable examples include *pundą ‘pound’, *katilaz ‘kettle’, a family of words denoting trade made to a root *kaup- (cf. Lat. caupō ‘merchant’), and perhaps a few others. [...] *kaisaraz ‘emperor’ must also be a post-PGmc loan for obvious historical reasons."

In volume 2, Ringe gives only two words that were borrowed from Latin directly into Proto-Northwest Germanic. One of them is *kaisar (“emperor”), a word which clearly cannot have entered Germanic earlier than 49 BCE. But he notes: "However, it is not clear whether PNWGmc existed late enough for these loans to be possible; borrowing into ON from an early dialect of PWGmc seems at least as likely. Of course such a scenario is most plausible if WGmc and NGmc had not diverged beyond the point of at least partial mutual intelligibility." That suggests that Ringe considers Northwest Germanic to have broken up around that time, and East Germanic, having been the first to split from the rest, must have already been separate at that time since it was the first to diverge. —Rua (mew) 20:51, 25 December 2019 (UTC)

And? Why can't this be one of those few words? --{{victar|talk}} 04:01, 26 December 2019 (UTC)

I agree with Victar. Wine, being a commodity that could be (and was) spread via trade routes quite early on (before the introduction of viticulture to Germanic-speaking regions), seems to me likely to have spread to Germanic no later than the first century BC and probably earlier. This is also the view of Dennis Green in his 1998 book Language and History of the Early Germanic World (p.228), who puts the terminus ante quem for the borrowing of vīnum at the first century BC as well. I don't think it's unreasonable to suppose a late PGmc word for wine. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 15:14, 30 December 2019 (UTC)

Southern Germany has been growing wine for over 2000 years, in the Pfalz region. Unless that area is known to not have been Germanic-speaking at the time (and thats quite possible .... they moved north to south, i think), I'd say this word makes perfect sense. —Soap— 20:36, 11 January 2020 (UTC)

If it is decided that the wine-word existed in PGmc, then Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/wīną needs to be undeleted, AFAICT, so I have added a link/header for it above, as this is de facto also an RFV of it. - -sche (discuss) 21:52, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

B. Richard Page, in Studies in Classical Linguistics in Honor of Philip Baldi (2010, ed. by Page and Aaron Rubin), pages 75-76, says: "Latin vinum 'wine' is one of the earliest loanwords in Germanic. It is attested throughout Germanic: Go. wein, ON vin vín, OE wīn, OHG wīn, OS wīn. Jellinek (1926: 184-185) argues that the loan occurred no later than the first century CE since the Germanic forms reflect a phonetic glide for initial Latin (v). Latin texts in the first century CE often confuse (b) with etymologically expected (v), indicating spirantization of the glide. Additional support is found in the orthographic treatment of Latin (v) in later Latin loanwords. Compare Go. wein with Go. naúbaímbaír 'November' (Green 1998: 207). Further phonological evidence for the early date of the loan is the loss of the final -o < -um in Latin vinum via the Germanic Auslautgesetze (Jellinek 1926: 185, Green 1998: 207). Green (1998: 127-129) surveys extralinguistic evidence that indicates the Germani were acquainted with wine, and presumably the word vinum, by the first century BCE. A large number of Roman wine sets have been discovered throughout Germanic territories in Northern Europe,..." - -sche (discuss) 22:06, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Of the two etyma, wine would be more plausible as a PGmc borrowing, because it represents an article of trade that might easily travel beyond the reach of a particular language. It's also a Wanderwort that was found all over the area in both Indo-European and Semitic languages from an earlier date. Was the form with "ī" unique to Latin, or is it possible that it got to PGmc by another route?.

As for the vineyard etymon, it isn't the kind of term that spreads with trade, so it would probably require PGMc speakers being familiar with vine-growing. Chuck Entz (talk) 22:53, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

I've restored Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/wīną, given the scholarly support for it. There should be consensus at either RFV or RFD if it is to be deleted. Note that it links to several other compounds, if anyone wants to RFV/RFD them: *wīnabasją, *wīnadrunkanaz, *wīnafatą, *wīnahūsą, *wīnatrewą. - -sche (discuss) 23:19, 23 January 2020 (UTC)

• RFV-kept. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 21:55, 28 March 2020 (UTC)