ON THE PHONOLOGY OF THE MESSAPIC DIALECT J. WHATMOUGH HARVARD UNIVERSITY It is disputed whether Messapic is to be classed with the centumlanguages or with the satem-languages. Discussion of this problem has been unduly influenced by comparison with Albanian (a satemlanguage) and by the commonly made assumption that Albanian can only be the modern representative of an ancient Illyrian dialect. It is at least clear that Illyrian did not represent the IE palatal stops by sibilants, see Hirt, Indogermanen 2.609, and 'Stellung des Illyrischen' in Festschrift für Kiepert 181ff. (1894) where Kretschmer's view to the contrary is criticised. The fact that Messapic appears on the available evidence1 to have nothing corresponding to the labiovelars or labials of the centum-languages (Lat. quinque, Gr. EμπтÓS: Alb. pese) that represent the IE velar stops (*penke), would seem to make it a priori likely that the palatals should have been treated as in the satem-languages. But the conclusion is not inevitable. It is probable that Venetic, which was also an ancient Illyrian dialect, neither labialised the velars nor sibilised the palatals; and it has been suggested accordingly that Venetic belongs to a stratum of IE speech earlier than the cleavage into centum-dialects and satem-dialects, see Conway, Annual Brit. Sch. at Athens 8.152 (1901-2). If this view, which certainly fits the facts, could be accepted as demonstrated, it would be conceivable that Albanian might be descended from an Illyrian satem-dialect belonging to a later stratum of Indo-European speech. Other explanations, however, are not far to seek, cf. Giles in Camb. Anc. Hist. 2.26: it may be that the ancestor of Albanian has perished unrecorded; or perhaps that it was, as has been conjectured, closely related to, or The single plausible example penkeos, penkaheh[e (both proper names, gen. sg. masc., cf. Osc.-Lat. Pompeius, Lat. Quintus) is by itself hardly convincing, even if correctly interpreted. Messapic forms are cited from my forthcoming edition of the texts. * Although I use here the traditional terminology I am, of course, aware of the bearing which the particular problem of Venetic and Messapic has upon the wider one of the IE gutturals. even a dialect of, Thracian. It is at all events improbable that the ancestor of Albanian was identical with the speech of the ancient Illyrians, of which a recent valuable collection of local and ethnic names goes to confirm Hirt's view. Thus, side by side with Bapdíλis (or Bápôvλis) on which almost alone Kretschmer based his opinion, seeing in ♪ [d?] the representative of an IE ŷ like Alb. 8 as in bardi 'white', we now have also Illyrian Bargulam, Bápyaλa and other forms with g or y, in the face of which it is hard to believe that Kretschmer's account of 8 in Bapôts is correct. That Bapouλis is necessarily cognate with Alb. bardi, Skt. bhra'jate cannot be proved; since, as a proper name, its original connotation is unknown. Ribezzo, who takes the same view of the treatment of the gutturals in Illyrian and Messapic as Kretschmer, rejects the etymology of Bapouλes in favour of the connexion proposed by Schulze with Illyrian Bardus. In view of the forms with g (y) there can be little doubt that & in Bapduλis is a true plosive [d] and not a fricative [d]; but Ribezzo's own etymology" of Messapic barzidihi (for Kretschmer cognate with Bapdíλλis and bardi) as derived from IE *brĝh-, cf. Skt. brhánt-, breaks down when confronted with Messapic brigannas, cf. Kelt. Brigantes. It is evident, however, that the several series of gutturals distinguished in Indo-European should, at the present stage of enquiry at least, be kept distinct so far as possible, since, so long as it is not clear whether Messapic labialised the velars or sibilised the palatals, it is impossible to say with which series the indeterminate gutturals (Brugmann's 'pure velars') should be regarded as coinciding in treatment; while, if the suggestion above mentioned be adopted, it will still be necessary, for purposes of comparison at all events, to make the same distinction. It is also necessary to consider first forms in which it is claimed that IE gutturals or their Messapic representatives have already been identified. The familiar klaohizis, klohizis (in which ao or o stands for ou or ū as in orra: Uria, Ovpía and aoze, ozen: Uzentum, Oűşevrov) a 2nd sg. (?) optative of a sigmatic aorist from the root *kley- 'hear', must be set aside; since cognate forms with k appear both in Slavonic and Albanian, and we may have here to do either with borrowings or H. Krahe, Die alten balkanillyrischen geographischen Namen (1925). Einleitung 265; Glotta 14.95n. (1925). Krahe 17, 83. • Eigennamen 33n. ▾ Lingua degli antichi Messapii 23. Cf. Whatmough, Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. 130.2 (1925). with an IE variation (k beside ) in the initial consonant. More convincing would be Hirt's comparison of vaikanetaos, gen. sg. masc., with Gr. oikos, Skt. veçá-ḥ, if we could be certain not only that ywas preserved in Messapic (valevas, later balevas: Valetium, veretahetis: Veretum, vasti: ǎoru; oikoroihi being presumably a borrowing from Greek) but also that the diphthong oi became ai. Contrast the ethnicon Poediculi and the proper names oibaliahiai[hi: Oebalia, i.e. Tarentum, Verg., G 4.125; Illyr. Oeplus, CIL 3.2891, 2900; oitinai[hi: Ital. Vtius, Vtilius, see Conway, Italic Dialects 188, 198, 257. Kretschmer apparently believes that baoçtas1o (cf. bosat, and perhaps blaozzezihi) contains an original guttural represented as a sibilant, cf. perhaps Illyr. Beucas CIL 3.7830. But, beside Illyr. Beuzas (ib. 9156), Beusas -antis (ib. x test., xi, xiv, xvii), Beuzetius -ia (ib. 9929*), Ital. Buccia and Busius, Busidius, Bussenius (Conway, ID 155, 36, 34, 307) that view is untenable. The forms with c are evidently distinct from those with s, from which there is no reason to separate the Messapic forms. The same argument applies equally to daçtas (cf. dazet, dastas) which, if I understand Kretschmer aright, he regards with baoçtas as 'wertvolle Zeugnisse für den Guttural-Charakter des Messapischen'. Beside forms with -c-[k] Dacio, Daciscus, etc. (CIL 3), Duceus, Docetius (ID 34, 276) and the frequent Decius11 we have forms with -s (s)- which there is no more reason to suppose connected with those with -c- than there is to suppose that -k- or even -ki- became -s- in Messapic, e.g. Dasius, Dassius, Dasiatus, Dasimius, Dasumius, all common both in Italy and in Illyria, where we find also Dasa, Dasas, Dazas, Dases, Dasianus, Dazanus, Dasmenus, Dasto, see Indices to ID and to CIL 3. Accordingly I connect the numerous Messapic names12 with s(ç, s, ss, z, sz) with the Illyrian ones in s (ss, z) regarding the (Illyrian) names with c as quite distinct from both. There remains Kretschmer's view of barzidihi. Here again there are Illyrian forms, as we have seen, with g; and further, quite distinct from them, other forms with s which there is no reason to suppose represents an older g or k: Barsemis, Barsimia, Barsimsus (CIL 3.10307, D lxvi), and possibly (with an Cf. perhaps Gr. àloow, root*yazik-? 10 On C and 3, see Whatmough Class. Quart. 19.68. "I do not, of course, suggest that Dac-, Doc- (Duc-), Dec- are necessarily cognate; though Doc- may stand to Dec- in the same relation as docere to decère. 12 dassinar, daçta, daçtas, daσras, daszes, dazes, dazet, daze[, dašel, daševi, dazeziai, dazeh[i]as, dazes, daszes, dazihi, dazetis, dazetves, dazetēihi, dazihonas, dazimaihi, dazimas, dazomas, Aáo μos, dazohonnihi, dazonnes, daŝos, dazohi (?) δάζου, δαζυ. older er preserved?) Bersumno, Birziminium, Berselum, Bersula, cf. Krahe 83. Nor again should Messapic plastas (gen. sg. masc. from *plaset, plazet) be connected, as it was by Deecke, with Placens, Placentius, but rather with the names Plassarus (CIL 3.4376) or (?) with Blasa, Blazziza, Blassius (ib. 7635, 8292, 3074, 1650, 4150, 5498) with p:b as in Messapus: Mérabos, IIvous: Buxentum, Clampetra: Clambetis. 13 Deecke's account of haçtorres (= *ExTópios) is equally untenable. I connect this form with Latin hostis, cf. Hostilius (ID 32, 34-Calabria, Peucetii; represented also in the borrowed hos@ellihi with Ital. -o-?), gh being represented by h as in the pronominal hi-, in dehatan (:Lat. fingo), and perhaps in mahehe (:Skt. mahā'n?). Finally βίσβη· δρέπανον (and βισβαῖα κλαδευτηρία) which H. Petersson interprets1 as *uik-ya, comparing Skt. veç?' 'needle', Arm. gišel ‘tear, split', may just as well stand for *uis-ua 'the divider, cutter, German Messer', cf. Skt. vişva- 'on both sides, on different sides', IE *ui- 'two', as in *ui-dh- 'divide, separate', cf. OCSI věja, Skt. vaja' 'branch, bough', Lat. virga for *viz-gā; and if Messapic did not sibilise the palatal stops, then Petersson's etymology becomes untenable. There are a few instances in which it has been proposed by Ribezzo (23ff.) to see examples of the sibilisation of ĝ or ĝh. These may be easily disposed of. Thus the series of names azen, açen, azinne, azena in which Ribezzo (28) sees IE *ĝen-, is far more likely to be connected with the names Asinius, Asenius (CIL 3.7118, 10765, 8897, 8895); and the name zarres with Sarius (ib. 1204493; 5.8115108; Pais, Suppl. 1080441, 1182) cf. Sarina, Sarus, Sarronius, Sarnus (CIL 3 Index) and zairikihi with Saerius (ID 155) than with Gr. xaipw, with which Ribezzo (26) connects them both. The two forms azinnota and inzanixis according to Ribezzo (29) both contain the same root IE *ĝen(cf. azen etc. above) and mean respectively 'creavit' and 'finxit'. Taking Ribezzo's view of the meaning, though that is quite uncertain, we may quite as reasonably see in -zin- -zan- the root *sen- (son-) 'achieve, complete', cf. Gr. avvμ, Skt. sanóti. I should not have thought it necessary to remove these examples, apparently contrary to the view which I take, namely that the palatal stops were not sibilised in Messapic, if there had not been also a con 13 Cf. Krahe 89. It would also be possible to separate plastas from the names given above and to connect it with Plarius, Plarentius (ID 155, 257, 375, cf., CIL 3.6183, D xxiii, C vi test., xiv), intervocalic -s- being preserved in Messapic (e.g. Canusium, Genusia, Galaesus, lasofihi, Busidius and the names cited above), unless in Plarius etc. -r- is original. 14 Only the summary, Glotta 15.9 (1926), is known to me. siderable body of positive evidence in favour of that view. To this I now pass. Apart from klaohizis, already discussed, we have, as against z from ĝ (azinnota etc.) oroagenas '(citizen, native) of Uria, Uritis' with -r- for -rr- from -ri-, and with -oa- indicating locality as in a large number of names (e.g. daran@oa, dalma@oa, kritaboa) though the form might conceivably be merely a patronymic. What cannot be doubted is the equivalence of -genas to Latin -genus, Venetic -xeneh (gen. sg.) in which -g-, -x- represent IE 9 (Skt. jánaḥ) especially when we find also genollihi gen. sg. masc. (cf. with a different suffix, Genucius CIL 3.2535, 4471, 141472) and the local name Genusia (Peucetii, ID 33). In the river name Vergellus (ib.) it is probable that we have the same root *ver (e)ĝ'bend, wind' as in Latin uergo, Skt. várjati. The meaning of Messapic argorian (cf. argora-pandes an official title) is admitted by every one to be 'silver, money', and here again there is evidence of ĝ represented by g (cf. Lat. argentum, Gr. ǎpyvpos, Skt. rajatám), for in view of the place names 'Apyv pivo (Epirus) 'Aрyúρinа (Apulia) the supposition that argorian was borrowed from Greek is quite needless. The Peucetian local name Geronium (ID 35) also probably contains IE ĝ (cf. Lat. grānum, Gr. yépas, yépwv: Skt. jaráḥ) and in y in the suffix of 'Iáπvyes (cf. 'Oprvyia) we may have either ĝ or g. It would be possible to connect Anxa (the older name of Callipolis) with either Lat. ancus or ango, referring either to the shape or to the character (narrowness) of the harbour; in the former case the word would be indecisive (IE k), but in the latter we should have g (x = g + s) for IE ĝh gs) after n as in brigannas (see above) after r. The local name trigonoxoa appears to show *ĝon- 'corner, bend' (Lat. genu, Gr. yóvu, ywvia: Skt. jā'nu) though borrowing from Greek (cf. Tpiywvos) is possible, and in konkolastis seems certain (k, gh), cf. Gr. kóyxos, kóyxn. The word agrafos seems to show ŷ (Lat. ager, Gr. ȧypós: Skt. ájraḥ) and if it is a proper name, as is likely, it will be parallel to such Latin names as Agrius, Agrestius, Agreius. There are three names in gor(gor, goro abbrev., gorrih[i, gorvaides, gorretavidihi) which are not decisive, since in these g is more plausible: cf. either Lat. gurges, root ger-, or Gr. yupós, also with g-, Lat. būra. Doubtless gronehias stands in some relation to Granius (Calabri, Daunii ID 32,36), but it is not clear whether we have gh (ĝh or gh?) represented before r by g, cf. Lat. frendo (*gheren-d- an extension of ĝher-, see Walde, s.v. and compare names like Frensidius, Fresidius: frēsus ?); or ĝ (*ĝerā2-: ĝr-, see Geronium above); or even g (*gren- with -dh-extension perhaps |