Talk:नलद

Coherence of borrowings

A borrowing directly from Sanskrit (India) to Phoenician (Near East) and without intermediate language ? If there were an Iranian and/or a Middle east language with chronological coherence between Skt and Phn I would believe it but directly Skt and Phn, no matter which direction, is incoherent. Malku H₂n̥rés (talk) 10:41, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

@Malku H₂n̥rés: But do you know fitting Iranian terms? The presence of the word in Phoenician is apparently assumed on the presence in Hebrew נֵרְדְּ (nerd), Aramaic נִרְדָּא (nirdā), נָרְדָּא (nārdā), ܢܪܕܐ (nārdā) and the observation that Greek obtained its Semitic and Eastern borrowings in general usually from Phoenician. And Phoenician could obtain borrowings directly from Sanskrit why not, as they were a seafaring nation, and in Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew, Arabic, and Ethio-Semitic, too, there appeared in the earliest times somewhat likely direct borrowings from Sanskrit, as it was a lingua franca while Iranian languages were irrelevant; Iranian languages were bypassed either by sea or by person. Early Semitic words directly from Sanskrit of the drug or plant area that come to my mind now are كُرْكُم (kurkum) and قَاقُلَّة (qāqulla). The Phoenician may also have been mediated by other Semitic languages, though the Akkadian term is thought to be 𒆠𒆗 (HIRIM /⁠lardu⁠/, “a kind of grass from which soap was made”), whereas the Arabian form later is رَنْد (rand). But I don’t know much of a reason why it would be a Semitic borrowing, it must be only because of the /r/. Technically Ancient Greek terms are even oftener directly from Sanskrit than Semitic terms are, as Greeks went there. The oldest quote in LSJ seems to be Theophrastus, which is from about the age of the Indian campaign of Alexander the Great. κόστος (kóstos) seems to be from the same age. However on the Greek page it is speculated the word is even originally Semitic, so the Sanskrit shouldn’t list this descendant page but link to the Greek in the etymology section since the spread of the word is uncertain. Fay Freak (talk) 20:27, 18 August 2020 (UTC)

Thank you @Fay Freak now I understand. That's why talk pages are better, we can see the relevance of a thing without editing and learn anecdotes by the way. I ignored Sanskrit was spoken so far in the West. The problem wasn't the Wanderwort itself but I just hadn't understood how could Skt bypass Middle East languages, but now it's all right. This will be helpful in my studies about Phoenician. Malku H₂n̥rés (talk) 08:28, 19 August 2020 (UTC)