Talk:amárach

bárach / i mbárach / amárach : from "am ba árach" [cow tying time] when cows were milked only once daily. Hence "next cow tying time".

Do you have any source for this rather fanciful-sounding etymology? —Angr 12:04, 28 May 2011 (UTC)

(For historical completeness only)

Hamp 1983: E. P. Hamp, “imbúarach, imbárachi”, Celtica 15/1983: 53-54.

Hamp 1998: E. P. Hamp, “Two regular milk products”, in: J. Jasanoff et alii (eds.) Mir Curad. Studies in Honor of Calvert Watkins, IBS, Innsbruck 1998: 241-243.

Quoted in Matasović’s Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Celtic under bārego‑ (p. 57). His theory isn’t reflected in the etymology here at the moment.

ETYM: A persuasive IE etymology is lacking. Hamp’s derivation of these words from *bā‑rigo- ‘cow-tying’ is not impossible, but it is semantically far-fetched. From the formal side, *bārego- can be a compound, consisting of PIE *bʰeh₂- ‘shine’ (Skt. bhā-, Gr. phaíno, Gr. Horn, pháos ‘light, daylight’, etc., cf. PCelt. *bāno-) and *h₃reǵ- ‘extend, stretch, rule’ (Skt. rāṣṭi ‘rules’, Gr. orégō ‘extend’, Lat. rego ‘rule’, cf. PCelt. *reg‑o-). Note that reflexes of the verb *bʰeh₂- are regularly connected with dawn (Skt. uṣás-, Gr. Horn, ēṓs) in both Greek and Vedic. A compound *bʰeh₂‑h₃reǵo- ‘light-extending’ would be similar to the Gr. type phaes-phóros, phōt-agōgós ‘light-bringing’ (Frisk, II: 989ff.). If this is correct, PCelt. *bārego- is in origin a nominalized adjective, perhaps originally an epithet of dawn.

☸ Moilleadóir ☎ 05:43, 2 October 2024 (UTC)