GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Evidence for Etruscan as an Anatolian Language

Core evidence

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction ............................................................................................2

Bound morphemes and clitics ................................................................3

Pronouns and deictics ...........................................................................4

Verbs .....................................................................................................5

Social organisation ................................................................................6

Kinship terms .........................................................................................7

Other nouns ...........................................................................................8

Miscellanea ...........................................................................................9

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Introduction

Imagine you came across a poorly attested language with

• -(a)l and -s(a) relational adjectives used as genitives and patronymics

• a partially understood lexicon, including mi ‘I’, mini ‘me’, cel ‘earth’, tin ‘day’, tur- ‘give as
a present’, nefts ‘nephew’, Tarχun ‘a mythical founder’, maru ‘a magistrate’, etc.

• -c and -(u)m enclitic coordinating conjunctions

• a phonetic inventory with: no voiced stops; a /ʦ/ affricate (<z>); an /f/ phoneme (written <8>
as in Lydian)

• massive loss of unstressed vowels (syncope)

• a closely related variant attested on an island not far off Anatolia

Would you not classify this language as Anatolian (possibly close to Lydian)? After all, Pisidian,
Carian and Sidetic have been classified as Anatolian based on even more fragmentary evidence,
including the highly diagnostic feature of relational adjectives used as genitives < Proto-Anatolian
*-asso/ī- and *-Vl(i)-.

Etruscan (with its cognate languages, Rhaetic and Lemnian) has been tentatively classified as
Anatolian (or, more generically, Indo-European) by various authors, incl. Adrados, Georgiev,
Steinbauer, Pittau, Woudhuizen, Zavaroni, etc.

I guess there are three main reasons why this classification has not gone mainstream yet:
1. previous attempts at an IE / Anatolian classification of Etruscan suffer from various
shortcomings;
2. Etruscan is attested “in the wrong place”: Italy; were it attested in Anatolia, like Pisidian,
Carian and Sidetic, its Anatolian affiliation would probably have been accepted more readily;
its close cognate, Lemnian, though attested a few dozen miles off the Anatolian coast, is too
poorly attested to shift the “centre of gravity” of Etruscoid languages toward Anatolia;
3. Etruscan studies have historically been firmly dominated by archaeologists often not
particularly well-versed in historical linguistics.

I have been studying this topic for several years and I am working on a long (100+ pages) paper
illustrating Etruscan-IE lexical cognates and bound morphemes, with regular sound
correspondences.

I summarise part of the evidence below.

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Bound morphemes and clitics

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

-al genitives and PA *-Vl(i)- > Melchert classifies
patronymics Lydian -al(i), Pisidian, Carian and
Sidetic as Anatolian
Carian patronymics in
mainly based on this
also attested in -l, etc.
highly diagnostic
Lemnian
feature
-s(a) genitives and PA *-asso/ī- >
patronymics Pisidian -s,
Sidetic -s,
Carian -ś,
Lycian -h, etc.
-c, -χ Hitt. -kku /kʷ/, PIE *-kʷe
(archaic: -ka, -ca) Palaic -(k)ku,
‘and’ (enclitic) CLuw. -ku,
Lydian -k
-m, -um ‘and, but’ Hitt. -ma ‘and, but’,
also attested in Palaic -ma,
Lemnian -m Lydian -m, -um

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Pronouns and deictics

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

mi ‘I’ (nominative) HLuw. á-mu /ʔmu/ ‘I’
Lydian amu ‘I’
Lycian emu, amu ‘I’
mini, mine, mene PIE *h1men- ‘me’
‘me’ (accusative) (accusative and
oblique stem) > OCS
mene ‘me’ (acc.,
gen.), etc.
ica, eca, ca ‘this’ PIE *h1(e)i- ‘this’ +
*k̑V ‘this’
ita, eta, ta ‘that, this’ PIE *h1(e)i- ‘this’ +
*to- ‘that, this’
θu-i 'here' PIE *to- ‘that, this’ +
locative -i
ipa ‘that’ (relative Hitt., CLuw. apā- Same semantic shift
pronoun and ‘that’, (deictic > relative
subordinating Lyc. ebe- ‘this’, pronoun and
conjunction) subordinating
Lyd. bi ‘he’
conjunction) as in
English that

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Verbs

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

ar- ‘to make, do’ PIE *h2(e)r- ‘to join, fit
> make’ >
Armenian aṙ nem ‘to
make, create’,
Greek ἀραρίσκω ‘to
fit together, construct’,
etc.
cap- ‘to take’ PIE *keh2p- >
Latin capiō ‘to take’,
Albanian kap 'to
seize, to grasp', etc.
cer- ‘to make, build’ PIE *kʷer- ‘to make,
build’ >
Skt. kr̥ṇóti ‘make, do,
build’,
Avest. kərənaoiti
‘make, do’,
Lith. kùrti ‘build,
create’, etc.
trin- ‘to say, speak’ Hitt. ter- ‘speak’ PIE *ter- ‘say, speak
out’
tur- ‘give as a PIE *deh3-r- ‘gift,
present’ present’ >
Greek δῶρον,
Arm. tur, etc.
zin- ‘to make, PIE *g̑enh1- ‘to beget,
produce’ create, produce’
also attested in
Rhaetic t’in- ‘to make’
ziv-as ‘living, alive’ PIE *gʷih3-u- ‘to live’ Etruscan sval ‘alive’
> (> sval-ce ‘lived’, etc.)
Latin vīvō ‘to live’, may also belong here
(if < *zv-al)
OCS živъ 'alive',
Latv. dzîvs 'alive',
Skt. jīvá- ‘alive’,
Zoroastrian Pahlavi
zīv-, etc.

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Social organisation

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

etera ‘member of a HLuv. andara-, PIE *n̥dʰero- ‘lower’ >
lower class’ Lyc., Mil. et̃ re- ‘lower’ Latin īnferus,
(possibly ‘plebeian’, Skt. ádhara-,
‘client’, or ‘slave’)
Avest. aδara-, etc.
laut-n-i ‘lībertus, PIE *h1leudʰ- ‘free Etruscan is close to
freedman’ man’ > OCS, both formally (-
Latin līber ‘free’, n- extension) and
semantically (‘free(d)
Greek ἐλεύθερος
man’).
‘free’,
Cannot be an Italic
OHG liut ‘people’,
loan on formal
OCS ljudinъ ‘free grounds (/t/ vs. /b/ or
man’ /f/, and -n- vs. -r-
extension).
maru ‘a magistrate’ Lyc. maraza- ‘judge,
also attested in arbitrator’, mere ‘laws’
Lemnian maras (dat. pl.) < /mare/,
Mil. mara- ‘law’
Tarχun ‘Tarchon, a PA *trHʷent- PIE *terh2-u-ent-
mythical founder ‘overcoming’ >
(οἰκιστής)’ Hitt. tarh̬u- ‘to prevail,
conquer, be powerful’,
Luw. Tarhunt- ‘Storm-
god’,
Lycian trqqñt-
/trkʷnt-/ ‘Storm-god’
rasna PIE *h3reg̑- ‘to direct, Rix glossed rasna as
a much-debated term, rule’ > *h3reg̑-no- > ‘state, army, people’.
usually rendered as: Latin regnum If the IE etymology
‘people’, ‘kingship, reign, proposed here is
kingdom’, correct, ‘(Etruscan)
‘Etruscan / Etruria’,
Avestan rāzan- ‘rule, state’ is the most
‘state’ likely original meaning
direction’
and/or of rasna.
‘army’

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Kinship terms

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

apa ‘father’ Greek ἄππα, TochA
āp, TochB āppo*, Alb.
apë, Arm. (dial.) apʿi,
apʿu
ati ‘mother’ PA *Honno- ‘mother’ Same *-ati extension
> as in HLuw.: *anati >
HLuw. MATER-nati *anti > /ãti/, written
/anati/ ‘mother’, <ati>
Hitt. anna- ‘mother’,
Lydian eñ a-, etc.
clan, clen-, celen- PIE *kelH- ‘to rise’ > Impeccable parallels
‘son’ Greek κέλωρ ‘son, can be found
descendant’, throughout IE, both
formally (*-n-
κολώνη ‘hill’ (< *kolH-
extensions) and
n-),
semantically (‘son,
Lith. kálnas descendant’)
‘mountain’,
English hill (< *klH-
ni-),
Lith. kìlti ‘to descend
from’,
Latv. cil̂t 'tribe, origin’
nefts ‘nephew’ PIE *nepōt- > Hardly an Italic loan
also attested in Latin nepōs, nepōtis, into Etruscan, as the
Lemnian naφoθ term is also clearly
Skt. nápāt,
attested in Lemnian
Av. napāt-,
Lith. nepuotis, etc.
papa ‘grandfather’ Palaic pāpa- ‘father’ Greek πάππος
‘grandfather’,
Arm. pap
‘grandfather’
puia ‘wife’ PIE *pot-nih2 There is good internal
‘mistress, lady, wife’ > evidence that <u>
Greek πότνια, may stand for [ũ], so
*potnih2 > *punja >
Skt. pátnī,
/pũja/, written <puia>
OPrus. wais-pattin,
etc.
teta ‘grandmother’ PIE *dʰeh1dʰ- >
Greek τήθη
‘grandmother’,
Illyr. deda ‘nurse’,
Russian ded
‘grandfather’, etc.

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GForni - Etruscan v20f - Core evidence only Copyright © Gianfranco Forni 2017

Other nouns

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

av-il ‘year’
also attested in
Lemnian avi-s
cel ‘earth, land, Lydian qela- ‘land’ <
ground’ PA *kʷélo- ‘plowed /
turned land, cultivated
land’
tam- ‘house’ Lyc. tama- ‘house,
building’
tin ‘day; Jupiter’ Hitt. šīu(na)- ‘god’,
Pal. tiuna- ‘god’,
Lydian ciwνali-
‘divine’,
Hitt. šīwatt- ‘day’, etc.
tiu ‘moon, month’
PIE *h2ei-uo- ‘time’ > Internal evidence
Latin aevum ‘period shows -il is a
of time’, productive suffix, so
the segmentation av-il
Skt. ā́yu ‘life(time)’, is licit
Greek αἰών
‘life(time)’,
Gothic aiws ‘eternity,
age’, etc.
PIE *kʷel(h1)- ‘to turn’ Also compare Latin
colō ‘to cultivate, to
till’
PIE *dem- ‘to build’,
‘house’ >
Latin domus ‘house’,
etc.
PIE *d(e)i-n- ‘day’ > Also compare
OCS dьnь, Latin Iūpiter, Iovis,
Lith. dienà, etc. Greek Ζεύς, etc.
PIE *dei- ‘to shine’ >
*d(e)i-u- ‘sky’ >
Latin Diāna ‘goddess
of the shining moon’

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Miscellanea

Etruscan Anatolian IE in general Comments

en, ein, ei ‘not’ HLuw. na, PIE *n(e) ‘not, un-’ > Probably < *n̥.
Lyd. ni-d, Latin in-, TochB e(n)-, The spelling <ei>
Lyc. ne, ni, etc. etc. stands for [eĩ].
pi ‘away’ Hitt. pe ‘away’ PIE *h1p-oi
in (preverb)
ei mini pi capi ‘don’t
take me away’