Vectors of language contacts: on the etymology of the “horse” lexeme

UDC 81`37

https://doi.org/10.20339/PhS.3-21.011       

Petrov Sergey Yu.,

Technical Translator

CJSC “Service-Gasification”, Omsk

e-mail: sypetrov@mail.ru

Being out to make his own attempt to etymologize the Russian word конь ‘a male horse, a steed’, and applying the theory of alteration of matres lectionis the author defined the ways of borrowing of the word from the Slavic to other languages, and revealed its lexical transformations in them. Using this theory which apparently opposes the commonly accepted PIE-based hypothesis of Indo-European languages vocabulary formation, and giving examples of vocabulary derivation from the word конь within the Slavic and other IE languages, the author found quite different ways of lexical formation in the languages which no one before had attempted. The results showed dramatic differences of the new etymologies from those suggested by national and foreign etymological dictionaries. Forasmuch as formal etymology of a significant part of the Russian core vocabulary in many ways remains inadequate and unsatisfying whereby resulting in wrong scientific conclusions and implications, the study is all too timely.

Keywords: ‘a male horse’, ‘a female horse, mare’, ‘a prince’, to smith, etymology, the Indo-European theory, the matres lectionis altenation theory.

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