Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic/swammaz
Proto-Germanic
Etymology
Seemingly related to Ancient Greek σομφός (somphós, “spongy, porous (esp. of wood)”), with which it is traditionally derived from Proto-Indo-European *swombʰ- (“sponge; tree-fungus”), but the Greek cannot be of inherited Indo-European origin given its lack of the expected shift *sw > *hw. Likely ultimately of substrate[2] or wanderwort origin. Such a substrate word may speculatively be related to the substrate sources of similar words in other languages, including Latin fungus (“mushroom, fungus”), Ancient Greek σπόγγος (spóngos)/σφόγγος (sphóngos, “sponge; tonsil”), Old Armenian սունկն (sunkn, “tree fungus”) and perhaps Proto-Balto-Slavic *gúmˀbas (“bulged, bloated”) (whence Lithuanian gum̃bas (“bulge”) and Proto-Slavic *gǫba (“fungus, mushroom; sponge; lip”)), which cannot be reconciled in terms of Proto-Indo-European.[1] See also the variant *sumpaz (“swamp”).
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈswɑm.mɑz/
Inflection
masculine a-stemDeclension of *swammaz (masculine a-stem) | |||
---|---|---|---|
singular | plural | ||
nominative | *swammaz | *swammōz, *swammōs | |
vocative | *swamm | *swammōz, *swammōs | |
accusative | *swammą | *swammanz | |
genitive | *swammas, *swammis | *swammǫ̂ | |
dative | *swammai | *swammamaz | |
instrumental | *swammō | *swammamiz |
Related terms
Descendants
References
- Kroonen, Guus (2013) “*swamb/ppan-”, in Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 11), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 495
- van der Sijs, Nicoline, editor (2010), “zomp”, in Etymologiebank, Meertens Institute