3. Homeric εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς and the etymology of PIE ‘cow’
Presenter: Tore Rovs Kristofferson
MASt Seminar Report Summer 2024, Friday, June 28
Bronze Age Intergenerational Dialogues (BA.ID), 2:
Early Career Researchers (ECRs) at MASt,
https://doi.org/10.71160/XPWU8208
§90. This paper presents new solutions for two different historical linguistic problems regarding two obscure Homeric epithets and the etymology of the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) word for ‘cow’.
§91. In Homer, εἰλίπους and ἕλιξ are epithets of βοῦς ‘cow’, e.g., at Il. 9.466:
πολλὰ δὲ ἴφια μῆλα καὶ εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς
many stout sheep and εἰλίποδας ἕλικας cows
§92. The epithets may occur together (Il. 9.466, 21.448, 23.166; Od. 1.92, 4.320, 9.46), or individually, i.e. εἰλίποδας βοῦς (Il. 6.424, 15.547, 16.488; Od. 8.60) and ἕλικας βοῦς (Il. 12.293, 15.633, 18.524; Od. 11.289, 12.136, 12.355, 22.292, 24.66). All but one occurrence is in the plural and the case is most often accusative. For details concerning variations and metrics, cf. LfgrE (II, 433, 550) and Le Feuvre (2015:451—459).
§93. The etymology and meaning of both epithets have been debated. Traditionally, εἰλίπους has been understood as ‘rolling in their gait’ and connected with εἰλέω ‘wind, turn around, roll / drehen, rollen’ (thus LSJ s.v.), derived from a PIE root *u̯elh₁(u̯)-. An alternative interpretation as ‘pressing the feet’ connects the word with the homonym εἰλέω ‘press’, from a homonymous root *u̯elh₁u̯- ‘envelope / einschließen, verhüllen’, which may or may not ultimately derive from the same basic root (cf. LIV2:674). The fact that εἰλίπους shows no trace of an initial digamma has led to a third interpretation as ‘foot-dragging’ (as against horses, who are ἀερσίποδες ‘high-stepping’), connecting the word with Lith. selė́ti ‘to drag’ < *sel- (cf. EDG:386). However, this latter option may be dismissed: The root in question is now reconstructed as *tsel- (cf. Ved. tsar‑ ‘to sneak, steal’, Kroonen and Lubotsky 2009, Kroonen 2013b), which would yield Greek *σελ- (Witczak 2017). As argued by Hoekstra (1965:67—68) and Le Feuvre (2015:452—454), the missing digamma may be explained as the result of a modification of metrical context in which the epithet occurs. Nothing therefore prevents the connection with a root of the shape *u̯elh₁(u̯)-.
§94. The meaning of the epithet ἕλιξ is similarly obscure, although there is general agreement that this word is etymologically connected with εἰλέω ‘wind, turn around, roll’ (EDG:411). Traditionally, it has been understood as referring to the cow’s twisted horns or, again, to its “rolling” walk (LSJ s.v.). Specifically, two options are commonly cited: The first is that we may be dealing with an adjective ἕλιξ ‘twisted, curved’, which in later texts is used also for other objects. The second option takes ἕλιξ as simply a metrically induced shortened form of *ἑλικό‑πους (= εἰλίπους) or *ἑλικό‑κραιρα ‘with curled horns’ (EDG:411), cf. the similar phrase βοῦς κεράεσσιν ἑλικτάς ‘cows with twisted horns’ (h.Merc.192).
§95. However, there seems to be no compelling reason to understand the epithets as referring to “rolling gait” or “twisted horns” other than tradition, with both interpretations the product of ancient scholarship and handed down through scholia (cf. LfgrE:II, 433, 550). These interpretations are clear attempts to explain terms the meaning of which had become obscure over time. These attempts are unconvincing: the idea that cows walk in a “rolling” fashion is quite arbitrary (cf. also Le Feuvre 2015:446), and ἕλιξ as referring to horns is contradicted by the fact that the cattle of the sun are described as both ἕλικες (Od. 12.136, 355) and ὀρθόκραιραι ‘straight-horned’ (Od. 12.348). According to O’Sullivan “this does not exclude taking ἕ[λιξ] as ref. to horns” (LfgrE:II, 551), but the cooccurrence must at least be seen as quite clumsy if this is the case. Furthermore, it should be noted that it is syntactically more straight-forward to take ἕλιξ as describing βοῦς itself, not the horns which are never mentioned.
§96. An innovative solution is presented by Le Feuvre (2015:445—463), who takes the underlying root of both epithets to be *u̯elh₁‑ ‘turn’ and argues that the formula εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς means ‘cows turning in narrow turns’ (‘bœufs virant en virages serrés’), with reference to ploughing oxen turning at the end of the furrow. This is semantically attractive, since the formula may then be explained as portraying the animal in its most prized function in an agricultural society—although, as Le Feuvre notes (2015:462), the formula is not attested in a context depicting ploughing (for the context, cf. §105). However, this argument depends on certain assumptions which are open to criticism: Le Feuvre argues that the long variant εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς is primary and the shorter variants εἰλίποδας βοῦς and ἕλικας βοῦς are both secondary truncations of the long variant. In favor of this, she presents certain metrical arguments: In the long variant (εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς), the ϝ of ἕλικας makes position, while it only does so some of the time in the short variant ἕλικας βοῦς, and while the ϝ of εἰλίποδας never makes position, this may be explained as originating in the long variant, where it is always preceded by the conjunction καί. Le Feuvre (2015:452) argues that this is a modification of the original context where καί was scanned as disyllabic *kahi, in which case *ϝεἰλίποδας would make position. If this is correct, it only allows one to take εἰλίποδας βοῦς as a truncation of εἰλίποδας ἕλικας βοῦς, while the variant ἕλικας βοῦς may still be seen as an independent formula. Concerning ἕλικας, Le Feuvre argues (2015:455—458) that this represents a noun (ἡ) ἕλιξ ‘spiral’ (in the sense ‘narrow turn’) whose case form is accusative of relation, rather than an adjective in -ιξ, which is otherwise unattested. She argues that ἕλικας was secondarily analyzed as an adjective agreeing with βοῦς, prompting the creation of variants with different case-forms: βοῶν ἑλίκων (Od. 22.292), βουσὶν ἕλιξιν (Il. 12.293), ἕλικος βοός (Il. 15.633). A problem with this interpretation is that, outside of this formula, the noun (ἡ) ἕλιξ only occurs once in Homer (Il. 18.401) where it refers to ‘armlets or earrings’, and is only found referring to other things of “spiraling shape” in later writers (cf. LSJ s.v.). The assumed meaning ‘spiral’ used in the specific sense ‘narrow turn’ posited by Le Feuvre (2015:462—463) is not attested.
§97. While it seems morphologically attractive to derive both εἰλίπους and ἕλιξ from *u̯elh₁(u̯)- ‘turn’, there is no obvious synchronic explanation for the semantics of either epithet. Therefore, it is beneficial to investigate the problem diachronically. The PIE root is reconstructed by LIV2 (675) as *u̯el‑ ‘drehen, rollen’, but forms such as Greek εἰλέω < *u̯el‑n‑h₁‑ point to *u̯elh₁‑ (Rasmussen 1989:147). Beside this simple root (reflected in Greek εἰλέω, Skt. val‑, Av. var- ‘turn’, OIr. fillid ‘bends’, Toch.B wäl‑ ‘curl, curve’), a root-extension *u̯elh₁u̯‑ is commonly reconstructed, cf. Arm. gelowm ‘turn’, Greek ἐλύσθη ‘rolled up, crouched’, Lat. volvō ‘turn, roll’, Go. walwjan ‘to roll’ (overview in IEW:1140—1142; cf. also de Vaan 2008:689—690; Cheung 2007:419). As it is evident from the material, the root is attested in most branches of IE. Semantically, the sense ‘turn, roll’ predominates (whence several nominal derivations referring to winding, twisted, or round objects), but a wider semantic spectrum is attested in Skt. val‑ which can also mean ‘move to and from; go, approach; return to a place’ (Monier-Williams s.v. val) and Germanic forms as OE weallian ‘to wander, roam’, MDu. wal(l)en ‘to turn, roll, wander’, OHG wal(l)ōn ‘to wander, roam’ (Kroonen 2013a:571).
§98. For the present purposes, one group of nominal derivations is of special interest: In a recent talk, Olsen (2023) has suggested that PIE the word for ‘pasture, meadow’ reflected in Hitt. wellu- ‘id.’, ON vǫllr ‘field’, and Greek Ἠλύσιον (πεδίον) ‘the Elysian field’ (first equated by Puhvel 1969) is derived from *u̯elh₁(u̯)- ‘turn, roll’ (i.e. wellu- < *u̯elh₁u‑, vǫllr < *u̯olh₁u‑, Ἠλύσιον < *u̯ēlh₁utii̯o‑). The derivation is morphologically and phonetically attractive and leads us towards an understanding of the association between *u̯elh₁(u̯)- and cows. However, I disagree with Olsen’s (2023) explanation of the semantics, which departs from the interpretation of the word in a specifically religious context: As it has long been noted, the conception of the abode of the dead as a pasture or meadow is wide-spread among Indo-European speaking cultures, and both Hitt. wellu- and Greek Ἠλύσιον are used in this sense in the relevant texts. Olsen (2023) argues that this idea may be connected with the practice among steppe cultures associated with speakers of PIE of raising burial mounds, these mounds being named “rolling meadows” for the “rolling” of lumps of earth and grass in the construction process. The problem with this account is that Hitt. wellu- ‘pasture, meadow’ and ON vǫllr ‘field’ are general terms and not confined to the religious sphere (cf. Tischler 2016:477—484 on the Hittite usage). It therefore seems more straight-forward to assume that *u̯olh₁u‑/*u̯elh₁u- was originally a general word for ‘pasture’ which could be used, inter alia, to refer to the abode of the dead. While I believe that the root *u̯elh₁(u̯)- is in fact the basis for the word for ‘pasture’, I reason that a different explanation of the semantics is warranted.
§99. The nature of the relationship between the root *u̯elh₁(u̯)‑ and cattle/cows may be explained if we look at the use of the root *kʷelh₁‑ ‘turn, roll’ (IEW:639—640; LIV2:386—388), which—as it is well-known—is closely associated with the semantic field of cow-herding. This is evident from the compound *gʷou̯‑kʷolh₁o‑ ‘cowherd’ > Greek βουκόλος (Mycenaean qo‑u‑ko‑ro), OIr. buachaill. In Greek, we also find αἴπολος ‘goatherd’, but this is not re-constructible for the proto-language. Here, it should be noted that *u̯elh₁(u̯)‑ and *kʷelh₁‑ may not only be semantically, but also etymologically related: Cohen (2004:57—58) lists *kʷelh₁‑ ~ *u̯elh₁‑ among a handful of cognate sets pointing to variation within PIE between word-initial *kʷ- and *u̯-, also including *kʷr̥mi- ~ *u̯r̥mi- ‘worm’ (Ved. kŕ̥mi‑, OIr cruim, MW pryf ~ Lat. vermis, Go. waurms, cf. IEW:649, 1152), *kʷerpH‑ ‘sich wenden’ ~ *u̯erp‑ ‘sich hin- und herdrehen’ (ON hverfa ‘to turn’ ~ Lith. ver̃pti ‘to spin’, Hitt. warp‑zi ‘to wash, bathe’, cf. IEW:631, 1156; LIV2:392—393, 690). It should be noted that Cohen (2004:52—53) is explicitly agnostic regarding the ultimate origin of the observed variation—conditioned sound-change in pre-PIE, interdialectal borrowing (etc.)?—and that the small number of comparanda makes it difficult to exclude the possibility that we are dealing with a chance resemblance between unrelated forms. Therefore, further research into Cohen’s (2004) claims would be beneficial. With these reservations in mind, I will proceed to explore what can be gained if we assume that the roots *u̯elh₁‑ and *kʷelh₁‑ are in fact cognates.
§100. Since the reflexes of *kʷelh₁‑ found in the daughter languages attest to a wide range of meanings, cf. Greek πέλομαι ‘become, be’, Lat. colō ‘dwell, inhabit’, Ved. cari‑ ‘move around, wander’, the traditionally reconstructed basic meaning ‘turn, roll’ (LIV2: 386—388) or ‘circulate’ (DELG: 878: ‘circuler, circuler autour’) has been criticized by a number of scholars. Rix (1994:17—22) rejects ‘turn’, reconstructing instead ‘tend to, care for’ as the basic meaning. Lubotsky (2023:257) reconstructs it as ‘to roam (with cattle), to live the nomadic life’. Accordingly, the sense of the root in relation to cattle, as well as the basic meaning of *gʷou̯‑kʷolh₁o‑ ‘cowherd’ are difficult to ascertain. Mallory and Adams (2006:283) assume that the ‘cowherd’ was ‘one who turns/moves cows’. Differently, assuming a basic meaning ‘circulate’, one might expect ‘one who circulates the cows, making sure they are all together etc.’ (as pointed out to me by a reviewer). Rix (1994:23) assumes that the basic sense of ‘cowherd’ was ‘Rinderversorger’. Following Lubotsky (2023:257), the cowherd would simply be ‘one who roams with cattle, a nomad’.
§101. Regarding the basic meaning of the root, it should be noted that while the reflexes in the daughter languages does not allow for a straight-forward reconstruction of a simply meaning ‘turn’, this sense is clearly present. It is directly reflected in Anatolian to, cf. HLuw. kuwalīti ‘turns’, Lyc. teliχa ‘I turned’ and this must be reconstructed for the highest node of the family tree. It is also preserved in Alb. sjell ‘bringe, trage; drehe um, wende’ (LIV2:386—388). The semantics of the remaining comparanda may ultimately be derived from ‘turn’, as evident, e.g. in Greek πoλέω ‘go about, range over, haunt’. The best solution is probably to assume that the root had a wider semantic field ‘turn, go around, wander’.
§102. With this in mind, we may take a closer look at the root in relation to cows. For the compound *gʷou̯‑kʷolh₁o‑ ‘cowherd’, the suggested basic meaning is ‘one who turns/moves cows’, ‘one who circulates the cows’, ‘one who tends cattle’, ‘one who roams with cattle’, which assume that the root *kʷelh₁‑ refers to the action of the human, with the cows as the object of this action. However, as is evident from the material collected in LIV2 (386—388), where the root is glossed ‘eine Drehung machen, sich umdrehen, sich (um‑, zu‑)wenden’, we must rather start from an intransitive sense. Here, it is informative to look at the Indo-Iranian: Vedic cari‑, the reflex of *kʷelh₁‑, means ‘gehen, wandern, von Göttern, Menschen und Vieh’ (Grassmann 1873: s.v.). In the Rigveda, collocations of cari‑ and gáv- ‘cow’ always refer to the action of cows (subject), not to humans in relation to cows (object). Cf. e.g. RV.6.28.4c-d (trans. Jamison and Brereton 2014):
urugāyám ábhayaṁ tásya tā́ ánu / gā́vo mártasya ví caranti yájvanaḥ
The cows of the mortal who sacrifices wander far across wide-ranging (space) free of fear.
§103. Also interesting are the numerous Middle- and New Indo-Iranian forms, which, as pointed out by Rix (1994:21), carry the sense ‘weiden’. What is not reflected, however, in the German rendering ‘weiden’ or, for that matter, in the English rendering ‘pasture, graze’ used by Cheung (2007:33—34), is that these words, such as Parthian/Middle Persian cr‑ /čar-/ ‘graze’ (cf. DMMPP:126) and Pali carati ‘moves, grazes’, Prakrit caraï ‘to graze’ (Turner 1966:254) are in fact intransitive and mean ‘to eat grass on the pasture’ (the animal is the subject), not ‘to feed, put animals out to pasture’ (human subject). In Indo-Aryan, the sense ‘graze (= to eat grass)’, as noted by Turner (1966:254) and Monier-Williams (s.v. car), is not Middle Indo-Aryan development, but is attested to in classical Sanskrit (Yājñavalkya). Thus, the comparanda suggest that the Proto-Indo-Iranian reflex of the root encompass the sense ‘to wander around on the pasture, wander around grazing’ when cows/cattle was the subject. If this situation is projected back into PIE, the basic meaning of *gʷou̯‑kʷolh₁o‑ ‘cowherd’ would be explicable as ‘one who makes cattle wander around on the pasture’, with *‑kʷolh₁o‑ conveying a causative sense; precisely this use of the causative is attested in the Mahābhārata (cf. Monier-Williams s.v. car) and is continued in Waigali čaräy- ‘to herd cattle’ < cāráy° (EWAia:I, 535).
§104. To sum up, the roots *kʷelh₁‑ and *u̯elh₁‑ share not only a basic meaning ‘turn’ but also the broader sense ‘move around, wander’. For kʷelh₁‑, this included the special sense ‘wander around grazing (of cattle)’, which is not attested in *u̯elh₁‑. However, if the two roots were originally the same, we may assume that this meaning was simply lost in the daughter languages’ reflexes of *u̯elh₁‑, as the two roots underwent gradual semantic specialization in opposite directions – perhaps in part due to a secondary association between *u̯elh₁(u̯)‑ and *u̯elh₁u̯‑ ‘envelope’ (LIV2:674), the reflexes of which are not always clearly distinguishable in the daughter languages. Thus, we may now explain *u̯olh₁u‑/*u̯elh₁u- ‘pasture’ as the ‘place for cows to wander around grazing’, a parallel for which is seen, e.g., in the different Indo-Aryan terms for ‘pasture’ derived from cari- < *kʷelh₁‑ (cf. Turner 1966:254).
§105. This also provides an explanation for the two Homeric epithets under discussion: εἰλίπους would originally have meant something along lines of ‘with wandering feet’ and ἕλιξ ‘the one wandering around’. The exact age and derivational basis of these formations remain difficult to comprehend: εἰλίπους seems to reflect *ἐλν‑ί‑πους, with the first member of the compound deriving from the verb εἰλέω, i.e. an inner-Greek formation. This could mean that εἰλέω (which itself is not attested in “our” Homer) preserved the sense ‘wander around (grazing)’ down to the time of the composition of the Homeric epics, which seems somewhat uncertain. Alternatively, we may see εἰλίποδας as a modification of an original (metrically illicit) *ἐλίποδας, which would reflect a PIE *u̯elh₁i‑pod- (with an i-stem *u̯elh₁i‑ as first member) or *u̯elh₁‑i‑pod- (with the simple root as first member + compositional vowel *‑i‑). Analyzed in this way, the formation would be regular from a PIE point of view and could therefore go back to the proto-language, when the root still carried the sense ‘wander around (grazing)’. Concerning ἕλιξ, the apparent connection with the noun ἕλιξ (f.) ‘spiral’ may be illusory, and we may be dealing with a separate formation. Morphologically, the formation seems old, since the suffix -ιξ derives from PIE *‑ih₂s > *‑iks with “laryngeal hardening” (Olsen 2010). This derivational type is based on collectives which underwent singularization through the addition of the animate nominative marker *‑s (Olsen 2010:210–211), i.e. *u̯elh₁‑i‑h₂ (i-stem collective) ‘herd of wandering animals/cows’ *u̯elh₁‑i‑h₂‑s ‘a wandering animal/cow’. This means that the epithet ἕλιξ should be interpreted as (originally) a noun standing in apposition to βοῦς, i.e. ἕλικας βοῦς ‘the wandering ones, the cows.’ Note that this interpretation does away with the idea of a morphologically isolated adjective in -ιξ, but still allows us to make sense of the passages showing other case-forms than the accusative plural, which Le Feuvre (2015) saw as secondary (cf. §95). The use of ἕλιξ as an adjective ‘twisted, curved’ found in later writers (cf. LSJ s.v.) probably arose due to the (incorrect) interpretation of the Homeric epithet as referring to curved horns (cf. §§93—94), induced by the existence of the homonym (ἡ) ἕλιξ ‘spiral’.
§106. While the present analysis of εἰλίπους and ἕλιξ relies heavily on comparative rather than inner-Greek material, we do in fact find circumstantial evidence supporting the interpretation in the Homeric passages themselves. The contexts in which the epithets occur may be divided in two types: the first type describes cattle being slaughtered for sacrifice (Il. 9.466, 23.166; Od. 1.92, 4.320, 8.60, 9.46, 24.66). In the second type, the narrative role of the cattle varies, but the way the animals are depicted forms a distinct pattern: they are described as being guarded/herded (Il. 15.547, 18.524, 21.448; Od. 12.136) or driven from one place to another (Od. 11.289), or as grazing (Od. 12.355). Once, we hear of Achilles killing the seven brothers of Andromache among the sheep and cows (Il. 6.424), suggesting a situation where the animals are grazing together. In a recurring simile, a lion is described attacking cattle (Il. 12.293, 15.633, 16.488), specifically described as grazing in a meadow at Il. 15.633. Finally, the epithet is incorporated into an epithet describing the cowherd Philoetius (Od. 22.292). In short, the epithets are used when cows are depicted as wandering around grazing, which conforms to the original sense of the epithets as proposed here. In fact, it seems that whenever Homer depicts cattle wandering around grazing, they are described—almost exclusively—using either the epithets εἰλίπους and ἕλιξ, or no epithet at all (e.g. Il. 5.161–162; Od. 11.108). The only exceptions seem to be the use of ἀγελαῖος ‘belonging to the herd’, but this seems to be used only when the poet’s focus is on describing the herd specifically (e.g. Od. 10.410, opposite calves in the stall). A single cow may be described as ἄγραυλος ‘dwelling in the field’ (e.g. Od. 22.403), but this is never used when depicting cattle grazing.
§107. Finally, it should be noted that the description of cattle as the ones ‘moving around’ would have been far from trivial: in PIE society, which was based on nomadic pastoralism (Anthony 2023), the cow occupied a central economic role as moveable property. This is also the case in the Greek world: cows serve as the principal measure of wealth in Homeric society (cf. Donlan 1997), and livestock (including cows) may be designated as πρόβασις ‘moveable wealth’ and contrasted with κειμήλια ‘stored wealth’ (e.g. Od. 2.75. Cf. Benveniste 1969:37—43). Although there is now little support for the claim (Snodgrass 1987:193—209) that Dark Age Greece saw a partial abandonment of sedentism in favor of a return to nomadic pastoralism (cf. Bintliff 2012:215), society as depicted by Homer certainly shows a preoccupation with the image of large herds of cattle. Cf. Donlan (1997:655):
Ploughlands, vineyards, and orchards do not fill the Homeric landscape […] Homer distorts the economy for us by foregrounding the huge ranching operations of the basileis and other plousioi and pushing into the background the agricultural economy and the small and middling farmer. But the poetic selectivity also suggests that the Dark Age audiences viewed animals as the higher wealth in social terms.
In this socio-economic context, the image of the cow as the one that ‘moves around, wanders’ would have also been of great significance for the audiences of the Homeric bard. I will return to this concept of the cow in the second part of this paper.
§108. The reconstruction of the PIE word for ‘cow, ox’, reflected in Greek βοῦς (Mycenaean qo‑u‑°), Lat. bōs, Ved. gáv- (etc.), is debated. Some scholars reconstruct the word as a (highly archaic) un-suffixed type nom.sg. *gʷō̌u̯‑s gen.sg. *gʷéu̯‑s (cf. Schindler 1972) while others prefer a (productive) u-stem, either nom.sg. *gʷeh₃‑u‑s gen.sg. *gʷh₃‑éu̯‑s or nom.sg. *gʷh₃‑éu̯‑s gen.sg. *gʷh₃‑u̯ó‑s (cf. Nielsen Whitehead 2018). Whilst a detailed discussion of the issues involved in the thorough overview given by de Decker (2011) and Nielsen Whitehead (2018), I would like to instead draw attention to a few points: Proponents of the u-stem option argue that this reconstruction has a number of advantages, namely that ‘cow’ may be derived in a regular fashion from the root *gʷeh₃- ‘to graze’, which explains the o-vocalism found throughout the paradigm as the result of laryngeal-coloring. Further, Nielsen Whitehead (2018) argues that the génitif fermé type assumed by Schindler (1972), i.e. gen.sg. *gʷéu̯‑s (as reflected in Ved. góḥ, Av. gə̄uš) is exceedingly rare in un-suffixed nouns, which means that ‘cow’ would belong to a very small group of words displaying a morphological pattern only attested as a relic, the main parallel being *dom- ‘house’ with its gen.sg. *dém‑s, while a u-stem would conform with a regular, productive pattern.
§109. Against these arguments, it may be noted that there is no reason ‘cow’ should not display highly archaic morphology, belonging, as it does, to what may be considered the basic vocabulary of animal names. Further, there is no evidence for the supposed lack of *o/e-ablaut in the paradigm often cited as pointing to the existence of *h₃ in the root. It is to be expected that most daughter-languages, such as Greek, would have levelled the paradigm and generalized the o-grade. Here, it must be noted that both the root-noun and u-stem options require a number of analogical changes to the paradigm in one or more daughter-languages, which means that neither option predicts all forms of the attested paradigms exactly. In Vedic, we do find forms pointing to an e-grade, such as dat. sg. gáve, loc. sg. gávi, where the lack of Brugmann’s law (PIE *o > Ved. ā in open syllable) excludes an o-grade. Of course, these forms, too, may be analogical, so the evidence for or against *o/e-ablaut in the original paradigm is inconclusive. Finally, certain derivatives in fact do point to an e-grade: as pointed out by an anonymous reviewer, this is the case for the word for ‘leather’ in modern Pamir languages, e.g. Yidgha žū, Munji žūg < *ǰauka‑ < *gʷeu̯°, which suggest the existence of an e-grade in the paradigm word for ‘cow’ itself (cf. Morgenstierne 1938:277).
§110. A quite different, and often-ignored issue is that the evidence for the root *gʷeh₃‑ ‘to graze’, which is the point of departure for the u-stem analysis, is in fact quite weak. The root *gʷeh₃- ‘to graze’ is reconstructed based on the Greek family of βόσκω ‘graze’ etc. and Lith. gúotas ‘herd’ (cf. IEW:482—483, EDG:227—228). However, it is uncertain whether the root *gʷeh₃- ‘to graze’ (not in LIV2) can in actually be reconstructed. Garnier (2009) argues that Lith. gúotas is rather derived from *gʷóh₂‑to‑ ‘richesse sur pieds, bétails’ to the root *gʷeh₂- ‘to go, step’, comparing Benveniste’s (1969:37—43) analysis of Greek πρόβατα ‘cattle’ < ‘*moveable property’. This would confine the root *gʷeh₃- to Greek. The author goes further, however, arguing that a similar formation *gʷóh₂‑teh₂‑ is reflected in Greek forms such as συ-βώτης, Mycenaean su‑qo‑ta‑o (PY Ea 109) ’swine-herd’, qo‑u‑qo‑ta (KN X 480) ‘cow-herd’, and βωτι‑άνειρα ‘man-feeding’, while the short-vowel forms, such as βόσκω, βοτήρ ‘herdsman’, βοτόν ‘beast’, βόσις ’food, fodder’, are due to secondary ablaut βω‑ : βο‑, which was created within Greek under the influence from ablaut the synonymous root *peh₂- : *ph₂- ‘to graze, protect’ (LIV2:460) which it eventually displaced.
§111. I would add the following modification to Garnier’s (2009) analysis: if there was in fact, as reconstructed by some scholars (e.g., Mayrhofer 1986:174—175), an original distinction between the two (later contaminated) roots *peh₂- ‘to graze, feed’ and *peh₃‑ ‘to protect, tend (cattle)’, cf. ποιμήν ‘shepherd’ < *peh₃i‑men‑, πῶμα ‘lid, cover’ < *peh₃‑mn̥ ‘protection’ (rather than *poh₂i‑men‑, *poh₂‑mn̥, with unmotivated o-grade, as argued by Mayrhofer). The zero-grade of the root *peh₃‑, namely *ph₃‑, would regularly yield βο‑ in Greek, with voicing *p > b next to *h₃. Note that the evidence for a labiovelar in the Greek comparanda is restricted to the Mycenaean forms, which may be accounted for by Garnier’s (2009) explanation, i.e. the forms in βωτ° (Mycenaen qo-t° would reflect /gʷōt°/) and those in βο° would by etymologically unrelated. Secondary association between the two groups would have given rise to such forms as βου‑βότης ‘giving pasture to cattle’ (Pi.Ν.4.52) for expected *βου‑βώτης (Mycenaean qo‑u‑qo‑ta). If this analysis is correct, we may then equate βόσκω with Lat. pasco ‘graze, feed, tend (cattle)’ < *ph₃‑sk̂e/o-, with Latin showing restored p‑ for *b‑, presumably from the pf. pāvi < *pōvi < *peh₃° (cf. octāvus ‘eighth’ < *octōvus).
§112. In view of these issues, the u-stem analysis of PIE ‘cow’ seems to lead to an etymological dead end. It is therefore worthwhile to explore whether a root-noun *gʷō̆u̯‑s has the advantage of being etymologically analyzable. Leaving aside the option that we are dealing with a Wanderwort of non-IE origin or an onomatopoeion (cf. EIEC:135), neither of which can in principle be excluded, the word must be derived from a root *gʷeu̯‑. A root of this shape is in fact reconstructed by a number of scholars, which, given the arguments presented above, seems an ideal candidate for the derivational basis of ‘cow’.
§113. According to García Ramón (1985) and de Lamberterie (1990:932—935), Greek πρέσβυς (variant πρέσγυς, πρεῖ(σ)γυς etc.), Mycenaean pe‑re‑ku‑ta (PY An 72), pe‑re‑ku‑wa‑na‑ka (PY Va 15) ‘old man, elder’ and its Armenian cognate erēc’ ‘elder’ are to be analyzed as a compound *prei̯s‑gʷu- ‘going in front’, where the second member reflects a root *gʷeu̯- ‘to go’. This root is found also as in compounds such as Ved. vanar‑gú‑ ‘wandering in a forest; a savage’ (etc.), Lith. žmo‑gùs ‘human being, man’ < *‘walking on the earth’. Both authors interpret *gʷeu̯- as a third variant of the two well-known roots meaning ‘to go’, *gʷem‑ and *gʷeh₂‑, for which García Ramón (1985:59) cites as a parallel of the three variant roots meaning ‘to run’, *dreu̯‑ (Ved. drávati), *drem‑ (Ved. drámati), *dreh₂‑ (Ved. drā‑, Greek ἔδρᾱν). Since, however, the root is attested only as second member of compounds, García Ramón (1985:59—60) notes the possibility that the comparanda rather reflect *‑gʷh₂-u-, i.e. u-stem formations to the root *gʷeh₂‑. Therefore, the evidence for a root *gʷeu̯- ‘to go’, if based on the above-cited comparanda alone, is meagre.
§114. However, the interpretation of these words as containing a root *gʷeu̯- may be strengthened if we assume that this root is identical to the one reconstructed by IEW (393—398) as gēu-, gəu-, gū- ‘biegen, krümmen, wolben’, on the basis of such forms as Greek γύης ‘curved part of a plough’, γυῖα ’limbs’, and γῡρός ‘round, curved’, ON ká ‘to root up, turn’, ká‑beinn ‘krummbeinig’, among many other comparanda. On the shape of the underlying root, two things should be noted. First, the evidence for (what would now be understood as) a root-final laryngeal, i.e. *geuH‑, is weak: For instance, the long vowel of Greek γῡρός ‘round, curved’ may reflect *gus‑ro‑ and belong to the forms showing an s-extension of the root (IEW:398). Beside this, the evidence for a seṭ-root seems primarily due to the long ū found in a number of Germanic comparanda, not all of which are equally certain. The short vowel attested in such forms as Greek γύης, on the other hand, points to an aniṭ-root. Secondly, among the material cited in IEW, very little speaks against reconstructing the initial consonant as a labiovelar *gʷ‑: of the comparanda belonging to languages that would show a distinction between *g- and *gʷ-, most forms show environments where delabialization would be regular, i.e. before rounded vowels (cf. Stiles 2017:985). Where Germanic shows a pure velar *k- before a Pre-PGmc *e (such as ON kjólr ‘keel’ < PGmc *keula-, if indeed related), this may be seen as analogically introduced from forms where delabialization was regular.
§115. Further comparanda, not included in IEW, may be adduced in favor of reconstructing the root in question as *gʷeu̯‑, among which are Greek βουνός (m.) ‘hill’. This word was first compared by Fick (1890:36, 406) to ON kaun (n.) ‘sore, blister’ < PGmc *kauna‑. Aside from the gender, the Greek and Germanic forms may be exactly equated and reconstructed *gʷou̯nó‑ ‘something round, curved; bulge, arch’ (compare Lith. kaũbras, kaũburas ‘hump, bulge, hill’ < *keu̯bʰ- ‘to bend, curve’). Most striking is Fick’s (1890) inclusion of the Hesychian glosses and δεῖν· […] καὶ στρέφειν. Κύπριοι. ‘to turn about. Cyprians’ (δ 491 Cunningham) and ἐπιδεῦσαι· ἐπιστρέψαι ‘to turn about, turn round’ (ε 4715 Cunningham). The interpretation of these glosses as directly reflecting a root *gʷeu̯‑ > Greek δευ‑ (preserved, as it seems, only in the Cyprian dialect) and seems to have drawn no scholarly attention. In part, this may be due to textual problems surrounding the glosses: The gloss “δεῖν” seems to conflate several originally separate glosses, as shown by the fact that the explicatio includes of number of other interpretations beside “στρέφειν”, while “ἐπιδεῦσαι” is slightly misplaced in the alphabetical order and is simply marked as corrupt by Cunningham (s.v.). These, however, seem to be minor problems, and as no better explanation for either gloss exists, Fick’s (1890) interpretation seems quite attractive. If this is correct, then Hesychius provides us with a direct verbal reflex of the root in question.
§116. I posit that the two roots *gʷeu̯- ‘to go’ and ‘bend, curve’ may be reduced to one, if we assume a basic meaning ‘to move circularly, move around’. As we have seen, this semantic breadth within a root is unproblematic and finds a parallel in the pair *kʷelh₁‑/*u̯elh₁(u̯)‑. Further, as the above discussion has shown, ‘to move circularly, move around’ was the sort of movement that was associated with cows among speakers of PIE. If we assume that PIE *gʷō̌u̯‑s ‘cow’ was derived from *gʷeu̯-, then the animal’s name can be understood simply as referring to the behavioral characteristics of the animal, the ‘cow’ being ‘the one that moves circularly, moves around’. The name itself therefore confirms what has long been known: That the cow was the moveable wealth par excellence for the speakers of PIE.
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For a discussion of this and the other ECRs’ papers, go the MASt Summer 2024 report landing page and scroll to §166