''Nomina im Indogermanischen Lexikon'' (''NIL'', ''"Nominals in the Indo-European Lexicon"'') is an
etymological dictionary
An etymological dictionary discusses the etymology of the words listed. Often, large dictionaries, such as the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' and ''Webster's'', will contain some etymological information, without aspiring to focus on etymology.
E ...
of the
Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo- ...
(PIE) nominals, that is,
noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Living creatures (including people, alive, ...
s and
adjective
In linguistics, an adjective (abbreviated ) is a word that generally modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun.
Traditionally, adjectives were considered one of the ma ...
s. It appeared in 2008, edited by German linguists Dagmar S. Wodtko, Britta Irslinger, and Carolin Schneider. Like other modern PIE dictionaries, ''NIL'' utilizes the modern three-
laryngeal theory
The laryngeal theory is a theory in the historical linguistics of the Indo-European languages positing that:
* The Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) had a series of phonemes beyond those reconstructable by the comparative method. That is, th ...
for its reconstructions.
History
During the 2000s, scientists at the
University of Freiburg
The University of Freiburg (colloquially german: Uni Freiburg), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (german: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), is a public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemb ...
worked on a project called "Indogermanisches Nomen" ("Indo-European Nominal"), comprising a volume on nominal
inflection
In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and ...
, to become part of
Manfred Mayrhofer
Manfred Mayrhofer (26 September 1926 – 31 October 2011) was an Austrian Indo-Europeanist who specialized in Indo-Iranian languages. Mayrhofer served as professor emeritus at the University of Vienna. He is noted for his etymological dictionar ...
's series on Indo-European grammar; a dictionary called ''Lexikon der indogermanischen Nomina'' (''LIN'', "Lexicon of the Indo-European Nominals" in analogy to the ''
Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben
The ''Lexikon der indogermanischen Verben'' (''LIV'', ''"Lexicon of the Indo-European Verbs"'') is an etymological dictionary of the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) verb. The first edition appeared in 1998, edited by Helmut Rix. A second edition follow ...
'', ''LIV''); and a work on PIE primary adjectives. Eventually, the project was cancelled due to cutting of funds.
University of Freiburg
The University of Freiburg (colloquially german: Uni Freiburg), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (german: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), is a public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemb ...
DFG-Projekt "Indogermanisches Nomen"
In 2008, a reduced version of the ''LIN'' was published under the title ''Nomina im Indogermanischen Lexikon''. It includes only a limited selection of words and is lacking the planned grammatical section, which should have listed PIE nominal inflection types (again in analogy to the ''LIV'') along with their scope of use and
syntactic implications. Still, an overview of PIE mechanisms for deriving nominals from verbs –
root
In vascular plants, the roots are the organs of a plant that are modified to provide anchorage for the plant and take in water and nutrients into the plant body, which allows plants to grow taller and faster. They are most often below the su ...
nouns, suffixes,
vṛddhi derivations, etc. – is included.
Entries
Part of the entries are based on noun stems (for example 'horse') or adjectival stems ( 'deep'), while a large number of PIE nominals are derived from
verbal roots (such as 'shine, glow').
The entries are modelled on the concept of the ''LIV''. Each contains
* the conjectured meaning of the stem or root,
* reconstructed stems and derivations with their reflexes in the daughter languages,
* extensive footnotes (with references, remarks on alternative and dubious reconstructions, etc., sometimes exceeding ten pages for a single entry),
* the page numbers of the corresponding ''
LIV'', ''
IEW'', ''
EIEC'' and ''
LIPP'' entries, where they exist.
The daughter languages often have
changed the meanings of inherited words. Consequently, many of ''NIL''s entries contain words with widely different meanings. For example, the entry 'deep' treats the
Lithuanian words ''dubùs'' 'deep' and ''dubuõ'' 'bowl, pelvis',
Old Irish
Old Irish, also called Old Gaelic ( sga, Goídelc, Ogham script: ᚌᚑᚔᚇᚓᚂᚉ; ga, Sean-Ghaeilge; gd, Seann-Ghàidhlig; gv, Shenn Yernish or ), is the oldest form of the Goidelic/Gaelic language for which there are extensive writt ...
''dub(o/ā)'' 'dark, black', and
Albanian ''det'' 'sea', among many others. 'shine, glow' lists derivatives with meanings as diverse as 'a light, insight, appearance, wrath, white, clean.'
See also
*
Proto-Indo-European nominals
Proto-Indo-European nominals include nouns, adjectives, and pronouns. Their grammatical forms and meanings have been reconstructed by modern linguists, based on similarities found across all Indo-European languages. This article discusses nouns a ...
Other PIE dictionaries and grammars
*''
'' (published 1886–1916 by
Karl Brugmann
Karl Brugmann (16 March 1849 – 29 June 1919) was a German linguist. He is noted for his work in Indo-European linguistics.
Biography
He was educated at the universities of Halle and Leipzig. He taught at the gymnasium at Wiesbaden and at Lei ...
and
Berthold Delbrück
Berthold Gustav Gottlieb Delbrück (; 26 July 1842 – 3 January 1922) was a German linguist who devoted himself to the study of the comparative syntax of the Indo-European languages.
Early life
Delbrück was born in Putbus. He studied at the un ...
)
*''
Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch
The ''Indogermanisches etymologisches Wörterbuch'' (''IEW''; "Indo-European Etymological Dictionary") was published in 1959 by the Austrian-German comparative linguist and Celtic languages expert Julius Pokorny. It is an updated and slimmed-down ...
'' (''IEW'', first published 1956 by
Julius Pokorny), with reconstructions pre-dating laryngeal theory
* ''
Indo-European Etymological Dictionary'', an ongoing project based in
Leiden
Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wi ...
, intended to result in the publication of a comprehensive Indo-European etymological dictionary
References
External links
Pokorny PIE Data(University of Texas)
(based on the ''IEW'' and including laryngeal-based reconstructions, but only as alternative lemmas with cross references to the pre-laryngeal ones)
{{Proto-Indo-European language
2008 non-fiction books
Indo-European linguistics works
Etymological dictionaries