# Arabic: برج (burj)



## arashmordad

Hello,
I was wondering what is the Etymology of the Arabic word for "tower" (burj) *برج*
Originally I thought it was from Semitic but now studying some Indo-European I am starting to think it might actually be of Indo-European Etymology:
PIE _bergh_ "fort, protect"; _brgh_ "high"
For instance German _Burg_ "castle" and _Berg_ "mountain", or Greek _πύργος_ (_pyrgos_) "tower."
What do you guys think?
Thanks!


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## Abu Rashid

This is one I've always wondered about too. The Arabic usage dates back to at least the time of the Qur'an, since one of the chapters is named al-Buruuj (which is plural of burj). The word also has the meaning of constellation in Arabic, so it could just be that perhaps it's a coincidence? Also I think it's fairly rare for a word with a 'g' sound to be borrowed into Arabic with a 'j' sound, more likely to come over as 'gh' I think, especially since it has that kind of spelling in most European languages anyway.


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## Outlandish

I remember reading the word in pre-Islamic poetry. Al-Boroug (j) (constellations) are so called in Arabic long time before Islam.


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## entangledbank

_Pyrgos_ fits perfectly if it was borrowed before Arabic [g] changed sound (which was a century or so after the Quran, if I recall rightly), and before Greek [y] changed to _ (which was about 900 or 1000, I think). Because of the [p] and [g], pyrgos can't be related to the IE bergh root._


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## Abu Rashid

> if it was borrowed before Arabic [g] changed sound (which was a century or so after the Quran, if I recall rightly)



Arabic changed sound a century or so after the Qur'an? As far as I'm aware no major sound changes have occurred in Arabic since the time of the Qur'an.


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## berndf

entangledbank said:


> Because of the [p] and [g], _pyrgos_ can't be related to the IE _bergh_ root.


The more likely English cognate would be _burgh_, not _bergh_, but your argument applies to both and _burgh_ and _bergh_ might have the same PIE root anyway.

Applying your argument to _burgh_, I can't see your point here:
1) [p]: If the PIE origin is bʰ, a <π> or <φ> in Greek and <b> in Germanic is plausible. In addition, according to Grimm, there are attested variants _φυρκος_ and Macedonian _βυργος_.
2) [g]: The English spelling _burgh_ corresponds to OE/ME pronunciation [bʊrç], OE spelling _burh_. As all other Germanic cognates end in <g> and, according to Grimm, there is an attested continental Anglo-Saxon spelling _byrig_, it is most likely that the OE _burh_ is derived from an older _*burġ_ [bʊrj] or _*byrġ_ [byrj] through unvoicing of <ġ>.


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## Abu Rashid

> The more likely English cognate would be burgh



I think borough is also another English cognate.


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## entangledbank

berndf said:


> 1) [p]: If the PIE origin is bʰ, a <π> or <φ> in Greek and <b> in Germanic is plausible. In addition, according to Grimm, there are attested variants _φυρκος_ and Macedonian _βυργος_.


 
Standard Greek [p] is only plausible if Grassmann's Law has applied, and **_bhVrgh-_ would give *_pVrkh-_. However, the existence of variants with all sorts of phonation makes that point moot. They make the connexion with Germanic likely.


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## berndf

Abu Rashid said:


> I think borough is also another English cognate.


Yes, both _burgh_ and_ borough_ are derived from OE _burh_.


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## Faylasoof

According to this it is an “ancient” borrowing from Germanic _burg_- fortified town, hill-fort. 

Not sure how exactly “ancient” that would be but given what Outlandish said about the word برج occurring in pre-Islamic poetry, it means it is prior to the 7th century.

Of course Homer's epic, The Iliad, does have  _πύργος_ (_pyrgos_) ="tower” – one of the meanings in Arabic. But I see the above link also doesn’t consider this as a possibility and goes for the Germanic root.


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## origumi

The words "pyrgos" (as in Greek) and "burgan" (Hebrew/Aramaic pronunciation of Roman "burgus") were used in Arab-neighboring regions.

1. A Phoenician town "Pyrgos Stratonos" (Strato's Tower, מגדל שרשן) existed since 4th (or even 5th) century BC in the place taken later by King Herod to build Caesarea Maritima, near today's Israeli town of Hadera. Choosing a Greek name for Aramaic speaking town was maybe under influence of Egypt's Ptolemy.

2. "Tetra pyrgos" was a known construction style for Roman legion camp, protected by 4 towers. Some locations of tetra pyrgos were Nitzana, Hatzeva, Yotvata (in a region populated mainly by Arab Nabateans at the time, today's southern Israel) and Jerusalem.

3. Romans in the region used the word "burgus" for castle, tower, fortification. It resonants frequently in Gemara Hebrew/Aramaic (3rd-5th century AD) as "burganin" בורגנין (pl.), from "burgan" בורגן (sing.).


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## Abu Rashid

> According to this it is an “ancient” borrowing from Germanic burg- fortified town, hill-fort.



Coming from Germanic sounds very unlikely. Perhaps from another European language, but Germanic just doesn't sound right. There was little if any contact between Arabs and Germanic people prior to Islam.


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## WadiH

I can see this word coming to Arabic from Greek, but in the absence of any further evidence it could simply be a false cognate like "Earth"/"Ardh" (which was discussed here in the past).


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## Ander

Abu Rashid said:


> As far as I'm aware no major sound changes have occurred in Arabic since the time of the Qur'an.



I've heard a few times that Arabic "j" (jiim, with English or French pronunciation) was first a "g" sound (English garden).


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## Masjeen

faylasoof said:


> according to this it is an “ancient” borrowing from germanic _burg_- fortified town, hill-fort.
> 
> not sure how exactly “ancient” that would be but given what outlandish said about the word برج occurring in pre-islamic poetry, it means it is prior to the 7th century.
> 
> of course homer's epic, the iliad, does have _πύργος_ (_pyrgos_) ="tower” – one of the meanings in arabic. But i see the above link also doesn’t consider this as a possibility and goes for the germanic root.


 

ستكون الكلمة عربية لو كانت من جذر ثلاثي
لان المصطلحات التي تعرب لا تكون لها هذه الخاصية
ب - ر - ج​


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## clevermizo

Masjeen said:


> ستكون الكلمة عربية لو كانت من جذر ثلاثي
> لان المصطلحات التي تعرب لا تكون لها هذه الخاصية
> ب - ر - ج​



That's not necessarily true. For non-Arabic speakers, what Masjeen is saying is that because _burj_ is reducible to a three-consonant root, it must therefore be Arabic, because words that are Arabized are not reducible to three consonants.

I disagree and I find this argument unsound. If the word is small enough, then it would appear to have a three consonant root once acquired in Semitic. The Greek_ pyrgos_ is easily reducible to the root p-r-g and Arabized to b-r-g/b-r-j. Or any of the other possible etymologies stated could similarly be reduced.


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## Faylasoof

Masjeen said:


> ستكون الكلمة عربية لو كانت من جذر ثلاثي​
> 
> 
> 
> 
> لان المصطلحات التي تعرب لا تكون لها هذه الخاصية​
> ب - ر - ج​


 Masjeen, I must say I have to agree with Clevermizo on this and like Abu rashid I'm very doubtful of the Germanic link. More likely it is from Ancient Greek as Origumi argues. 

Foreign vocabulary in Classical Arabic was studied by many Arab / Muslim philologists, grammarians and historians. Jarir at-Tabari was just one of them. He alone traced the influences and borrowings from Persian, Syrio-Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek and Latin, not to mention Ethiopian and some others. 

Most of these words were already part of the Classical Arabic lexicon in pre-Islamic times.


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## Abu Rashid

> I've heard a few times that Arabic "j" (jiim, with English or French pronunciation) was first a "g" sound (English garden).



I have never heard of this. Sure the letter is pronounced 'g' in most other Semitic languages, and so perhaps originally it was a 'g', we don't know. But I've never come across any claim this shift occurred after the arrival of the Islamic period.


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## de boer

Abu Rashid said:


> Also I think it's fairly rare for a word with a 'g' sound to be borrowed into Arabic with a 'j' sound, more likely to come over as 'gh' I think, especially since it has that kind of spelling in most European languages anyway.


While your assumption is more or less correct for Modern Standard Arabic, it is quiet common that /g/ is represented by _ǧīm_ in Classical Arabic.

Some examples from the Qur'an:

_ǧibrīl_ "the Archangel Gabriel", ultimately derived from the Hebrew _gaḇrīʾēl_ (Jeffrey 1938, pp. 100 et seq./Ambros 2004, p. 305)
_yaʾǧūǧ wa-maʾǧūǧ _ "Gog and Magog", ultimately derived from the Hebrew _gōḡ ū-māḡōḡ_ (Jeffrey 1938, pp. 288 et seq./Ambros 2004, p. 311)
_al-maǧūs _ "the Magians, the Zoroastrians" ultimately from the Iranian _magush_, probably through the Greek _magos_ (Jeffrey 1938, pp. 259 et seq./Ambros 2004, p. 310)
_ǧālūt_ "Goliath", ultimately derived from the Hebrew _golyaṯ _ (Jeffrey 1938, pp. 97 et seq./Ambros 2004, p. 308)
_siǧn_ "prison", ultimately from Latin _signum_ (Ambros 2004, pp. 129 et seq.), probably via Greek _signon_ or from Greek through Coptic (Rippin 2006, p. 125)
_siǧill_ "scroll", ultimately derived from Latin _sigillum_ (Ambros 2004, p. 129)
_ǧund_ "troop of warriors, army", from Middle Persian _gund_ (Ambros 2004, p. 62)


Abu Rashid said:


> I have never heard of this. Sure the letter is pronounced 'g' in most other Semitic languages, and so perhaps originally it was a 'g', we don't know. But I've never come across any claim this shift occurred after the arrival of the Islamic period.


But one can try to reconstruct the pronunciation of Classical Arabic e.g. by comparing Arabic dialects spoken today. So Janet C. E. Watson proposes the phonemes /ɟ/ or /gʲ/ for _ǧīm_ in Classical Arabic of the eighth century. (Watson 2002)

Biography:

Ambros, Arne A., _A Concise Dictionary of Koranic Arabic_ (Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag, 2004)
Jeffrey, Arthur, _The Foreign Vocabulary in the Qur’ān_ (Vadodara: Oriental Institute, 1938)
Rippin, Andrew (ed.), _The Blackwell Companion to the Qur’ān_ (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2006)
Watson, Janet C. E., _The Phonology and Morphology of Arabic_ (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002)



Wadi Hanifa said:


> I can see this word coming to Arabic from Greek, but in the absence of any further evidence it could simply be a false cognate like "Earth"/"Ardh" (which was discussed here in the past).


But there is one major difference: one can find _erṣetu_ in Akkadian, _ereṣ_ in Hebrew, _arʿā_ in Aramaic, _arḍun_ in Arabic and further cognates in other Semite languages so that one could reconstruct a Proto-Semitic form _*arṣ́-_. That is not the case with the Arabic _burǧ_ because it seems that no Proto-Semitic word _*burg-_ exists.



Faylasoof said:


> Masjeen, I must say I have to agree with Clevermizo on this and like Abu rashid I'm very doubtful of the Germanic link. More likely it is from Ancient Greek as Origumi argues.


D'accord. That's the same explanation one can find in Ambros (2004, p. 36).


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## WadiH

de boer said:


> But one can try to reconstruct the pronunciation of Classical Arabic e.g. by comparing Arabic dialects spoken today. So Janet C. E. Watson proposes the phonemes /ɟ/ or /gʲ/ for _ǧīm_ in Classical Arabic of the eighth century. (Watson 2002)



That seems to assume that there was only form of جـ in the eighth century.  In the Arabian Peninsula circa 1900, both those sounds you mentioned existed among the bedouins all over the country (or at least one of them did), but they co-existed with [dj] of MSA (sedentary Najd and Al-Hasa), [j] (urban and rural Hejaz), [g] (Yemen and Oman), and of course [y] (the Gulf littoral and one town in Najd).  Is there any reason to believe that this was not also the situation in 700?  My suspicion is that, c. 700 AD, the citizens of Mecca used [dj] or [j], while the surrounding bedouins used /ɟ/ or /gʲ/, which is about the same situation as it is today.  Throughout the Arabian Peninsula /ɟ/ or /gʲ/ is a hallmark of bedouinism, and one of the first changes to the speech of the bedouin when they turn to the settled life is the change of /ɟ/ or /gʲ/ to [dj].



> But there is one major difference: one can find _erṣetu_ in Akkadian, _ereṣ_ in Hebrew, _arʿā_ in Aramaic, _arḍun_ in Arabic and further cognates in other Semite languages so that one could reconstruct a Proto-Semitic form _*arṣ́-_. That is not the case with the Arabic _burǧ_ because it seems that no Proto-Semitic word _*burg-_ exists.



Indeed, Lisaan Al-'Arab does not include any verb forms from b-r-j other than تبرّج ("tabarraj"), which means to flaunt one's appearance (especially for a woman).  This might be related to the "tower" meaning (a tower is prominent for all to see, much like an unveiled woman), but the connection strikes me as a bit tenuous.  So, I'm beginning to lean to the borrowing theory as well.


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## Awwal12

That's interesting. In Russian, there is a word "берег" /b*e*reg/ (a bank), obviously related somehow with the word "беречь" /ber*e*ch'/ (to keep, to protect). Please, note the interchange of consonants in this verb during conjugation:
/ber*e*ch'/ (to keep), /beregl*i*/ (were keeping), /berezh*o*m/ ({we} keep)
[ʨ]<->[g]<->[ʐ]
According to Vasmer dictionary, these words are initially Slavic, but share the common root with Germanic words mentioned above.


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## de boer

*Comment on off topic post deleted.*
*Frank, moderator*


@Wadi Hanifa the linguistic situation in the Arabian Peninsula in the 8th century AD/1st century AH is quite delicate or respectively our (not) knowing thereof. But Watson is hardly the only one who assumes a sound shift for _ǧīm_. I can give you a slightly more detailed answer soon when I can spend more time on this.


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## Mahaodeh

de boer said:


> @Wadi Hanifa the linguistic situation in the Arabian Peninsula in the 8th century AD/1st century AH is quite delicate or respectively our (not) knowing thereof. But Watson is hardly the only one who assumes a sound shift for _ǧīm_. I can give you a slightly more detailed answer soon when I can spend more time on this.


 
Yes, but couldn't it be possible that the shift happend a few centuries earlier and by the 8th century there remaind people with the older pronounciation? as well as other pronounciations?


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## 0m1

Well Wiktionary gives Proto-Germanic borrowing as the source of the Arabic word "burj", as someone here suggested, but that leaves a lot unanswered- such as how a Proto-Germanic word made it anywhere near the Semitic lexicon of early Arabic in the first place. Sound shifts are all very well, but how on earth did the two communicate at all in the first place? 

Having given it a little thought, the most plausible seems to be via Latin, I suppose, which Wiktionary incidentally does not mention- but L. burgus is assumed to have come from the Proto-Germanic *burg-, and thus might just be seen as another entrant into the language from Latin, alongside things like Castrum/Qasr and perhaps the slightly more contentious Strata/Siraat.

Does this sound like a sound hypothesis, or does anyone have any better explanation as to how Germanic *burg might have otherwise made it to Arabic burj?


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## vaftrudner

I asked my Arabic professor at university about this word earlier, he seems to think that it was borrowed into Aramaic from either Latin or Greek since it is attested in Aramaic very early, and he thinks that it has come to Arabic by way of Aramaic. Which of the European languages it originated from seems hard to determine.


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## 0m1

Ahh, interesting, that makes a lot of sense, if it was present in very early Aramaic then a Latin burgus -> Aramaic **burg or whatever the attestation actually is, and later Arabic burj. And I say burgus because 1. a lot of people cite Germanic *burg- as the origin, which would be the case, indirectly via Latin and Aramic as it happens; and while probably not phonetically impossible, Greek pyrgos seems far more distant. I know I'm hardly 100% on the phonetics side, though, and Arabic [ p -> b ] is more than common enough, and the same [ g/gh -> j ] could have taken place from the Greek too, actually- ok as usual I'm changing my mind mid-post, and I suppose Greek doesn't seem that unlikely now. 

But that puts the Germanic to one side, at least, and might even mean that Arabic burj and Germanic burg- aren't even cognates, if we're to take seriously claims like "the abundance of Pre-Greek placenames (e.g. Πέργαμον (Pergamon) ) seems to indicate a Pre-Greek origin [to pyrgos]". Which would be another of those delicious linguistic coincidences. I wonder where that chap who was claiming Turkish as the mother-language of humanity is now... though in all honesty, surely the Greek _is_ actually cognate with *burg. 

Well, veered violently off-topic once more, but things make somewhat more sense now at least, thanks for asking your professor, vaftrudner!


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## Abu Rashid

Om1 said:
			
		

> alongside things like Castrum/Qasr and perhaps the slightly more contentious Strata/Siraat.



I wouldn't be so quick to accept these claims. Siraat for instance is quite likely Semitic, as it exists in Aramaic also. Also there is a variant root which has the last two radicals juxtaposed which exists in OSA languages as well.

These roots both carry the meaning of to be straight/to write in various Semitic languages, and it's unlikely there's any Greek/Latin influence there since the Semitic concept seems much more basic.


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## 0m1

Abu Rashid said:


> I wouldn't be so quick to accept these claims. Siraat for instance is quite likely Semitic, as it exists in Aramaic also. Also there is a variant root which has the last two radicals juxtaposed which exists in OSA languages as well.
> 
> These roots both carry the meaning of to be straight/to write in various Semitic languages, and it's unlikely there's any Greek/Latin influence there since the Semitic concept seems much more basic.



Ahh, I'm glad to see some proof for the Semitic origin of Siraat; I did call that particular Latin origin "contentious", as I wasn't sure whether to accept it or not, but until now I had not seen any evidence either for or against a Semitic origin, so thank you, Abu Rashid! 

And actually, what is made of other Latin borrowings, like Castrum/Qasr or Exercitus/  Ɛaskar? Is there some degree of accepted early Latin-Arabic interaction? (I know this is veering dangerously off-topic, but in my experience new threads I start seem particularly apt at fading away )


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## 0m1

Abu Rashid said:


> I wouldn't be so quick to accept these claims. Siraat for instance is quite likely Semitic, as it exists in Aramaic also. Also there is a variant root which has the last two radicals juxtaposed which exists in OSA languages as well.
> 
> These roots both carry the meaning of to be straight/to write in various Semitic languages, and it's unlikely there's any Greek/Latin influence there since the Semitic concept seems much more basic.



Sorry to double-post, actually, but I just came across the following quote: 


> "In his work ‘The patterning of Semitic Root Morphemes’ , Greenberg observes that no more than one emphatic consonant can occur in a native Semitic root. Širâ has two: Šâd and Ťah"


What do you make of that?


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## WadiH

0m1 said:


> Sorry to double-post, actually, but I just came across the following quote:
> What do you make of that?



What about ضرط ?  That has THREE emphatics in it (because the ر is also emphasized in this word).

There's also رطب (It has ط + emphatic ر)

سطر سطا سطع (the س is pronounced ص in these words)

ضبط


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## Abu Rashid

Om1 said:
			
		

> "In his work ‘The patterning of Semitic Root Morphemes’ , Greenberg observes that no more than one emphatic consonant can occur in a native Semitic root. Širâ has two: Šâd and Ťah"
> What do you make of that?



Perhaps Mr. Greenburg is basing this on Hebrew. Arabic certainly has a plethora of native roots which use 2 or more emphatics (as Wadi Hanifa dutifully pointed out).

Since pretty much every other Semitic language has long since merged most of the emphatics, Arabic is really the only language that would tell us about such things, and it quite clearly does accept two or more emphatics in the one root.


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## berndf

Abu Rashid said:


> Since pretty much every other Semitic language has long since merged most of the emphatics,...


If two emphatics merge, that should keep the number of emphatics in any one root constant, shouldn't it? I am no aware of a merger resulting in an emphatic becoming non-emphatic.


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## Abu Rashid

berndf said:
			
		

> I am no aware of a merger resulting in an emphatic becoming non-emphatic.



I think very few, if any, Hebrew letters are today pronounced emphatically, and it's probably been that way pretty much since the earliest attested Hebrew writings.


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## berndf

Abu Rashid said:


> I think very few, if any, Hebrew letters are today pronounced emphatically, and it's probably been that way pretty much since the earliest attested Hebrew writings.


Which letters count as emphatic and which not has little to do with how modern speakers pronounce them. The morphological rules correspond to Mishnaic Hebrew phonology.


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## Abu Rashid

berndf said:
			
		

> The morphological rules correspond to Mishnaic Hebrew phonology.



Which is not that much different to today's phonology.

Perhaps what I should've said was the weakening of the emphatics so that they resembled their non-emphatic counterparts, but this was also accompanied by their mergers also in some cases.

Either way, Hebrew is useless when it comes to looking at emphatic phonemes.


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## berndf

Abu Rashid said:


> Which is not that much different to today's phonology.
> 
> Perhaps what I should've said was the weakening of the emphatics so that they resembled their non-emphatic counterparts, but this was also accompanied by their mergers also in some cases.


This is wrong. The mergers in Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew where between emphatics (like emphatic s and emphatic s2 (Arabic Dad) merged into Tsade) and not between emphatics and their non-emphatic counterparts. In Mishnaic Hebrew e.g. Tet end Tav and Koph and Kaph were well separated.



Abu Rashid said:


> Either way, Hebrew is useless when it comes to looking at emphatic phonemes.


I don't see why. The occasional unetymological emphatics in Arabic, like the emphatically pronounced "l"s and "r"s, can equally be seen as problematic when trying to reconstruct a possible PS root.


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## Abu Rashid

berndf said:
			
		

> The mergers in Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew where between emphatics (like emphatic s and emphatic s2 (Arabic Dad) merged into Tsade) and not between emphatics and their non-emphatic counterparts



Actually I think you'll find ص ض & ظ all merged into Hebrew צ and that is probably long before the time of Biblical Hebrew, certainly long before Mishnaic Hebrew.

And as far as I'm aware צ is not pronounced in an emphatic manner in Hebrew.



			
				berndf said:
			
		

> I don't see why. The occasional unetymological emphatics in Arabic, like the emphatically pronounced "l"s and "r"s, can equally be seen as problematic when trying to reconstruct a possible PS root.



Not really, they are merely a 'stylised' pronunciation, rather than something which became a fundamental part of the language. Even though those letters can occasionally be pronounced in an emphatic manner, it does not mean the non-emphatic way of producing the sound disappeared. In Hebrew this may have been the case thousands of years ago, but long ago the ability to distinguish between the sounds themselves vanished, and we are left today with only one way of pronouncing the sounds, which as far as I know is non-emphatic.


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## berndf

Abu Rashid said:


> Actually I think you'll find ص ض & ظ all merged into Hebrew צ and that is probably long before the time of Biblical Hebrew, certainly long before Mishnaic Hebrew.


צ *is* an emphatic letter. The pronunciation [ts] is modern. Mishnaic pronunciation is ṣ.

PS: The emphatic letters in Hebrew are צ ,ט and ק. All of them are derived exclusively from PS emphatics and no PS emphatic merged with any other Hebrew letter.


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## Abu Rashid

Interesting discovery, whilst flicking through a dictionary of Sabaic (Ancient South Arabian) I came across the verb b-r-g, which supposedly means to acquire, possess. The Arabic translation is listed as ملك which is the Arabic verb for 'own' or 'possess' and also from where the noun for 'king' comes from. Kings, castles... am I drawing too much of a conclusion here?


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## apmoy70

0m1 said:


> But that puts the Germanic to one side, at least, and might even mean that Arabic burj and Germanic burg- aren't even cognates, if we're to take seriously claims like "the abundance of Pre-Greek placenames (e.g. Πέργαμον (Pergamon) ) seems to indicate a Pre-Greek origin [to pyrgos]". Which would be another of those delicious linguistic coincidences. I wonder where that chap who was claiming Turkish as the mother-language of humanity is now... though in all honesty, surely the Greek _is_ actually cognate with *burg.


Actually Πέργαμον (Pergamon) is not a Pre-Greek name; it derives from the eponymous hero «Πέργαμος» ('Pĕrgāmŏs) the son of Neoptolemus and founder of the city, a name which according to mr Babiniotis, the prof. of Linguistics in the Athens University has clearly IE roots: _*bhrgh-,_ meaning "fortified elevation"


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## desi4life

Wouldn't the Middle Persian _burg _be the likely source of Arabic _burj_? None of the above responses mentioned it.


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## fdb

The current view among Indo-Europeanists is that Greek πύργος “tower” is NOT related to German Burg, Berg, IE *bherǵh- “high”. Beekes writes that it is “clearly pre-Greek”, i.e., non-Indo-European.

Latin _burgus_ “tower, turret” is considered by some to be a loan from Greek πύργος, with an irregular shift of the initial p- to b-, but others hold it to be a (late) Latin borrowing from Germanic.

Syriac _burgā_ “turret” is believed to be a borrowing from _burgus _(Roman military vocabulary), and not (or not directly) from Greek πύργος. Middle Persian _burg_ “tower” is either of the same origin, or else borrowed from Arabic (I do not have any demonstrably pre-Islamic attestations to hand).

Arabic _burj_ pl. _burūj _occurs in the Qur’an also in the meaning “signs of the zodiac”. It is generally believed to go back either to πύργος  or to _burgus_ (presumably via Aramaic, or via Persian). It might, however, be remarked that πύργος does not ever have this meaning in Greek.


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## ahvalj

Beekes has rejected without serious grounds the entire stratum of evidence of ancient loans from other Indo-European dialects into Greek.
_
*bʰr̥gʲʰos>*burgʰos>πύργος_ like _*gʰebʰlā>*gebʰlā>κεβλή_ with a Grassman's law followed by a consonant shift in some non-Greek Palaeo-Balkanic language.

For_ g, d, b _and_ p, t, k _cp. e. g. Macedonian : Greek correspondences here Ancient Macedonian language - Wikipedia (also _κόμβους<*gʲombʰo- _there).

For the non-Greek reflexation of _*r̥>ur_ in the Balkans cp. _Μερμησσός~Μαρμησσός~Μυρμησσός_ in Mysia — Harry Thurston Peck,  Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities (1898), M, Menelaïum, Mermessus


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## fdb

The initial consonant of πύργος is not the problem. In fact *bh- > ph- > p- in the first of two syllables with aspirates is perfectly regular in Greek, but in Greek only. As in *bheudh- > *pheuth- > πεύθομαι. The problem is with the vowel. So you would have to posit a language that had exactly the same consonant rules as Greek, but with completely different rules governing the vowels.


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## ahvalj

Yet, we have to explain _γ_ pro _**χ<*gʲʰ_ (_**πάρχος_).

The most mysterious is of course the famous _φύρκος (_mentioned by berndf back in 2009 in #6), which can be explained either as: 

(a) a loan through a language B that experienced the consonant shift later than the donor language A, i. e. _bʰr̥gʲʰos>*burgʰos>*purgos _in A, loaned in this form to B where later _*purgos>pʰurkos_ (when the shift finally reached this language, cp. the gradual spread of the Second Germanic Consonant Shift to the north), and in this form it entered Greek;

(b) a combination of several changes: the non-Greek _*r̥>ur,_ the Greek devoicing _*bʰ…gʲʰ>*pʰ…kʰ,_ and the (not attested anywhere) reversed Grassman's change with the second aspiration lost: _*pʰ…kʰ>pʰ…k._​
By the way, there is also the classical Georgiev's "Pelasgic" example _τύμβος : τάφος_. There are also various other problematic words like _ῥύμβος : ῥάμφος_ (with a non-Greek _αμ_), especially in onomastics.


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## CyrusSH

fdb said:


> The current view among Indo-Europeanists is that Greek πύργος “tower” is NOT related to German Burg, Berg, IE *bherǵh- “high”. Beekes writes that it is “clearly pre-Greek”, i.e., non-Indo-European.
> 
> Latin _burgus_ “tower, turret” is considered by some to be a loan from Greek πύργος, with an irregular shift of the initial p- to b-, but others hold it to be a (late) Latin borrowing from Germanic.
> 
> Syriac _burgā_ “turret” is believed to be a borrowing from _burgus _(Roman military vocabulary), and not (or not directly) from Greek πύργος. Middle Persian _burg_ “tower” is either of the same origin, or else borrowed from Arabic (I do not have any demonstrably pre-Islamic attestations to hand).
> 
> Arabic _burj_ pl. _burūj _occurs in the Qur’an also in the meaning “signs of the zodiac”. It is generally believed to go back either to πύργος  or to _burgus_ (presumably via Aramaic, or via Persian). It might, however, be remarked that πύργος does not ever have this meaning in Greek.



The Urartian word _burgana_ with the same meaning of "tower, fortress" can be seen in the inscriptions of Ishpuini and Menua from the 9th century BC, it is meaningless to say that ancient Armenians, Persians, Arabs, Aramaeans and other people who lived in the same region, borrowed this word from Latin.


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## berndf

It makes indeed no sense relating Classical Syriac ܒܘܪܓܐ to Urartian. There is a gap of about 600 years.


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> It makes indeed no sense relating Classical Syriac ܒܘܪܓܐ to Urartian. There is a gap of about 600 years.



There is also Old Armenian բուրգն (burgn) with the same meaning of "tower", there are several Urartian words in Armenian and it is one of them, Armenians were the northern neighbors of Syriacs.


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## berndf

CyrusSH said:


> There is also Old Armenian բուրգն (burgn) with the same meaning of "tower", there are several Urartian words in Armenian and it is one of them, Armenians were the northern neighbors of Syriacs.


It is the same problem. If it were indeed a Middle Eastern wanderwort why would it go into hiding for at least 600 years and then miraculously reappear in two languages (Classical Syriac and Classical Aramaic) intimately linked with Christianity?


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## CyrusSH

berndf said:


> It is the same problem. If it were indeed a Middle Eastern wanderwort why would it go into hiding for at least 600 years and then miraculously reappear in two languages (Classical Syriac and Classical Aramaic) intimately linked with Christianity?



I really don't know what you mean by "600 years", of course the Armenian word can be also linked with Christianity because there is no Armenian text older than a 5th-century Bible translation but why you think this word didn't exist in Armenian before this date?


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## berndf

Classical Syriac and Classical Armenian occur 600 years after the extinction of Urartian and both occur only after Christianization of the groups that used these registers. There is no reason to assume they would have unearthed an extinct word that hadn't been heard for at least 600 years rather than from the environment in which these languages, or more precisely "literary registers", came into being, namely the Roman Empire.

If you want to make a case for a Middle Eastern wanderwort, independent of Latin and Greek, you have to show occurrences in other, earlier registers of Aramaic than Classical Syriac.


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## CyrusSH

It seems to be clear that the word has been developed in the Germanic culture with the original meaning of "high", Diakonoff in "Hurro-Urartian Borrowings in Old Armenian" says "Urart. burg-ana- 'tower' is not attested in Hurrian and therefore cannot be proved to be originally Hurro-Urartian.", the ancient Greek word which also dates back to 1st half of the 1st millennium B.C., is believed to be a loanword too, the same thing can be said about Armenian, Latin, Syriac, Middle Persian and Arabic words, all of them have been borrowed directly or indirectly from Germanic.


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## berndf

The Urartian word can be a borrowing from about anything and, as @fdb explained,  πύργος cannot sensibly explained to be related to the Germanic word. The Latin word may or may not been from Germanic.


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## CyrusSH

fdb explained nothing, according to wiktionary, some linguists believe the Greek word is from Urartian, some other ones, like Kretschmer, say it is from proto-Germanic and Beekes says it has a Pre-Greek origin.

Urartians didn't live in another world, we are talking about some similar Semitic and Indo-European words and almost all neighbors of Urartians were Semitic and  Indo-European speaking people, so this word could be borrowed from either a Semitic or an Indo-European language.


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## berndf

He explained, why modern Indoeuropeanists don't follow Kretschmer's 122 years old conjecture any more. But wherever the Greek word ultimately came from. It is apparently not an ancient Middle Eastern wanderwort and the Syriac and Arabic words only came with the Romans.


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## Treaty

1- The meaning of _burgana_ is not clear. It may be fortress, palace, building or something else (if I'm not wrong, the stela containing _burgana_ is free-standing, and not on a certain building).
2- Words like "castle, fortress, tower" would be common in inscriptions considering how much military campaigns are usually recorded. However, there is no mention of _burg_- or similar in Semitic writings and inscriptions for 2000 years (including during their contact with Urartu) until the Roman period.
3- There are variants of _pyrgos_ the Greek dialects which suggests the proto-word might have even predated the Urartian usage.
4- Even if _burgana _means "fortress", there were a few IE older neighbors to Urartu which could have sourced the world (like Hittites and Indo-Iranian elements of Hurro-Mitanni cultures). Considering that Urartian didn't have [j] or [ž], an Iranian (or even Indic pre-_ǵh>h_) derivative of PIE *_bherǵh_ could have sounded like _burga_- in Urartian (esp. with zero-grade r). A pre-Old Armenian descendant of *_bherǵh_ could have entered in Urartian as _burga_- (see #5). Besides, considering how loosely you corresponds sounds to justify borrowings, Hittite _parganu_ "tower, foundation" (< Hit. _park_- < PIE *_bherǵh_) could have easily ended up as Ur. _burgana_.
5- Armenian _burgn_ is considered either a loan from Aramaic/Latin or a native development in Armenian (parallel to PIE _dherǵh> _OA_ durgn_).


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## CyrusSH

If the Urartian word has nothing to do with the word برج in Arabic then why my thread about the Urartian word was closed because of this thread?

Urartian: burgana (fortress, pyramid) -- under moderation


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## VAN BELLE Jean Marc

This is an old topic, but i think the discussion of 600 or more 'missing years' is quite general. I come from this town Naamkunde. Jaargang 3 · dbnl and we have an extremely good documentation for the last 1000 years about words. Halad, we have a missing link, just like Bulgarian and the Arabs themselves befor the years of Islam, Mohammed (i studie two years Arab science as well). That is why i am studying old Church Slavonic as well (cyrillic has great advantage in knowledge about pronunciation). 

The 4th biggest town of Bulgaria, is Burgas, the Turkish word that contains the old Greek Pyrgos as well. Only 'brygja' refers to the gap between Armenian and perhaps Hebrew plus Sanskrit. There it stands for a place at a river or sea for boats. So often that place contained a hard tower or higher wall which refers to tower. When it concers a tower that is part of a castle, the German Turm, Dutch Toren, English Tower, and a city like (Veliko = great) Turnovo in Bulgarian, Makedonian, Russian...  

It is even less sure, but normal that, though there are no written proofs (see Edict Milan 313 and Edict of Serdica 311 that were translated to only LATIN!), that the cities contains most origin for the consonants here about something of hard substance in 'brg' (always drop the vowels, the first real Qur'an of 1935 still contained RED vowels to show they were ADDED to the original Qur'an, whuch was in the end the version of the Koreish (Mohammeds family were Qureish), and the other six (6!) versions in other arab dialects were distroyed after discussion about differences in consonants.  

I think we can conclude that it is likely, but never sure, that this chapter of the Qur'an ("kr" in this is affilated to the first NON written words from God to Mohammed in Iqra, iqra, iqra that means much more than the simple 'read' in most translations, because he was analphabet and had an outstanding auditive memory because of this) refers to a higher position in hard construction materials. sura al burooj, used to be translated like 'lighttower' but this can be an error. The chapter at+tur does refer to mountain like bErg in Dutch and German and... but perhaps not to bUrg. 

I do not give my personal opinion here, but wanted to state that 600 pr more years missing may not be a problem to language if the pronounciation if consonants gives something similar. I have one golden rule: Never listen to a... golden rule. Feel if it is anout language and pronounce it several ways with dufferent viwels. Like koptic, hierogliphic, sanscrit, Arab that is affiliated to Hebrew. All languages are evolving... +je


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## danielstan

As far as I read about the etymology of the Bulgarian city that you spelled as Veliko Turnovo it has nothing to do with tower (turn).
I found this Romanian translitteration for it: Veliko Tărnovo - Wikipedia - where the letter 'ă' denotes the schwa sound (/ə/)
and the Bulgarian spelling: Велико Търново – Уикипедия  ('ъ' stands for /ə/)

An etymology of this name here: Veliko Tarnovo - Wikipedia
It comes from an Old Slavic _trŭnŭ _meaning "thorn".
See also the Slovak city Trnava - Wikipedia

In Romanian there are Slavic loans from this root, like _târnă_: dexonline

On another idea, in the text _De Aedificiis _(written by Procopius of Cesarea around 550 - 560 AD) there are attested cities from Balkan Peninsula with names containing the Latin _burgus_:
_Burgu_altu (< lat. _burgus altus_), Lucernaria_burgou_, Tulco_burgo_, Sculco_burgo_, Mare_burgou_, Stili_burgou_, Halicani_burgou_ - (http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Procopius/Buildings/4B*.html)


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