Proto-Slavic Collectives in *-ьje from a Historical and Comparative Perspective

Abstract

The aim of this article is to conduct a diachronic analysis of Proto-Slavic collective nouns ending in *-ьje with a view to gathering comparative evidence for postulating its Indo-European origin. The formation at issue exhibits exact counterparts not only in Germanic, but also in Indo-Aryan and Tocharian—e.g., PSl. *berzьje n. coll. ‘birch woods, birch forest’ (= ON. birki n. ‘birch forest’ < PG *berkijan n. coll.), PSl. *bratrьje n. coll. ‘brothers, brotherhood’ (= Ved. bhrātryám n. coll. ‘brotherhood’, Toch. A pratri ‘brothers’), PSl. *govьje n. coll. ‘horned cattle’ (= Ved. gávyam, gavyám n. coll. ‘herd of cows’); PSl. *vьrmьje n. coll. ‘worms’ (= ON. yrmi n. coll. ‘id.’ < PG *wurmijan n. coll. ‘swarm of worms’). The authors polemicize against Ranko Matasović (2005), who assumes a secondary origin of the collective *-ьje, and argues that the suffix stems from the Indo-European collective nouns in *-i- (whence PSl. *-ь).

Keywords

• archaism
• collectives
• etymology
• Germanic-Balto-Slavic relations
• Proto-Indo-European
• Slavic languages