My attention was recently caught by this word shared by Selkup and Kamas, but lacking any further etymology so far: SlkTa ɛ̄ti̮ ‘camp’, Ty ēd ‘village, dwelling site, house, yurt’, K ētǝ ‘village’ (< PSlk *ētǝ) ~ Kam jada ‘village’. This word shows an unusual sound correspondence. Word-initial j- is rare in Kamas; Proto-Samoyed word-initial *j- has undergone fortition and become a palatal(ized) stop or affricate [dʹ] ~ [ʒ́] ~ [tʹ] ~ [ć] in Kamas, so any word-initial j- in the language must be of secondary origin. As I began looking for an explanation for this apparently unique case of the correspondence PSlk *ē- ~ Kam ja-, it quickly dawned upon me that the word must be of Proto-Uralic origin.
There are no other examples of Kamas ja- correspoding to a vocalic initium in other Samoyed languages, but obviously this word-initial ja- must result from the same development as sequences of the type Ća-. When we look at the etymologies of Kamas words that show a palatalized consonant followed by the vowel a, it turns out that in several cases the sequence Ća- goes back to PSam *Caj-, *Cåj- or *Cǝj-. Consider the following examples:
- Kam hʹama ~ jama ‘boot’ < PSam *pajmå (> NenT ṕīwa, EnT pee, Ngan hᵘajmu, PSlk *pēmǝ (> Ta pēmi̮, Ty pȫ, K pȫwǝ) ‘boot’).
- Kam hʹaʔ- ~ jaʔ- ‘chop, mow, peck’ < PSam (?)*pǝj-t-; cf. PSam *pǝjä- (> Ngan hoi-, Kam påj- ‘chop (wood)’), PSam *pǝjǝ-t- (> NenT pæ°ʔ-, NenF păjăʔ-, PSlk *paćǝt- (> Ta pači̮t-), Kam påjåʔ– ‘chop (wood)’).
- Kam kʹama ‘marrow’ < PSam *kåjmå (> NenT xæwa, EnT kaa, Ngan kojmu, PSlk *qǖmǝ (> Ta qümi̮, Ty qöwǝ, K qǖwǝ) ‘marrow’)
- Kam ṕago ‘pelvis’ < PSam *påjkV; cf. *påjkV-tǝ̑ (> NenT pæxǝd° ‘pelvic bone’, Ngan hojkaδǝ ‘buttock’, hojkaδǝǝ ‘pelvic bone’)
The first two words show the change *p- > *h- which is regular in Mator but not in Kamas, and therefore they may be borrowings from Mator. Even if this is the case, they were probably borrowed relatively early: Kam hʹama ~ jama ‘boot’ (< *häjma) could stem from a Pre-Mator form *häjma or the like, but not from Mat hīma. Regardless of whether Kam hʹama ~ jama and hʹaʔ- ~ jaʔ- are inherited words or early borrowings from Mator, in any case they demonstrate the regularity of the change *Cäj- > Kam *Ća-. It appears that the change was limited to cases where *-j- occurred in coda position, as in open syllables the change is not attested; this is demonstrated by Kam påj- and påjåʔ- ‘chop wood’, which must be inherited reflexes of PSam *pǝjä- and *pǝjǝt- (< PU *puδʹa-; on the Uralic etymology see Aikio 2006: 22–23).
As regards PSlk *ētǝ ~ Kam jada ‘village’, we find a perfect parallel for the vowel correspondence in the aforementioned PSlk *pēmǝ ~ Kam hʹama ‘boot’ (< PSam *pajmå). Thus, we can reconstruct PSam *ajtå ‘village’ as the proto-form of the former word. This can be further traced back to PU *ajta ‘fence’, an etymon which can be reconstructed on the basis of Fin aita, Est aed (< PFi *aita) and Kh VVj atʹ, Irt otʹ, Kaz ɔś ‘fence, enclosure’ (< PKh *āć) (Aikio 2014: 1–2). The sound correspondence is fully regular. The default reflex of PU *a is PSam *å, but PSam *a occurs before tautosyllabic *j; compare the following cases:
- PU *kajwa- ‘dig’ > PSam *kajwå- ‘dig up; shovel’ (> NenF śewa-), *kajwå ‘spade’ (> NenT śīwa, NenF śewa, EnT sea, Ngan kajbu, Kam kō ‘spade’). — Cognates are widely attested in other braches, e.g. SaaN goaivut ‘dig, shovel, ladle’, goaivu ‘spade’, Fin kaivaa ‘dig’, MdE kaja- ‘throw; hit; pour’, MariE kuem ‘shovel’, Komi koj- ‘pour; scoop out, bail’, Hung hajít ‘throw, hurl, fling’ (Aikio 2002: 41–42).
- PU *wajŋi- ‘breathe’, *wajŋi ‘breath, soul’ > PSam *wajŋǝ̑- (> PSlk *kuǝjǝ- > Ta ke̮ji̮-, K kwej- ‘breathe’), *wajŋǝ̑-w (> EnT beu, Ngan bǝü, PSlk *kuǝji (> Ta ke̮ji, K kwej), Kam mājǝ, Mat möjüh ‘breath, soul’), *wajŋ-čut (> NenT jīnt°ʔ ‘breath, steam, air’, Ngan baćüʔ ‘soul’). — The Samoyed word-stem is cognate with SaaN vuoigŋa ‘breath; spirit’, vuoigŋat ‘breathe’ (UEW), Hung vágy ‘desire, wish, longing, eagerness’, vágyik ‘desires, wishes’ (Aikio 2018: 84–85), and MariE üŋǝ̑šö ~ üŋšö ‘quiet, calm, mild’ (Metsäranta 2020: 120–121). Note, furthermore, the obscured consonant-stem derivative *waj[ŋ]-ma(-), which is attested in Mordvin (E ojme, M vajmä ‘breath, soul’; E ojma-, M vajma- ‘rest, calm down; breathe’) and Finnic (Fin vaimo ‘wife’, Est vaem ‘spirit, soul, ghost’; Fin vaimea ‘muffled (of voice, sound); light, gentle (of wind, waves, etc.)’, vaimeta ‘fade away (of voice, sound); subside (of wind, waves, etc.)’). The last two Finnish words have not been previously included in this cognate set, and other etymologies have been suggested for them, but their connection to the aforementioned Mordvin verb is both semantically and phonologically obvious.
As regards semantics, there are several independent parallels for the semantic development ‘fence, enclosure’ > ‘dwelling site, village’ which is assumed for PSlk *ētǝ and Kam jada. The following examples can be mentioned:
- English town < Old English tūn ‘enclosure, garden; homestead; village, town’ ~ German Zaun < OHGerm zūn ‘fence’ (< PGerm *tūnã-)
- Latvian pilsēta ‘city, town’ < pils ‘castle’ + sēta ‘fence; wall; yard; farmstead’
- Old Church Slavonic gradŭ ‘castle, fortification, city, town’, Russian город ‘city, town’ ~ Lithuanian gar̃das ‘fence, enclosure, stall’ ~ Old Norse garðr ‘fence, wall; courtyard; dwelling, house’, Old English geard ‘enclosure; yard; dwelling; court; region’ ~ Albanian gardh ‘fence; enclosure; barricade’ (< PIE *gʰórdʰos); note also SaaS gaertie ‘reindeer corral’, SaaN gárdi ‘reindeer corral; enclosure; a kind ptarmigan trap’ (< PSaa *kārtē), which was borrowed from Proto-Norse *garda-.
- Kh VVj wač, Irt woš, Kaz wɔš ‘village, town’ (< PKh *wāč) ~ Ms T ōš, K ūš, W wūš, N ūs ‘town; fence, enclosure’ (< PMs *ūšǝ) ~ NenT waʔ ‘fence, enclosure’, En baʔ ‘reindeer corral’, Ngan bǝʔ ‘fence’, SlkTa kūt ‘reindeer corral’ (< PSam *wåč) < PU *woča. — Note that many references, UEW included, cite a different Selkup cognate: PSlk *quǝččǝ (> Ta qē̮tti̮, Ty quǝǯ, K quǝččǝ ‘town’). This cannot be related, however, because PSlk *q- reflects PSam *k- and not *w-.