XLI

PART 7 – Ch.XLI.14

The great Pelasgian empire

(The Pelasgian language)

XLI. 14. The Pelasgian inscription from Lemnos island.

Another important monument of Pelasgian barbarian language is the inscription discovered in the Lemnos island around 1884-1885.

This island, situated in the northern parts of the Aegean Sea, towards south-east of Mount Athos, was inhabited in prehistoric times by a population of Pelasgian race, called Sinties and Sinti, from the same nation of the Thracians and the Getae. According to Homer, the Sintii spoke a wild barbarian language, meaning northern, Sinties agriophonoi (Iliad, I. 594; Odyss. VIII. 294; Strabo, VII, 57). Later on, during historical times, the inhabitants of this island appear under the name “Pelasgians” with Herodotus (VI. 140) and “Pelasgian-Turseni” with Thucydides (IV, 109; VII. 57).

The Pelasgian-Tursenii of the island of Lemnos, as Thucydides writes, had the same language as the Pelasgians of Placia and Scylace (Hellespont), as the inhabitants of the neighboring islands Samothrace and Imbros, and as those of the peninsula of Mount Athos.

Around 499-496bc, Lemnos island was occupied by the Athenians. The ancient inhabitants being ousted, they scattered through various lands; part of them settled in the Peloponnesus, while others, as traditions said, entered Italy under the leadership of Tyrrhen / Tursan (Herodotus, VIII. 73; Strabo, v. 2. 4).

In Lemnos island has been discovered around 1885, in the village Kaminia, a bas-relief of a rectangular shape, having two engraved inscriptions. The first inscription is on the main face and surrounds the head of a robust soldier, who holds a lance in his hand, and the second inscription, which presents some letters of forms differing from those of the first inscription, is engraved on the lateral face on the right side.

Both these inscriptions pre-date the year 500bc, but are from different times. The letters have the ancient Pelasgian form, and the mode of writing is boustrophedon, from right to left and from left to right. The words are often connected, and the points between them figure more as decoration and are not based on any grammatical rule.

The facsimile of this inscription, as it has been published in the “Bulletin de Correspondance hellenique” (1886, X. I. 1-3), and its transcribing with Greek letters, made by Breal, are as follows:

We ask now, which is the linguistic character of these two inscriptions in general, and the meaning of these words in particular? We shall start with the first inscription.

= Eolai ez, “Eolai”, in Greek form ‘Iolaos, is a barbarian personal name (Diod, IV. 30; V. 15), like Iolea in Romanian onomastics from the Tera Fagarasului.

After “Eolai” follows in the first inscription the word “ez”, and in the second “fzi” or “fli” (?) = fiul (TN – the son). “Ez” corresponds therefore to the Macedo-Romanian word aus, old.

The meaning is: Eolaus senex = Rom. Eolaie betranul (TN - Eolaie the old).

= na foth ziazi.

“An” and “na” in the Macedo-Romanian dialect, like “an” in the Umbrian dialect, are prepositions with the meaning “in”; “foth” is the same word as the Latin “hocce”; “ziazi” = Rom. “zace”, Lat. “jacet”: “Na foth ziazi” has therefore the meaning: in hocce (tumulo) jacet = Rom. in acest (mormant) zace (TN - in this [grave] lies). It is the same expression which we find also on the epigraphic monuments of Dacia and Pannonia: “in hoc tumulo jacet”; “hoc jacet in lapide” (C. I. L. vol. III. 2341. 3397).

= maraz mav sialhveiz afiz.

In Greek language marasmos meant: weakening of strength, becoming sick, wasting of the body; in the Macedo-Romanian dialect “maraze” means constant pain; (mav) corresponds to the Greek particle with negative meaning, or to meaning no, to Macedo-Romanian ma’ meaning never, or to Romanian “ba” meaning no. “Sialhveiz” = salvus (sospes), and “afiz”, which is often repeated in these inscriptions, is a verbal form, like the Romanian “fuse”, from the verb “a fi”, Lat. esse (TN – to be).

The meaning of this phrase is: aegrotus nunquam, salvus (sospes) fuit = Rom. bolnav niciodata, sanatos fuse (TN – never sick, healthy he has been). In Roman funerary inscriptions there was sometimes mentioned the state of health of the deceased: “florente aetate”; “menses quinque et annum cum aegrotaverit” (C. I. L. vol. III. 2197).

= e fistho zeronaith.

“E fistho” corresponds to the Romanian words “a fost” (TN – has been), in older language “au fusto” (Hasdeu, Cuv. I. 152), Lat. fuit. But the letter e from the beginning does not stand for a (from “a fost”), but stands for e (este / TN – is), like the Macedonians say “este fugit” instead of “a fugit”, “este venit” instead of “a venit” (Hasdeu, Dict. l. rom. I. 11 / TN – “is run” instead of “has run”, “is come” instead of “has come”). In Umbrian dialect “fust” = fuerit, in old French “fuist” = a fost (TN – has been).

The following word, “zeronaith” is by its form, a past participle, as in the Armerine dialect from Sicily: ”stait” = stat (TN – sat), “mangiait” = mancat (TN – eaten – Roccella, Vocab. della l. parl. In Piazza Armerina, p. 29), with i added between the last two letters. This participle derives from the verb “zerona”, Fr. “enterer”, Lat. “in terra ponere”, or as we would say in Romanian “a interina” (TN – read intzerina), “a pune sub terina” (TN – to inter, read tzerina); in the Macedo-Romanian dialect “tara” (TN – read tzara) = pament, “tara de mortu” = pament de pe morment (TN – earth from the grave – Papahagi, Basme aromane, p. 721).

The ancient Greeks represented sometimes the sound tz of the Barbarians, with z: Zeranioi (Zeranii), people from Thrace, Romanian terani (TN – read tzerani), Zegan (Zegan), Romanian tigan (TN – read tzigan).

E fistho zeronaith has therefore the meaning: fuit in terra positus = Rom. a fost pus in pament (TN – he was placed in the earth).

= zivai.

The letter F is an Eolian digamma, which corresponds in Latin alphabet to V and F. In the dialect of the Romanians from Istria “jivi’ = a trai (TN – to live), Lat. vivere, Lituan. “gyvata”, Germ. leben. The meaning being therefore: vixit = Rom. a trait (TN – he lived).

= Famala sia l zeronai.

“Famala” is the Macedo-Romanian “fumeale”, art. “fumealea” = familia (TN – family); “sia”, Lat. sua, Rom. sa (TN – his); l is the shortened accusative of the personal pronoun in the third person singular; “zeronai” = placed in the earth. So, the meaning is: familia sua illum in terra posuit = Rom. familia sa il puse sub terina (TN – his family placed him in the earth). Cicero writes (Leges, II. 22) that the Romans had an ancient law that the “family” had to place in the ground the deceased.

= morin ail a cer.

Here “morin” is the present participle of the verb “mori” (TN – to die), without the final d, like in the Armerine dialect from Sicily “mangiann”, Ital. “mangiando”. “Ail” is a verbal form, the third person of the indicative present, Fr. aller, Burg. ai (air) (TN - to go). In the Istrian dialect is heard even today “ala” = hai, vina (TN – come). “A cer” (ker) = in ceriu, like in the dialect of the Romanches from Switzerland “ilg ir a tschell” (Conradi, Deutsch-romanische Gram.1820, p. 85). The meaning of the words is: moriendo abit in coelum = Rom. murind se duce in ceriu (TN – dieing he goes to the sky/heaven). We have here traces of the ancient Pelasgian belief in the immortality of the soul (Dionys. Hol. II. 556).

= taf arzio.

“Taf” is the same word as the Greek taphe and taphos, burial, grave, Lat. sepulchrum; “arzio” means “ars” (TN – burnt), its etymology from “ardeo”. In Thrace Arzus (= Ars) was the name of a city.

The meaning of the above words is: sepulchro (mortali corpore) cremato = Rom. remasitele pamentesci s’au ars (TN – the mortal remains were burnt).

We arrive now to the second inscription.

After Holai follows the particle Fi (or Fzi) = fiul (TN – the son of Iolaie). We find the same word under the form phie and phe on two inscriptions from Lycia: (Bull. d. Corresp. Hell. 1886, I. p. 40-42), words which cannot have another meaning than “the son”, like we find with Homer:

= focia siale, in the first inscription.

“Focia” is the same word as Lat. hocce, Rom. aoce and aocia, Macedo-Rom. aote = aici (TN – here); andis the third person present indicative of a verb which corresponds to the Romanian “salaslui”, Lat. habitare, demorare, sedere. From the same root derives Italian sala, Fr. sale, Germ. Saal, Rom. salas and saiea, shelter for cattle.

The meaning of the words above is: hic habitat, quiescit, pausat = Rom. aici salasluiesce (TN - here dwells).

(instead of )= zeronaith e fistho, words identical with “e fistho zeronaith” from the first inscription.

= tof eromarom Earalio.

“Eromarom” is a genitive plural from “Eromi” = Aromi, as Romulus had been also called in the Middle Ages “Heromulus” (Graf, Roma, vol. I. 223).

The Pelasgians from Lemnos belonged to the family of the Arimii. The name “Lemnos” was in reality a dialectal form instead of Remnos. An ancient Pelasgian king who had reigned over Lemnos, bears with Suidas the name ‘Ermon (Hermon). “Earalio” is the name of a locality.

The meaning of this phrase is therefore: in terra positus fuit ad sepulchra Eromorum Earalio = Rom. a fost interinat la mormintele Arimilor din Earalia (he was placed in the earth at the graves of the Arimii from Earalia).

= zivai eptezio arai.

Lat. vixit septemdecim annos = Rom. a trait septespredece ani (TN – lived seventeen years).

“Arai” is a feminine form from Lat. annus, like “annee” of the French, but with a rotacised n.

= tin foce zivai afiz sialhviz.

The letter of the first word represents a nasal sound, like = n in the old Romanian alphabet; “tin” = Macedo-Rom. pin, Rom. pana (TN – until). “Foce”, Lat. hocce, Rom. aoce = aici (TN – here). “Afiz”, which is often repeated in the text of these inscriptions corresponds to the Romanian fuse (fuit / TN – was). And the meaning of the phrase is: dum hocce vixit, fuit salvus (sospes) = Rom. pana aoce trai, fuse sanatos (TN – until he lived here, healthy he was).

= maranm afiz aomai(th).

Here maranm, by its form and place it occupies, is only a different pronuntiacion of the word morin from the first inscription. The meaning of the words is: moriendo fuit hutmatus = murind fuse inhumat (TN – dieing, he was inhumed). Cicero (Leg. II. 22) says: ut humati dicantur….quos humus injecta contegeret.

We have another important testimony about the Latinity of the barbarian language spoken in the north-eastern parts of the Aegean Sea.

Dionysius of Halikarnasus writes: “The language which the Romans use is neither entirely barbarian, nor absolutely Greek, but a combination of both, its biggest part though coming from the idiom of the Eolii” (I. 90).

The Eolii dwelt on the littoral of Asia Minor facing the islands Lemnos and Lesbos. To their territory had once also belonged the regions of Troy. In the times of Dionysius (1^st century bc), these Eolii still spoke therefore a semi-Latin language.

We repeat the text and verbal translation of these two inscriptions:

(TN – 1^st inscription: Old Eolai in here lies, never sick, healthy he was; he was placed in the ground, he lived, his family placed him in the ground, dieing he goes to heaven, his grave was cremated.

2^nd inscription: Eolai the son here dwells, placed in the ground he was at the graves of the Aromii from Earalia; he lived seventeen years; until now he lived, was healthy, dieing he was inhumed).

As a particularity worthy of note is the lack of the letter u (Greek u, ou) from the text of these two inscriptions. This letter seems to have been replaced with ei and i in the words: sialhveiz, sialhviz, afiz, fistho, sia.

Finally, the Pelasgians from Lemnos also used in their speech the post-posed article lu(s), as results from the word Mosuhlos (Rom. Mosul), the ancient name of a mountain from this island.

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