pλašo-

This lexeme is found in a grave inscription that can be dated to the fifteenth year of the rule of one of the Persian kings named Artaxerxes. Gusmani 1964a:18 prefers dating them to Artaxerxes III and thus assigns the stele to the year 344 BCE, which is possible but not provable, and an earlier dating should not be discarded.

[D.S.]

nom. or acc. (?) sg.	pλašo(s/d)	LW 2.2 (Sardis)
dat. sg.	pλašoλ	LW 2.7 (Sardis)

The neuter gender of the noun pλašo- is not absolutely assured, because the enclitic =k in LW 2.2 causes the loss of a preceding -s, -ν and -d. However, Littmann 1916a:50 points out that the word should agree with the following qid ‘what, which’, which shows the neuter gender (thus also Brandenstein 1929a:274). But the analysis depends on what grammatical construction is assumed. For example, Sasseville 2021a:284f., 330 takes the relative pronoun qid as the direct object of kataνil and pλašo- as the subject. Therefore, the gender cannot be decided yet.

[D.S.]

Lydian pλašo- designates a part of the rock-carved grave, which should not be damaged. It occurs together with wãna- ‘rock-carved grave, tomb’, mru- ‘stele’, and laqriša-, translated here as ‘woodwork (?)’. To narrow the choice, Littmann 1916a:50 points out that the only parts not yet named are the door, the front- or rear-chamber, the stairs, and the inscription itself (as well as fore-court and couch). Gusmani 1980a:43 suggests an equation with Hitt. palzaḫḫa- c. ‘pedestal’ (followed by HEG P:408), which is not phonologically possible. No translation is given in Dusinberre 2003a:229. Sasseville 2021a:284f., 330 chooses to translate pλašo- as ‘dromos’, a part of a grave, which has not yet been identified properly in the Lydian lexicon. The word can be interpreted as a compound of pλ- (= Luw. pari ‘out’) and ašo-, perhaps matching Luw. /assu-/ ‘stone’ (cf. also SCALPRUM-na VIA-na in KÖTÜKALE, §3). Therefore, it would refer to the way in and out of a tomb. This suggestion is adopted here provisionally.

[D.S.]

The Lydian noun is an o-stem. For their correspondence to Anatolian u-stems, see Sasseville 2021a:180-183.

[D.S.]

For the possible lemma head and the etymology, see Luw. /assu-/.