luga-^(ti)

This lexeme is found in the inscription of the inscribed pillar of Xanthos, dated contextually to shortly after the ascension of Artaxerxes II in 405-404 BCE and stylistically to around 400 BCE (Borchhardt & Eichner 1997-1999a:19f.).

[D.S.]

3pl. impv. act.

lugãtu

TL 44d.60 (Xanthos)

Meriggi 1936b:263, Shevoroshkin 1971a:212, 220 (Shevoroshkin 2012a:473) and Neumann 2007a:187 interpret Lyc. B lugãtu on contextual grounds as a destructive and “forbidden” action (followed by Gehrisch 2018a:91 with ‘to destroy’). Shevoroshkin 2015a:194 translates the verb more precisely with ‘to burn’, adducing HLuw. (FLAMMAE)la_x-há-nú-wa/i-ta_x /luhanuwa(n)ta/ (a verb of burning) as a cognate. If we take the sentence preceding the one with lugãtu into consideration, the destructive action is something done by means of the zẽna-season, which is hot and dry and therefore destructive to crops:

me=du=tu : lusalija : zẽna nuniti : xruwasaz : me=qliju : xupeliju : sebe=lijeiz : ddelupeliz : ni=uwe : lugãtu : sm͂mẽte : klleime qñtili=uwe : plluwi : mlu xr^!ãti : tunewñni (58-62)

‘For you (Gergis), the xruwasa-deities will make swift the destructive autumns and they shall not “overheat” the funerary complex of the precinct and the ddelupeliz nymphs, if they (scil. the river-valleys?) offer (as compensation) for the binding payments a Pinarean votive offering to the qñtili-deity of (the town) Tuna.’

Therefore, a meaning such as ‘to overheat, dry out (?)’ is contextually expected and more adequate than ‘to burn’, especially since it refers to the water nymphs (= water fountains), although the notion of “burning” is not too far off.

[D.S.]

The verbal form lugãtu should reflect a factitive verb luga-^(ti) derived from a non-attested substantive *luga-, potentially equivalent to CLuw. lūḫa-, whose exact sense is however obscure.

[D.S.]