/laranu(wa)-(i)/, la+ra/i+a-nú-
‘to make prosper’
- Language
- Hieroglyphic Luwian
- Grammar
- verb
- ID
- 1919
1. Individual Anatolian Languages
1.1 Hieroglyphic Luwian
/laranu(wa)-(i)/, la+ra/i+a-nú-
‘to make prosper’1.1.1Transmission
This lexeme is probably attested twice in the HLuw. corpus. Its occurrence in the Karatepe bilingual from Cilicia is secure and dates to the early 7th century BCE. The other attestation is less securely identifiable, and the origin of its source text is unknown, but tentatively dated to the 8th century BCE.
[AH.B.]
1.1.2Forms
| 1sg. pret. ind. act. | /laranuhha/ | la+ra/i+a-nú-ha | KARATEPE 1 Hu., §4 (Cilicia) |
| inf. | /laranuna/ | la+x-[n]ú?-na | ALEPPO 3, §1 |
The reading in ALEPPO 3, §1 is not assured, first because the inscription is broken immediately before the attested word, i.e. the signs may continue a different word altogether. Secondly, what is transcribed as 〈x〉 here may in fact be a 〈ia〉, resulting in the attested word again belonging to a different lexeme otherwise unattested; see the discussion in Hawkins 2000a:563. Still, a suitably large, more elaborate version of the usually very plain thorn-like 〈+ra/i〉 attached to the side of an adjacent sign can actually be found in KARATEPE 1 Hu., §4, the only other place of attestation for the present lexeme; see below in phonological interpretation for further details.
[AH.B.]
1.1.3Graphic Features
1.1.3.1Phonological Interpretation
The phonological interpretation appears to be reasonably clear, because the word is obviously related to the verb /lara-/ ‘to enhance’ and involves the well-known suffix /-nu(wa)-(i)/, which is present in many similar formations. In addition to that, the interpretation profits from the clear spelling. In fact, the spelling used in KARATEPE 1 Hu., §4 〈la+ra/i+a-nú-ha〉 features a variation of the sign 〈+ra/i〉, usually a thorn-like protrusion attached to an adjacent sign, but here furnished with two short parallel lines added to that thorn in perpendicular fashion much in the way the signs 〈ia〉 and 〈za〉 are distinguished from 〈i〉 and 〈zi〉 respectively. This has compelled Hawkins & Morpurgo Davies 1978a:104 to interpret the variation as indicating a-vocalisation on the usually vowel-indifferent 〈+ra/i〉 sign, reading the string 〈la+ra/i+a〉, and it also means that the stem of the verb very likely is /laranu(wa)-/ rather than /larnu(wa)-/ vel sim.
[AH.B.]
1.1.4Meaning
As the lexeme occurs in the bilingual inscription from Karatepe, the meaning was already clear to Bossert 1948a:181, because it translates the Phoenician infinitive absolute past perfective yḥw ‘kept alive’ (cf. Krahmalkov 2001a:46). The clause of KARATEPE 1 Hu., §4 includes a direct object as well as the preverb ARHA /ahha/ ‘away, back’, which is also seen with the related verb /lara-/ ‘to enhance’.
The context in ALEPPO 3 is too broken to add to the understanding of /laranu(wa)-/.
[AH.B.]
1.1.5Stem
This verb is a causative formation in /-nu(wa)-/, as already observed by Bossert 1948a:181 and followed by Hawkins & Morpurgo Davies 1978a:104f. and others. Verbs of this class are known to inflect according to the ḫi-conjugation (Sasseville 2021a:463f.).
[AH.B.]
For the derivational base, see /lara-(i)/.