Šdτat

Hapax in a Carian tomb stela from Memphis from the second half of the 6th c. BCE (O. Masson 1978a:6f.).

[Zs.S.]

gen. sg.

Šdτatś

E.Me 13

Attestation following Adiego 2007a:418 checked against the photograph in O. Masson 1978a:Plate V.1. On the emendation Šdwatś proposed by Schürr 2017a:3 n. 10 see under Meaning.

[Zs.S.]

According to Schürr 2017a:3, the Sidetic name Śdit “erinnert an” this Carian name and Nikolaev 2017a:223 already claims that the Carian name “is in all likelihood a feminine counterpart to this name”. Although the deceased person is indeed female based on the depiction, it is morphologically unclear how Šdτat could be a feminine counterpart to Śdit. Moreover, Šdτat clearly belongs to that numerous group of Carian names that show a suffix -at- (Schürr 2017a:3; Simon 2017a:33). Based on the similarity of Šdτat with the Carian name Σιδυατος (known only from Greek transmission) Schürr 2017a:3 n. 10 even cautiously (with question mark) considers the possibility if Šdτat should be emended into Šdwat. A scribal error, however, seems unlikely, since neither the phonemes nor the signs in question are remotely similar.

Still, the basic idea of Schürr and Nikolaev, the connection of these names might be, however, ultimately correct. The most plausible explanation derives Śdit from the unattested Sidetic cognate of Luwian zida/i- ‘man’ (see the discussion s.v.). Although the Carian cognate is also unattested (see the discussion s.v. sat), one would expect *sd vel sim. based on the Carian historical phonology (cf. Adiego 2007a:259–261), or rather *šd, since we know that Carian *s was palatalized preceding a front vowel (Simon 2008b:460). This would nicely match Šdτat, but the °τ° remains unexplained and since the origin of the phoneme written with this sign is completely unclear (Adiego 2007a:251), the entire connection is nothing more than a possibility.

[Zs.S.]