wicν

The lexeme is attested two times in a poetic inscription and a legal agreement, both found in Sardis.   

[I.Y.]

It was assumed for a long period of time that wicν represented a 1sg. pret. form of a hypothetical wic- ‘to build’ (Gusmani 1964a:225). The reason for this was its perceived relationship with the Luwian verbal form 3sg. pret. da-wic-il. Such an interpretation, however, has been challenged on combinatory grounds in Melchert 1997a:41-44 and Schürr 1997a:202. Melchert suggested that wicν represents an acc. sg. c. of a nominal form, while Schürr pleaded for its interpretation as an infinitive or adposition and furthermore defined its approximate meaning as ‘in honour of’ based on the comprehensive analysis of LW 22 (Schürr 1997a:205). Schürr’s overall interpretation appears to be borne out by context, but the absence of assured Lydian infinitives in -ν tips the scales in favour of his second alternative. The analysis of wicν as an adposition is supported, in fact, not only by its morphological structure but also by its likely genetic relationship with the preverb wc- attested in wc-paqẽnt and wc-pinwν. Accordingly it is translated here by an English preposition with a broad benefactive meaning.

[I.Y.]

The adposition wic-ν is synchronically derived with the suffix -ν, which is otherwise typical of Lydian preverbs and adpositions; cf. lẽν, šawν and uν.

[I.Y.]

The historical derivation with the help of the -ν suffix is borne out not only by a comparison with the prefix wc- (where the final -ν could theoretically disappear in heavy consonant clusters) also by the existence of a likely denominative verb Lyd. da-wici- . Regarding the origin of this suffix, two explanations are possible. On the one hand, one can argue that wic-ν represents a historical compound the second element of which is cognate with the Lydian postposition ẽn (cf. šawν). On the other hand, it is possible that the productive adverbial suffix -ν was extended to wic-ν as a result of analogical leveling. The difference between these two accounts is essentially that of relative chronology.

The etymology of the morpheme wic- at present remains unknown. The variant wc-, occurring as a verbal prefix, must be attributed to syncope. A parallel instance of syncope is that of Lyd. wsta- vs. wastνun-. This type of syncope is not treated in Melchert 1994a:373-376, but it is reasonably assured, since otherwise the initial cluster wC- would be hard to explain. Presumably, the development wVC- > wC- in unstressed initial syllables in Lydian should be considered together with the instances of -rVC- > -rC-, on which see Melchert 1994a:376.

[I.Y.]