April theme: Birds 🐦

Teaser

thrush, ostrich

Full Text

• ?

  • Northwest Indo-European *tr(o)zdos ^[1]

    • Balto-Slavic

      • East Baltic

        • Lithuanian strazdas thrush
      • Slavic *drȏzdъ thrush

        • East Slavic

          • Russian дрозд drozd thrush
        • South Slavic

          • Serbo-Croatian дро̏зд drȍzd thrush
        • West Slavic

          • Polish drozd thrush
    • Celtic *trezd

      • Gaulish *tresd

        • Gaulish *tresdina

          • French draine mistle thrush
      • Brythonic

        • Welsh tresglen
      • Old Irish truit starling

        • Irish druid starling
    • Germanic *þrastuz thrush

      • North Germanic

        • Old Norse þrǫstr thrush

          • Danish trost thrush archaic
          • Icelandic þröstur thrush
      • Germanic *þrustaz

        • Germanic *þruskijǭ dimuntive

          • West Germanic

            • Old English þrysċe

              • English thrush
        • Germanic *þrustalȭ diminutive

          • West Germanic

            • Old English þrostle

              • English throstle
            • Old High German drōscala

              • German Drossel thrush

                • Danish drossel thrush
    • Italic

      • Latin turdus thrush, fieldfare

        • Translingual Turdus taxonomic genus of true thrushes
        • Eastern Romance

          • Romanian sturz thrush ^[2]
        • Western Romance

          • Italian tordo thrush
          • Spanish tordo thrush
  • Greco-Armenian? *drodʰ- ^[1]

    • Armenian տորդիկ tordik thrush archaic

      • Armenian Տորդիկ Tordik Thrush (surname)
    • Hellenic

      • Ancient Greek *drouthos sparrow

        • Ancient Greek Τρουθος personal name
        • Ancient Greek Δρουθου personal name (gen.)
        • Ancient Greek στρουθόs strouthós sparrow

          • Latin strūtheus pertaining to sparrows
          • Ancient Greek στρουθιοκάμηλος strouthiokámēlos ostrich lit. "sparrow-camel" ^[3]

            • Greek στρουθοκάμηλος
            • Latin strūthiocamēlus ostrich

              • Latin strūthiō ostrich

                • Translingual Struthio taxonomic genus of ostriches
                • Eastern Romance

                  • Romanian struț ostrich
                • Western Romance

                  • Italian struzzo ostrich

                    • Old High German strūz ostrich

                      • German Strauss ostrich, bouquet

                        • Russian стра́ус stráus ostrich
                      • Yiddish שטרויס shtroys ostrich
                • Old English strūta

                  • Icelandic strútur ostrich
                • Old Norse strúz ostrich

                  • Danish struds ostrich
                • Latin avis strūthiō ostrich bird

                  • Vulgar Latin *austruthio ostrich

                    • Western Romance

                      • Old French ostruce

                        • French autruche ostrich
                        • English ostrich
                        • Welsh estrys ostrich
                      • Spanish avestruz ostrich

Visual

Collected English words

thrush, throstle, Turdus, Struthio, ostrich

Footnotes

1. ^

   This word has characteristics of a borrowing from Non-IE into Late Northwestern (like many other bird names), which may explain why no single IE reconstruction quite fits all the descendant forms.

   On the other hand, there are possible connections in Armenian and Greek (which aren't in the Northwestern group). But Greco-Armenian is a likely sub-grouping anyway, so I've graphed it as speculating two separate borrowings, one into LNW and one into Greco-Armenian.

2. ^

   The initial 's' in Romanian sturz is unexpected. It may be a conflation with Latin sturnus: "starling".

   Given the uncertain and likely non-IE origin of this family, the "starling" family—Latin sturnus, Old English stær(linc), Welsh drudwen, etc.—may be related. If so, the "tern" family is likely related also.

   IE initial s's are predictably unpredictable between branches, so variations like Latin sturnus vs Welsh drudwen are expected. A variation as late as the descent from Vulgar Latin to Romanian is not an example of s-mobile, but since Latin still has lots of grammatical endings with "-s", a similar effect is reasonable.

3. ^

   Compare Ancient Greek στρουθιοκάμηλος strouthiokámēlos: "ostrich" (lit. "sparrow-camel") to κᾰμηλοπάρδᾰλῐς kamēlopárdalis: "giraffe", but literally "camel-leopard" (English leopard is itself actually "lion-leopard").