Papers by Sampsa Holopainen
The RUKI Rule in Indo-Iranian and the Early Contacts with Uralic
Internal and External Causes of Language Change: The Naxos Papers, 2023
Notes on the phonology of Alanic loanwords in Hungarian
Die Sprache. Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft, 2024
Finnisch-Ugrische Forschungen, 2024
The purpose of this paper is to discuss some debated etymologies that have competing explanations... more The purpose of this paper is to discuss some debated etymologies that have competing explanations in Hungarian and in other Uralic languages. It is shown that in most cases quite clearly one of the suggested etymologies is superior and that some phonological details have been neglected in recent discussion of these etymologies. The discussion includes criticism of some recent etymologies that have not yet been commented on elsewhere in detail.
Diachronica
The widespread Uralic family offers several advantages for tracing prehistory: a firm absolute ch... more The widespread Uralic family offers several advantages for tracing prehistory: a firm absolute chronological anchor point in an ancient contact episode with well-dated Indo-Iranian; other points of intersection or diagnostic non-intersection with early Indo-European (the Late Proto-Indo-European-speaking Yamnaya culture of the western steppe, the Afanasievo culture of the upper Yenisei, and the Fatyanovo culture of the middle Volga); lexical and morphological reconstruction sufficient to establish critical absences of sharings and contacts. We add information on climate, linguistic geography, typology, and cognate frequency distributions to reconstruct the Uralic origen and spread. We argue that the Uralic homeland was east of the Urals and initially out of contact with Indo-European. The spread was rapid and without widespread shared substratal effects. We reconstruct its cause as the interconnected reactions of early Uralic and Indo-European populations to a catastrophic climate c...
The article deals with presumed Indo-Iranian loanwords in Finnic languages which have no cognates... more The article deals with presumed Indo-Iranian loanwords in Finnic languages which have no cognates in other branches of the Uralic language family. A mainstream view, held by nearly all scholars of Uralic etymology, is that the contacts began already at the proto-language level, and that the words with a wide distribution in Uralic languages were borrowed from Proto-Indo-Iranian. Actually, contact is even attributed to before that, from "Pre-Indo-Iranian" which was still retaining the PIE vowel system, while some changes characteristic of Indo-Iranian had already happened in the consonantal system. The article discusses all the etymologies presented in earlier research and assesses their credibility (convincing/unconvincing/unclear). According to the author, the number of Indo-Iranian borrowings restricted to Finnic is in fact very low. In almost half of the cases evaluated in the paper, the words are either of non-Indo-Iranian origen or have cognates in other Uralic languages. If the unclear cases are counted, the number is even greater. Finnic words with a plausible Indo-Iranian etymology clearly refl ect several diachronic layers, all of which are shared by some other Uralic branches. This means that Finnic could not have acquired these words as a separate language. Some clearly late Iranian loans such as varsa and vasa have regular cognates in Mordvin [Koivulehto 1999a: 218-219], whereas some more archaic words are confi ned to Finnic. It is, however, interesting to note that many of the loanwords confi ned to Finnic manifest clearly Iranian features, and among those that are not demonstrably Iranian, there are no features that force us to consider these borrowings earlier Proto-Indo-Iranian loans; some of the more archaic loans are either problematic (such as verso) or should be rejected (such as herätä). There are few irregular cases (*waćara, *akštara, *šukta) which cannot be explained as wrong etymologies or results of undetected sound laws, though. They could either be parallel Indo-Iranian loans or indicate that the respective Indo-Iranian words * I would like to express my gratitude to Janne Saarikivi, Niklas Metsäranta, Santeri Junttila, Petri Kallio, Juha Kuokkala and the editor of this volume for useful comments and discussions on the topic of this paper and comments of its earlier versions. All the remaining errors are, of course, mine. A large part of the results of this paper has been published in my 2019 dissertation Indo-Iranian borrowings in Uralic: critical overview of sound substitutions and distribution criterion. 614 S. Holopainen ALP 16.3 spread through a dialect continuum which consisted of predecessors of Finnic, Saami and Mordvin, at the least. However, at least *waćara and *šukta clearly refl ect diff erent layers of Indo-Iranian borrowings (*waćara with *ć from PII *ȷ́ and *šukta with *š from PI *ts). It is therefore unlikely that they were simultaneously diff used through the already diff erentiated West-Uralic dialects.
Linguistica Uralica, 2024
In this paper, the problems with the reconstruction of an affricate phoneme *ć and its reflexes i... more In this paper, the problems with the reconstruction of an affricate phoneme *ć and its reflexes in Hungarian are discussed. 1 Proto-Ugric *ć is often reconstructed, but its alleged reflexes in Hungarian show unexplained variation (s, z, cs), and many of the etymologies involve other phonological irregularities. It is troubling that although in some cases Hungarian shows s and Khanty and Mansi *ć, often the reflexes of the affricate show discrepancy, with part of the languages showing regular reflexes of Proto-Uralic *ś. In this paper, the Ugric etymologies suggested in earlier etymological sources are analyzed and new solutions to the problem of Proto-Ugric *ć and its reflexes in Hungarian are suggested. The problems is also related to the study of the reflexes of Proto-Uralic *ć in Hungarian.
Itämeren kieliapajilta Volgan verkoille: Pühendusteos Riho Grünthalile 22. mail 2024, 2024
Journal de la Société Finno-Ougrienne, 2023
In this paper, the shared vocabulary of the Ugric languages (Hungarian and the Ob-Ugric languages... more In this paper, the shared vocabulary of the Ugric languages (Hungarian and the Ob-Ugric languages Khanty and Mansi) is discussed. Words that have been considered loanwords from Iranian or Turkic languages into Proto-Ugric, the intermediary protolanguage of Hungarian and Ob-Ugric in traditional models of Uralic taxonomy, are analyzed critically, and Proto-Ugric words that fulfill the criteria of substrate words are also analyzed. It is shown that a large part of the vocabulary traditionally reconstructed for Proto-Ugric in earlier etymological dictionaries like the UEW, consist of parallel loanwords (sometimes from unknown sources) rather than shared lexical innovations.
Finnisch-Ugrische Forschungen, 2023
This article discusses the alleged sound change Proto-Uralic *u > Hungarian a, á. The etymologies... more This article discusses the alleged sound change Proto-Uralic *u > Hungarian a, á. The etymologies manifesting this change that have been presented in earlier etymological literature are critically examined, and it is shown that a significant portion of them are wrong or based on outdated reconstructions. New explanations for many etymologies are presented, and possible causes for the few convincing examples of *u > a are discussed.
Contact phenomena in IE kinship and social terms and beyond
Colloquium, 2020
Siberica et Uralica: In memoriam Eugen Helimski, 2022
Tonavan Laakso: Eine Festschrift für Johanna Laakso, 2022
Journal de la Société Finno-Ougrienne, 2021
In this paper, the Indo-European etymologies of Uralic words are analyzed that allegedly contain ... more In this paper, the Indo-European etymologies of Uralic words are analyzed that allegedly contain reflexes of Proto-Indo-European palatal stops (palatovelars) *ḱ, *ǵ and *ǵh. Especially Jorma Koivulehto has in many works argued that words that show these reflexes attest to very early contacts between Indo-European and Uralic, and these ideas have been very influential in the discussion of the location and dating of early varieties of Uralic, and to a lesser extent, Indo-European languages. While most of these etymologies are convincing in that they are indeed borrowed from Indo-European, a critical examination leads to the conclusion that they can be considered loanwords from later branches (such as Indo-Iranian) that had already gone through satemization (the merger of plain velars with labiovelars and change of palatovelars to affricates or sibilants). Some etymologies also turn out to be unconvincing in the light of modern views of Uralic and Indo-European historical phonology. These results support other recent, more skeptical views of contacts between Proto-Indo-European and Proto-Uralic and mean that many of the extra-linguistic conclusions based on earlier loanword studies have to be considered unreliable, which is in line with recent studies of prehistory.
Hämeenmaalta Jamalille: kirja Tapani Salmiselle, 2022
Tapani Salminen on monen muun saavutuksensa ohella ansiokkaasti käsitellyt uralilaisen kantakiele... more Tapani Salminen on monen muun saavutuksensa ohella ansiokkaasti käsitellyt uralilaisen kantakielen ja sen jakautumisen ongelmia monesta lähtökohdasta käsin (ks. esim. Salminen 1999, 2001, 2002), ottaen kantaa myös lingvistisen paleontologian ongelmiin uralilaisen kantakielen ajoittamisessa ja paikantamisessa (Salminen 2001: 392). Tässä kirjoituksessa pohdin uralilaisen etymologian nykytilaa lingvistisen paleontologian kannalta ja erityisesti niin sanotun kulttuurisen rekonstruktion ongelmakohtia viimeaikaisen etymologisen tutkimuksen valossa. Lähtökohtani on tarkoituksellisen kriittinen: tässä seuraan erityisesti James Clacksonin (2000; 2007: 15-19, 196-213; 2013) huomioita kantaindoeuroopan kulttuurisen rekonstruktion ongelmista ja yritän soveltaa samanlaista kriittistä näkökulmaa kantauralin sanastoon. Tarkoitukseni ei ole kuitenkaan väittää lingvististä paleontologiaa tarpeettomaksi, vaan osoittaa sen tietyt heikkoudet, erityisesti uralistiikan osalta, ja kannustaa kriittisyyteen uralilai sen esihistorian tutkimuksessa. En esitä yleiskuvaa kantauralilaisen kulttuurin rekonstruktiosta vaan käsittelen muutamia ongelmakohtia tarkemmin. Uralilaista lingvististä paleontologiaa tutkiessa täytyy pitää mielessä, että tutkija kohtaa oikeastaan kaksi eri kysymystä: miten hyvin metodi toimii yleisesti, ja miten hyvin sitä voi uralistiikassa soveltaa. Pelkkä lingvistisen paleontologian toimivuus yleisellä tasolla tai jonkin toisen kielikunnan osalta ei automaattisesti tarkoita, että myös kantauralin puhujien kulttuurista saadaan samalla metodilla automaattisesti paljon irti. On myös selvää, että tutkittavan kantakielitason ajallinen syvyys vaikuttaa metodin tarkkuuteen. Esimerkiksi kantasuomalaisesta kulttuurista voidaan sanaston valossa sanoa enemmän kuin kantauralilaisesta. Uralilaisen esihistorian tutkimuksessa lingvistisen paleontologian ongelmat ovat aina ajankohtaisia, ja viime vuosikymmenten etymologinen tutkimus on tehnyt vanhat paleolingvistiset työt pahasti vanhentuneiksi (vaikka näihin yhä näkeekin viitteitä, ks. esim. Mallory 2019). Edelliset aiheeseen keskittyvät laajemmat esitykset kuten K. 1 Olen kiitollinen juhlakirjan toimitukselle, anonyymille vertaisarvioijalle. Janne Saarikivelle ja Jussi Ylikoskelle hyödyllisistä kommenteista. Artikkelia kirjoittaessani olen työskennellyt Itävallan tiedeakatemian APART GSK-apurahalla Wienin yliopiston suomalais-ugrilaisessa laitoksessa (Fellowship holder of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (APART-GSK) at the Department of European and Comparative Literature and Language Studies (Finno-Ugrian Studies) of the University of Vienna).
Virittäjä 125, pp. 499-520., 2021
Virittäjä, 2020
Väitöksenalkajaisesitelmä (lectio praecursoria) Helsingin yliopistossa 14. joulukuuta 2019
Ёмас сымыӈ нэ̄кве во̄ртур э̄тпост самын патум — Scripta miscellanea in honorem Ulla-Maija Forsberg. Edited by Sampsa Holopainen, Juha Kuokkala, Janne Saarikivi & Susanna Virtanen. Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran Toimituksia ~ Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne 275. Helsinki 2020. Pp. 103-111., 2020
Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran Toimituksia ~ Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne 275. Helsinki 20... more Suomalais-Ugrilaisen Seuran Toimituksia ~ Mémoires de la Société Finno-Ougrienne 275. Helsinki 2020. Pp.
Romain Garnier (ed). Proceedings of the International Colloquium on Loanwords and Substrata in Indo-European languages (Limoges, France, 4th–7th June 2018). Innsbruck: Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, 345–366: ISBN 9783851247510, 2020
Terms of relatedness can belong to both basic and cultural vocabulary.
Borrowing of such words ha... more Terms of relatedness can belong to both basic and cultural vocabulary.
Borrowing of such words happens fairly often in multilingual communities. Therefore, research of this lexical field should always include both genealogical and areal perspectives. This pilot study presents an effort to educe areal features of Central Eurasian terms of relatedness and how they are realised in the Uralic and Iranian languages. For this purpose, we have collected and analysed (Indo-)Iranian borrowings in the Uralic languages and Turkic borrowings
in both Uralic and Iranian languages. The evidence indicates that not
only separate words but whole structures can be borrowed: most languages of Central Eurasia tend to have different terms for older and younger siblings, i.e., they have so-called relative age distinction.
Rasprave 46/2 (2020.), 2020
This paper presents the new project Digital etymological dictionary of the oldest vocabulary of F... more This paper presents the new project Digital etymological dictionary of the oldest vocabulary of Finnish (University of Helsinki, funded by the Kone Foundation) and discusses the present state and challenges of the (especially digital) etymological resources of the Finnic languages and Uralic languages in general. It is also shown how crowdsourcing of etymology can work, and how the present platform could be used in the etymological lexicography of other languages and language families.
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Papers by Sampsa Holopainen
Borrowing of such words happens fairly often in multilingual communities. Therefore, research of this lexical field should always include both genealogical and areal perspectives. This pilot study presents an effort to educe areal features of Central Eurasian terms of relatedness and how they are realised in the Uralic and Iranian languages. For this purpose, we have collected and analysed (Indo-)Iranian borrowings in the Uralic languages and Turkic borrowings
in both Uralic and Iranian languages. The evidence indicates that not
only separate words but whole structures can be borrowed: most languages of Central Eurasia tend to have different terms for older and younger siblings, i.e., they have so-called relative age distinction.
Borrowing of such words happens fairly often in multilingual communities. Therefore, research of this lexical field should always include both genealogical and areal perspectives. This pilot study presents an effort to educe areal features of Central Eurasian terms of relatedness and how they are realised in the Uralic and Iranian languages. For this purpose, we have collected and analysed (Indo-)Iranian borrowings in the Uralic languages and Turkic borrowings
in both Uralic and Iranian languages. The evidence indicates that not
only separate words but whole structures can be borrowed: most languages of Central Eurasia tend to have different terms for older and younger siblings, i.e., they have so-called relative age distinction.
(Some references added to the bibliography in November 2022.)
283 pp.
historical phonetics: An areal linguistic study. With an appendix
on the role of Proto-Mari in the history of Chuvash vocalism
(Turcologica 17).