Chapters

Book Chapter

Chapter 11. An Occupation without a Name: Commerce

Book II: The Vocabulary of Kinship Introduction Abstract If our knowledge of the Indo-European vocabulary of kinship has not been noticeably advanced since the study of Indo-European kinship by Delbrück (1890), ethnological research, for its part, has made great progress, and this is what today provokes the linguist to revise the traditional interpretation of certain lexical “anomalies.” Text The terms relating to kinship are among the most stable and securely… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 10. Purchase and Redemption

Chapter 17. Gratuitousness and Gratefulness Abstract Lat. gratia is a term, originally having religious value, which was applied to a mode of economic behavior: what designated “grace” and an “action of grace” came to express the notion of “gratuitousness” (gratis). Text The terms relating to the various aspects of payment lead on to consideration of the opposite notion, namely that of “gratuitousness.” This is an economic as well as a… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 9. Two Ways of Buying

Chapter 16. Lending, Borrowing, and Debt Abstract In contrast to Bartholomae, who distinguishes two roots par-, it is shown that the Iranian derivatives (and the Armenian ones) of par-, from which comes Iranian *pr̥tu-, and from it Armenian partkc ‘debt’, can be attached to a single basic meaning “compensate by something levied on oneself, on one’s own person or one’s own possessions.” Lat. par ‘equal’ can be brought together with… Read more

Book Chapter

Section 3: Purchase

Chapter 15. Credence and Belief Abstract The exact formal correspondence between Lat. crē–dō and Sanskrit śrad–dhā– is a guarantee of ancient heritage. Studies of the uses of śrad–dhā– in the Rig Veda show that the meaning of the word is “act of confidence (in a god), implying restitution (in the form of a divine favor accorded to the faithful).” The expression of the same complex notion, the IE *kred-, recurs… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 8. Personal Loyalty

Chapter 14. Price and Wages Abstract When studied in their most ancient uses and referred to their Indo-European origin, the words for wages—in particular Gr. misthós, Got. laun (German Lohn)—show that before designating the “price for some piece of work,” they signified “reward for a brilliant exploit,” “prize in a competition.” As for Lat. merces, which also does not signify “wage” in the modern sense, its connection with merx ‘merchandise’… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 7. Hospitality

Chapter 13. Hiring and Leasing Abstract Unlike French, Latin opposes conducere ‘to hire, take on lease’ to locare ‘let out on hire, to lease’. The specialized sense of conducere , which basically signifies “lead,” started in the military context of recruiting and becomes specifically “to hire” when a chief (dux) engages men for a given sum of money: conducere mercede. By a parallel development, locare ‘to put a thing in… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 6. Giving, Taking, and Receiving

Section 4: Economic Obligations Chapter 12. Accountancy and Valuation Abstract Latin duco and Greek hēgéomai have the same senses; the literal sense “lead, command” and the figurative sense “believe, judge, estimate.” But we must be careful not to deduce from this that there were parallel lines of development in both cases, from the literal to the figurative sense. Whereas with Greek hēgéomai ‘command’ there was a direct passage from… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 5. Gift and Exchange

Chapter 11. An Occupation without a Name: Commerce Abstract The comparison of Indo-European languages furnishes no common designation for commerce as a specific activity, as distinguished from buying and selling. The particular terms which appeared in different places are usually recognizable as borrowings (Lat. caupo, Gr. kápēlos), or recent creations (Gr. émporos). The Latin negōtium, itself a recent word, has a peculiar history: 1) A calque on Gr. a–skholía, neg–ōtium… Read more

Book Chapter

Section 2: Giving and Taking

Chapter 10. Purchase and Redemption Abstract Indo-European had words for “to be worth” and “value.” But a study of the Homeric usage of alphánō ‘to bring in, yield, fetch’ makes it clear that alphḗ designated originally the exchange value of a man put up for sale. Skt. arhat ‘a man of particular merit’ brings confirmation of this ancient sense. With the Germans, the custom of selling a man who had… Read more

Book Chapter

Chapter 4. Livestock and Money: pecu and pecunia

Section 3: Purchase Chapter 9. Two Ways of Buying Abstract Were the roots *wes– and kwrī-, which have provided the verbs for “to buy,” synonymous in Indo-European? Greek, where these two roots coexist and function in suppletion, enables us to determine the first as the designation of transaction and the second as that of payment. Text To designate the “purchase,” the agreement of several languages provides us with a well-defined… Read more