344 Is the Pushto a Semitic Language? Xo. 4. 



Uader^J^Jl " silk" Vullers is mute, as alas he is inmost] 

 where one would look for information. In Pushto (J^ijj (wresh-al) 

 is " to spin," which at least shows that the a in abresham is prosthetic, 

 for euphony, and that the original meaning of the Persian word is 

 " that which is spun" by the silkworm. But at the same time a 

 conjecture may be ventured as to the Greek apayyr\ " spider" which 

 may reasonably be supposed to be connected with a word for " spin- 

 ning," like its equivalent in so many languages ; the change o?v into 

 a vowel before r is quite common, e. g. Sanskrit vrih = Greek 

 opx-eoi ; Pushto ^j^jj (wrbushe) == Greek 6'po/?os (German erbse) . 

 Prof. Max Miiller in another conjecture on the same word (Zeitschrift 

 fur Vergleichende Sprachforschung, 4, 368), makes a suggestion most 

 worthy of consideration. He observes that a specific term in course 

 of time often passes over into a general application, and that a word, 

 for instance, denoting originally some peculiar kind of " making" 

 adopts the sense of " making" generally ; he instances rkyyr] (art) 

 from Sans, tvaksh (to work in timber) ; and Latin ars (art) from ar-o 

 (I plough) ; and he goes on to say that the Sanskrit rack (to make) 

 may originally have meant " to weave." This I would modify so 

 far as to say that if a root for apa^-vr} must be sought for in Sanskrit, 

 it may be vraj " to make,"* which may originally have signified " to 

 spin ;" and support the conjecture not only by the Persian +**ijl 

 (which would then be the original form of both *^*J) and /**»tr>\, 

 both forms being due to the same principle of dislike to a double 

 consonant at the beginning of a word), and the Pushto O^'jj 

 (wresh-al) ,t but also by the Greek 7rpay — (do) and the Polish ^rac« 

 (work), both of them etymological cruces and nieces; and would 

 venture to add even the English work and German loerh. 



Taking the Persian wordj^* "hunting" by itself, it would seem 

 rash to connect it with ^liXi " to break," which has for its Imper- 

 ative v&»> ; yet this seems to be the connection on the analogy of 

 the Pushto ^L* (mate) " hunting" especially that of the lion, as 



[* This very rare root (vrajayati) is explained by the grammarians " to send," 

 " to purify," rather than " to make" (" Vraja mdrganasansJcdra-gatyoli.)" Eds.] 



t For the change of the consonant j into sh (vrij = wresh) cf. Sanskrit jiv 

 ami = Old Slavic shkni ; Sanskrit jnd = Persian U**>], and the Highlander's 

 shenthman for gentleman. 



