Prasun historical linguistics: new etymologies and the fate of the Indo-Iranian morphemes <i>*-am</i> and <i>*-ka-</i>

Abstract In this article, I touch on some lexical and morphological aspects of Prasun historical linguistics. I propose six new etymologies for Prasun words that have not been etymologized at all ( üžóg “resin”, ćəwā́ “rhubarb”, wulóg “footprint”, žíma “tent, camp”) or differently ( wuzógrog , zógrog “knee”, wuẓnúg , wuẓéŋ “salt”), and add further remarks to three words ( üzǖ́ etc. “ice; cold”, lümī́ , lümǖ́ “tail”, wəs “day”) with whose traditional etymologizations I basically agree. Furthermore, it is argued that the common epenthetic wu- ~ ü- and the final (usually) - u ~ -ü have the same origin and largely go back to the acc.sg.m/n, nom.sg.n *-am of the Indo-Iranian a-stems. Additionally, while the *-ka- suffix is present in all Nuristani languages in various functions, there is a noticeable split between Prasun, where *-ka- is added to many nouns of the inherited basic vocabulary while it is absent in the cognates in the other Nuristani languages.