Comparative Notes on Hurro-Urartian, Northern Caucasian

AP RU(M) “to send” (in the bilingual text K Bo XXXII 15 I 16–II 16; IV 6-7–III 6-7 67 ),
one may suggest a frozen class prefix p- as has been found in several other Hurrian
verbs. 68 The last part of the stem -e/ind- may be compared to Western Northern
Caucasian *-dÛP “to move back, to return” > Proto-Adyg-Kabardian -dÛP (suffix of a
reverse action) > Kabardian -ÛP; the Western Caucasian morph is traced back to the
Proto-Northern Caucasian verbal root *ićwË “to come, to return” (> Avar aÇ-in-, with
the -n- conjugation that is supposed to be of later origin 69 ), which in many Eastern
Caucasian languages is contained in verbs used mostly (or only, as in Khinalug) with
locative preverbs. If in Proto-Hurro-Urartian (or an early dialect that had been its
historical parent) this morph was preceded by a nasal element, such as a local preverb
(as in cognate Eastern Caucasian stems, but cf. also in Western Caucasian morphemes
like the Adyg-Kabardian directive verbal prefix na- of pronominal origin) or another
verbal stem (as in Western Caucasian), the resulting group might have developed into
Hurrian -nd-. But this conjecture is purely hypothetical, since no such combinations are
attested in Hurro-Urartian, and their structural relation to the initial prefix (presumably
a class prefix) is not clear. Besides, the type of Proto-Northern Caucasian affricate is
different from all the other examples studied above. If one operates with very short
morphs with rather broad meaning, as is the case with most Northern Caucasian verbal
roots, the degree of certainty is much less than in the case of larger lexical units having
some specific connotation.
Since, nevertheless, the other cases discussed above seem transparent 70 , it can be
stated that from the phonetic point of view the suggested etymology of Hurrian endan
is quite possible.
herari : herahi) with the adjective pandani occurs in the ritual of Ishtar KUB XXVII 1 Vs. II 4, Salvini
1977, 82; Wegner, ib.: pantani hirahi “the right upper arm (of Teshop)”.
67 Neu 1996, 323, 348, 521.
68 Starostin 1998, etymologies 34-36.
69 Nikolayev and Starostin 1994, 627-628.
70 In previous studies some possible examples of another development of the group nasal + affricate in
Hurrian have been discussed: see e.g. on anz-an-uhh- Diakonoff and Starostin 1986, 23; Nikolayev and
Starostin 1994, 262; but the meaning of this verbal stem is not yet sufficiently clear (see Neu 1996, 350;
cf. Nozadze 1978, 63-64).