Programme

Ares the Ripper: From Stang’s Law to long-diphthong roots
Andreas Willi, Oxford University
In response to a recent - and a priori rather attractive - derivation, by T. Barnes, of the Greek
theonym Ἄρης from a root *h 2 reh 1 -, the present paper will start by highlighting some formal
problems arising from this view, in particular the need to postulate an inversion of (the effects
of) Stang’s Law in order to explain the Aeolic form of Ares’ name, Ἄρευς. These difficulties,
it will be argued, can be avoided if the theonym directly instantiates Stang’s Law, and if an
original nom. *h 2 reu-s (as preserved in Aeolic) is posited next to acc. *h 2 reu-m > *h 2 rēm >
Ἄρην. In pre-Mycenaean times already (cf. Myc. dat. a-re etc.), Ἄρευς was then regularised
as Ἄρης, with the nominative following the accusative because the onomastic use is
secondary. The root involved must be the one posited in LIV (s.v.) as *reu̯ H- ‘aufreissen’
(despite aniṭ evidence in Sanskrit): cf. Latin ruere ‘rip (up/down)’, Ved. rav- ‘wound’ (and,
from *(H)reu-s-, OCS rušǫ ‘destroy’).
Independent support for this proposal comes from the Old Latin carmen Arvale, in
which Ares’ Roman counterpart Mars is addressed with the phrase ne uelue rue(m) ‘do not
roll upon (us) ruem’. The hitherto obscure acc. rue(m) surfacing here can be equated with the
Homeric acc. ἀρήν ‘destruction’, and be taken to reflect the Proto-Latin paradigm of *h 2 reu-s,
viz. nom. *rous, acc. *rēm, gen. (*h 2 rw-es >) *rues, etc., whence ruēm by analogical
transformation of the irregular accusative *rēm.
In a last, more speculative, part, the paper will briefly explore if the root *h 2 reu- ‘to rip
(apart)’ may not ultimately be connected with *h 2 erh 3 - ‘to plough’. Admitting Schwebeablaut,
a pair *h 2 reh 3 - ~ *h 2 reu-, if conceived as *h 2 reh 3 (u̯ )-, resembles ‘long-diphthong roots’ of the
shape *CeH(u̯ )-, and it more specifically evokes the case of *deh 3 - ~ *deu- ‘to give’ (i.e.
notional *deh 3 (u̯ )-).
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