𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐍃

Forms

𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐍃 (fisks), a masculine a-stem noun.^[1][2][3] Only plural forms are recorded: the accusative 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐌰𐌽𐍃 (fiskans, five times), the genitive 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐌴 (fiske, four), the dative 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐌰𐌼 (fiskam, twice) and the nominative 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐍉𐍃 (fiskos, once), in the Wulfila project's count.^[4][5][6]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-Germanic *fiskaz (“fish”),^[7][8][9] like Old Norse fiskr, Old English fisc, Old Frisian fisk, Old Saxon fisk and Old High German fisc.^[8] Feist and Lehmann also cite the Crimean Gothic form, whose printed final t Lehmann, after Schröder, takes as a misprint.^[10][6] Outside Germanic the word is shared with Latin piscis and Old Irish íasc, which Kroonen treats as a western Indo-European word, with another stem formation in Latin and another vowel grade in Irish.^[8] Wiktionary traces it to Proto-Indo-European *peysk-.^[7] Lehmann reports Pokorny's link with a Russian name of the gudgeon, accepted by Walde and Hofmann, which would make the word "water animal", and finds any wider Indo-European connection doubtful.^[6] Feist asks, without deciding, whether Sanskrit words for "tail feather" and "slime" belong here.^[10]

Attestation

The Wulfila project counts twelve tokens, in John, Luke and Mark (seven, in manuscript CA) and in the Skeireins (five, in manuscript E); Köbler counts fourteen records, Crimean Gothic included.^[4][5] The first in canonical order is the accusative fiskans at John 6:9.^[4] PROIEL aligns seven tokens with the Greek: Ancient Greek ἰχθύς (ikhthús) four times, Ancient Greek ὀψάριον (opsárion) twice and Ancient Greek ἰχθύδιον (ikhthúdion) once.^[11] At John 6:9: ist magula ains her saei habaiþ ·e· hlaibans barizeinans jah ·b· fiskans, "there is a little boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish".^[12]

Meanings

1. fish^[1][2][7]

Word family

• 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐌾𐌰 (fiskja, “fisherman”)
• 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐍉𐌽 (fiskōn, “to fish”)

References

1. ^ a b Streitberg, Wilhelm (1910), Die gotische Bibel, II: Gotisch-griechisch-deutsches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Winter, p. s.v. fisks
2. ^ a b Regan, Brian T. (1974), Dictionary of the Biblical Gothic Language, Phoenix: Wulfila House, p. 61
3. ^ Braune, Wilhelm; Heidermanns, Frank (2004), Gotische Grammatik, mit Lesestücken und Wörterverzeichnis, 20th ed., Sammlung kurzer Grammatiken germanischer Dialekte A 1, Tübingen: Niemeyer, p. 276
4. ^ a b c De Herdt, Tom (2004–2026), Project Wulfila: digital edition of the Gothic Bible with lemma and morphological annotation, data release 2026-09-03, wulfila.be
5. ^ a b Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Gotisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. fisks*
6. ^ a b c Lehmann, Winfred P. (1986), A Gothic Etymological Dictionary, based on the third edition of Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der gotischen Sprache by Sigmund Feist, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. *fisks
7. ^ a b c Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org, p. s.v. 𐍆𐌹𐍃𐌺𐍃
8. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. 141
9. ^ Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill, p. s.v. *fiskaz
10. ^ a b Feist, Sigmund (1939), Vergleichendes Wörterbuch der gotischen Sprache, 3rd ed., Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. fisks
11. ^ Haug, Dag T. T. et al., PROIEL Treebank: The Gothic Bible (gothic-nt), 2023 release, Pragmatic Resources in Old Indo-European Languages, University of Oslo
12. ^ De Herdt, Tom (2004–2026), Project Wulfila: digital edition of the Gothic Bible with lemma and morphological annotation, data release 2026-09-03, wulfila.be, p. Jn 6:9