You can read about Yingpan Man and see the putti on his caftan in " Yingpan Man’s Fabulous Wealth", by the outstanding science writer Heather Pringle, Archaeology (March 29, 2010). Although Yingpan Man was discovered in the remote, northeast corner of the Takalamakan Desert in Eastern Central Asia, the motifs on his red and gold-colored caftan are decidedly Greco-Roman. AD), one of the more famous among the Tarim Basin mummies. putti) when studying the amazing robe of Yingpan Man (4th-5th c. One thing that really rubbed me raw is their reference to "an early Sanskrit language" (I wrote this before seeing Ambarish Sridharanarayanan's note), as though there were a bunch of different Sanskrit languages out there. How could they get so many things wrong in such a short space? It's as if they were just winging it and saying whatever came into their mind and sounded mystical. The Wiktionary entry for this seems quite good to my amateur eye. Oh, and in modern French, there's the term "putain" for prostitute, and the form "pute" is generally considered a more familiar, vulgar word. To be writing in English and to make such an egregious error makes me wonder if the whole thing is a farcical joke. Whenever I see or hear "out-of-the-box" used in place of "outside the box", I doubt the other persons grasp of the English language. The none too veiled association of the latter with "la puta" has apparently caused problems with Spanish translations… When they start using an indefinite article with Sanskrit is about when I start doubting that they know what they're talking about.Īnatoly Liberman has suggested that Jonathan Swift might have been going with the "put" and "puta" connection in Gulliver's Travels when coining the names "Lilliput" and "Laputa". The only guideline that dabblers in etymology follow is "If x looks or sounds like y, x must be derived from y."
Filed by Mark Liberman under Words words words, WTF.Indo-Europeanīasque puta "whore," assumed to be a loanword Perhaps from Vulgar Latin put(t)a, a feminized form of putus "boy." From Proto-Italic * put-o- "boy." Formed from Proto-Indo-European * pu̯t-lo- "son" (see pollo). (Noun) (obscene) "whore," "slut" 13th cent. Late Old English hóre , corresponding to (Middle) Low German hóre , Middle Dutch hoere (Dutch hoer ), Old High German huora (Middle High German huere , German hure ), Old Norse hóra < Old Germanic *χ ōrōn- , < root represented also by Old Norse hórr , Gothic hôrs adulterer, Old Frisian hôr (also overhôr , urhôr ), Old High German huor , Old Norse hór adultery, Middle Low German horre , Middle Dutch huerre , Old High German huorra adulterer ( < *χ ōrjon-), and Old Frisian (over)~hôra to fornicate, Middle Dutch hoeren , Old High German huorôn (German huren ), Old Norse hóra , Gothic hôrinôn Indo-European qār- appears in Latin cārus dear, Old Irish cara friend, caraim I love, Latvian kārs lascivious.Īnd Spanish puta doesn't seem to have any connection with a Sankrit word for "pure and holy": puta f. < Old French herlot, harlot, arlot (masculine), lad, young fellow, base fellow, knave, vagabond = Provençal arlot vagabond, beggar, Italian arlotto ‘a lack-latin or hedge-priest’ (Florio), ‘glutton, greedy gut, great eater’ (Baretti) compare medieval Latin arlotus, erlotusglutton (Mahn) Old Spanish arlote, alrote lazy, sluggardly, loafing Old Portuguese alrotar to go about begging, Portuguese to mock. The OED's discussion of that word's etymology:Īs a word of masculine gender found early in 13th cent., as feminine in 15th cent. Taking up the first case: harlot doesn't seem to have anything to do with a goddess named Har. We’re the only Pop Archaeology site combining scientific research with out-of-the-box perspectivesīut the etymology in those two paragraphs is not just out-of-the-box, it's out-of-its-mind. The Ancient Origins "about-us" page says that The cave, the hole and the bottomless black lake were metaphors for the Great Goddess- the primordial darkness from which all life is born. The root of the word came from an early Sanskrit language where puta is defined as pure and holy. In turn, the Latin term for “grave” is puticuli, which means “womb of rebirth”. The Hebrew word hor means “a cave” or “dark hole” and the Spanish word for “whore”, puta, derives from the Latin term for “a well”. These harlots were holy virgins serving goddesses such as Ishtar, Asherah, or Aphrodite. These “harlots” were not prostitutes as we know them, but priestesses and healers. Ishtar was sometimes called the Goddess Har since she was the mother of the harlots. " Lost in Translation? Understandings and Misunderstandings about the Ancient Practice of 'Sacred Prostitution'", Ancient Origins: