Old Irish -icc, -ucci

Abstract

Old Irish -ice 'reach, attain',' which does not exist as a simple verb in any Celtic language, has usually been connected with Skt. a'noti 'reaches'; more particularly it should be comparable to the augmentless form of the aorist. The chief reason for upholding this theory is the close affinity between the perfect forms of this verb in Celtic and Sanskrit: OIr. -dnicc and Skr. anaimba. The vowel in the present-tense form in Old Irish has caused some difficulty and has been variously explained (see VG 752, Anm. 3; Pokorny, Altir. Gramm. 48, and IF 35.339). The only possible explanation seems to be that we have here a case of shortening in unstressed position. The expected stressed forms would be: 3d sg. *-&icc, 3d pl. *4-ccat, which became, as stress was lost in context, -ice and -eccat respectively. In the same way one finds OIr. ldcimm 'I leave, let' appearing as leigim and ligim (seldom tIigim) in the modem Irish (and Scottish Gaelic) dialects.2 The influence of numerous compounds (ni-aricc 'does not find' etc.) must also be taken into consideration in order to explain the final victory of the forms with a short vowel. The original Celtic form corresponding to OIr. -ice may therefore have been (3d sg. pres. ind.) *anket, which in Goidelic changes its a into e (and i) before the nasal consonant cluster. In Welsh a corresponding stem is found in rhangu (earlier rhanghu, now rhyngu, see below), which is chiefly found in the phrase rhangu (rhyngu) bodd 'satisfy, please', lit. 'reach (someone's) pleasure' (cf. OIr. rice a less 'needs', lit. 'attains the advantage of it'), e.g. ? malphei edrfch a ranghei uod idaw Y weith 'as it were to see if his work would satisfy him' (see Strachan's Glossary s.v. rengi, in Introduction to Early Welsh). The 3d sg. pres. ind. is reinc in Middle Welsh