Abstract
The article deals with the phonological and semantic reconstruction of Nostratic etymon *'wet and its genetic transformations that were restored on the basis of five language families.The process of transposition of the generalized sign *'wet is established to have taken place in the development of sacred meanings in its semantic structure. These meanings were connected with the initial ideas of Nostratic native speakers about water as a liquid (substance) and its movement: horizontal, vertical, speed.The motivational macromodel WATER – LIQUID / SUBSTANCE was built, which was gradually transformed into a universal metaphorical model WATER – MOVEMENT with three micromodels typical of the studied etymons of five language families: WATER – HORIZONTAL MOVEMENT (Afro-Asiatic *wada?e "water, river" (as a result of the initial fixation of figurative-sacred meanings "to fluctuate" and "long", preserved in the semantic transpositions of Indo-European roots of del-2 and del-5); WATER – VERTICAL MOVEMENT (Altaic *оdV "rain", the meaning of which is completely preserved in the Indo-European root del-4 "rain"); WATER – SLOW MOVEMENT (VERTICAL-HORIZONTAL / SOURCE) (for Dravidian *vat- (-d-) and fixed in the semantic transpositions of the Indo-European del-5).It is assumed that the polysemy of meanings influenced the phonological transpositions in the etymons of five language families, one of which is the transition from a simple form of Nostratic *t-root to extended (complex) preforms with *d-root.The polysemy of meanings, as well as the phonological transposition in the etymologies of the five language families, probably took place according to two regular schemes: radial and chain-radial. The radial scheme of polysemy with phonological transposition is typical of Afro-Asiatic *wada?e "water, river"; Dravidian *vat- (-d-) "flow, run in a small stream"; Indo-European *'wed- / *'wod- / *'ud- "water", meanwhile the chain-radial scheme with phonological transformations – of Altaic *оdV "rain" and Uralic *wete "water".
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