Mar.4] PROCEEDINGS. [1890.sense of "ointment" or "anointing" (rukkii);cp. £JEJ lu, "to
mix up " ingredients into an ointment (mardsu: Jensen), withnit
"to work or knead with the fingers, as in clay." The character
►vjfjy, nag,has also the value lam(Hommel), both apparently
in the sense of drinking or giving to drink ; cp. the Chinese Ian,
dialecticlam,lam,le", "greedy for gratifying the appetite," "to have a
drinkall round, andfinishthe bottle." ThesameAccadiancharacter
is pronounced immeli,in the sense of the Assyrian Sikru," strong
drink,""newwineor must," or simply "liquor." imme= imma
ima (im), withvowelharmony, on account of LI, has already been
explainedas meaning " to drink," " drink." (Or imme= in + me,
" drink + water " : imma = in + ma, ditto.) In this term it is
compounded withu, "must" or simply "drink";cp. the Chinese
//', dialectic lei, le, li, "sweet or newly distilled spirits—must,new
wine." imme-li, "drink+ must," is thus formed exactly after
the analogy of geS-din, " liquor+ wine," gug-kal," sheep+ lamb,"
ban-sur, tim-men, etc. The syllabaryuses the same Assyrian
term, Sikru, for the explanation of another Accadian term for
"drink,"viz.,gam,written.i^J^E^; a term which is not to be
confusedwithits homophones of various meanings, gam,Sikru,is
relatedto gu, l&Su, "tosip,"as lam in nita-lam, "husband,"is to
lu, "man," or as nam,* impliedby the Chinese nan,"male,"is to
nu, "male" (in the three dialectsnanappearsas nam, lam,nc" =
nam,lam, nin). Nowgam, " drink," corresponds withyen, " to
swallow";e.g., yen-shui, " to drink water";in Cantonese in and //,
in Amoy yal,in Shanghai i" ; yun, "fermented liquor,"= wan, un,
yiin;yin, "todrink—drink," and, witha different tone,"to give
to drink" =yam, im, ydng) and otherrelatedterms.
ThesameAccadian ideogramrepeated,gam-gam, is the name
of some kindof bird, whichthe Assyrians, imitating the Accadian
name, called gamgammu. There may be as much or as little
connexionbetweengam,"drink,"and gam-gam the bird, as between
the Chinese yen,"drink,"andyen, "a swallow" (cp. English, "to
swallow"and"a swallow"). Yenis the general namefor birds of
the swallow tribe;but another yenis the female phoenix(in, an, i"),
so called in early timesbecause it was the bird before which all
othersbowed {cp. Accadian gam, kadddu, "to bow the head");
another,the wild goose= ngan,gan,nge"(=ganor gam, gin).
- nam, " man," is also impliedby nam as a relative particle; cp. MULU,
"man,"and "who."
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