corresponds exactly in form to the Indic vácas-, which in the Rigveda can
mean ‘word, speech’ but mostly refers to the pronouncements that make up
the song, or to the song as a whole. The feminine va ̄c- (corresponding to Latin
uo ̄x) is used similarly, and there is another word from the same root meaning
‘hymn’,ukthám.^19 In Avestan a strophe of the Ga ̄tha ̄s was called a vacatasˇt i -,
literally a ‘fashioning of the utterance’. Tocharian A wäktasurñe‘eulogy’ and
Old High German giwahan, giwahanen ‘mention, tell of’,giwaht ‘fame,
remembrance’, give further hints of the use of this root in connection with
formal or poetic utterance. Most remarkable is the Irish term anocht for a
type of metrical fault; it means literally ‘not (to be) uttered’, the counterpart
of Vedic anukta-, and it must be a very ancient survival, as the wekw root was
defunct in Celtic.^20
English ‘say’ goes back to the Indo-European root sekw. This appears to
have been appropriate to declarations or recitals made before an audience, as
derivatives in various languages are used in connection with public discourses
or narratives in prose or verse: Greek $ν(ν)-πω, used in the imperative
in Homer in asking the Muse to relate a particular matter; Latin in-sequo;
Old Irish sc-e ̄l ‘story’,in-sce ‘discourse’,ro-sc(ad), a form of alliterative
composition; Middle Welsh chw-edl‘recitation’; Lithuanian pa ̄-saka‘story,
legend’.^21
Of several words for singing, one that is common to east and west is geh 1 :
Vedic ga ̄‘sing’,ga ̄ ́tha ̄‘song’ (Avestan ga ̄θa ̄); Lithuanian giedóti‘sing’,giesme ̇ ̃
‘song of praise’; Slavonic gudú‘sing with a stringed instrument’; Old English
gieddian‘sing’,giedd, gidd‘song, poem, saying, riddle, tale’. The root sengwh
which provides the common Germanic word (Gothic siggwan, German
singen, English sing, song, etc.) must once have had a wider distribution, as,
besides Church Slavonic se ̨tь, it lies behind the Greek poetic word %μφ <
songwha ̄. In the Homeric language this is used only of prophetic utterances
issuing from a god, but the Doric lyric tradition preserved its older sense of
musical sound from voices or instruments. The root kan prevailed only in
Italic and Celtic, where it is associated with charms and spells as well as
poetry: Latin cano, carmen < can-men; Old Irish canaid‘sings’,cétal‘song’,
Welsh cathl, < kan-tlon. But it has left traces in Greek καν-αχ ‘clangour’
and in the Germanic word for ‘cock’, Gothic hana, modern German Hahn.^22
(^19) I normally cite Vedic and Avestan nouns in the stem form, but in the case of neuter o-stems
I give the ending -am/-əm as an economical way of indicating the gender.
(^20) Watkins (1995), 87 n. 0, 119. On the derivatives of *wekw cf. Gamkrelidze–Ivanov (1995),
733 f.
(^21) Ernout–Meillet (1959), s.v. insequo; Meid (1978), 22 n. 36.
(^22) Cf. the obscure gloss in Hesychius, (ϊκαν· + α, λεκτρυ.ν. On these words cf. IEW 525 f.;
Watkins (1963), 214 = (1994), 369; EIEC 519b.
32 1. Poet and Poesy