The name of an Indo-European god of thunder and/or the oak may be reconstructed as *Perk^wunos or *Perkunos. Ancient anthropomorphic Ukrainian stone stela (Kernosovka stela), possibly depicting a late Proto-Indo-European god, most likely Dyeus, the thunderer. ... Look up deity in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Thunder is the sound of the shockwave caused when lightning instantly heats the air around it to up to 30 000 °C (54 000 °F). ... Species See List of Quercus species The term oak can be used as part of the common name of any of several hundred species of trees and shrubs in the genus Quercus, and some related genera, notably Cyclobalanopsis and Lithocarpus. ...

Another name for the thunder god contains an onomatopoeic root *tar-, continued in Gaulish Taranis and Hittite Tarhunt. Germanic *Þunraz (Þórr) is from a stem *(s)tene- "thunder". In Celtic mythology Taranis was a god of thunder worshipped in Gaul and Britain and mentioned, along with Esus and Toutatis, by the Roman poet Lucan in his epic poem Pharsalia. ... Teshub was the Hurrian god of sky and storm. ... Thor carries his hammer and wears his belt of strength (MS SÁM 66, 18th century). ... Thors battle against the giants, by MÃ¥rten Eskil Winge, 1872 Thor (Proto-Germanic: *Þunraz, Old Norse: Þórr, Old English: Þunor, Old Dutch and Old High German: Donar) is the red-haired and bearded god of thunder in Norse Mythology and more generally Germanic mythology. ...

Cognates

• Lithuanian Perkūnas, Latvian Pērkons, Old Prussian Percunos, Perkunos, Percuns / Parcuns, the god of thunder
• Old Russian Perunъ, Belarusian Pyarun, Polish Perkun or Perun, the god of thunder
• Finnish Perkele, Mordvinic Pur'gine-paza^{[citation needed]}, assumed early loan from Indo-European, probably from Baltic
• possibly Albanian Perëndi, the god of thunder
• possibly root cognate, Sanskrit Parjanya, the god of rainstorms
• Thracian Περχων ^{[citation needed]}
• Greek keraunós "thunderbolt" is unrelated ^[1].

Perkūnas' wife was named Perkūnija or Perkūnė (Przeginia, Perperuna). Compare also Icelandic Fjörgyn, the mother of Thor, the Norse thunder god. Lithuanian PerkÅ«nas, Latvian PÄ“rkons, Prussian Percuns was the common Baltic god of thunder, one of the most important deities in the Baltic pantheon. ... In Latvian mythology, PÄ“rkons (Latvian for thunder) was the god of thunder, rain, mountains, oak trees and the sky, one of the most important deities in the Pantheon. ... Old Prussian is an extinct Baltic language spoken by the inhabitants of the area that later became East Prussia (now in north-eastern Poland and the Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia) prior to German colonization of the area beginning in the 13th century. ... The name Old Russian language has been applied to different things. ... In Slavic mythology, Perun (with many spelling and pronunciation variants among modern Slavic languages) is the highest god of the pantheon and the god of thunder and lightning. ... Perkele originally referred to the Finnish thunder god, which was also sometimes referred as Ukko (=The old man). With Christianity the Swedish priests co-opted him for one of the titles of Satan. ... The Mordvinic languages are a subgroup of the Finno-Volgaic languages. ... The Albanian god of thunder and the consort of Prende. ... The Sanskrit language ( , ) is a classical language of India, a liturgical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, and one of the 22 official languages of India. ... Monsoon in the Vindhya range. ... The Thracian language was the Indo-European language spoken in ancient times by the Thracians in South-Eastern Europe. ... Przeginia (Pl. ... In Slavic mythology, Perperuna or Dodola was the (wife) of the god Perun, the god of thunder. ... In Norse mythology, Jörð (Earth, sometimes Anglicized Jord) is a goddess and the personification of the Earth. ... Thors battle against the giants, by MÃ¥rten Eskil Winge, 1872 Thor (Proto-Germanic: *Þunraz, Old Norse: Þórr, Old English: Þunor, Old Dutch and Old High German: Donar) is the red-haired and bearded god of thunder in Norse Mythology and more generally Germanic mythology. ...

Etymology

*Perk^(w)unos is reconstructed on the basis of Perkūnas. Parjanya is no exact cognate, see below. The labiovelar is reconstructed due to a Centum word for "oak", "coniferous tree", or "mountain", "coniferous mountain forest", *perk^wus. Here also, the labiovelar is non-trivial, and indeed singular in the sequence *-k^wu-, its justification being in Latin quercus "oak", the result of an assimilatory Italo-Celtic sound law changing *p...k^w to *k^w...k^w (compare quinque, Irish cóic vs. Sanskrit pañca "five", coquo vs. Sanskrit pacati "to cook"). Celtic *Ercunia, if cognate, did not partake in the assimilation, advising towards a cautious reconstruction of *perk^(w)us.To perk - percolate is heated water bubbling up. A labiovelar sound is one produced with the lips and velum simultaneously. ... Centum is the collective name for the branches of Indo-European in which the so-called Satem shift, the change of palato-velar *k^, *g^, *g^h into fricatives or affricates, did not take place, and the palato-velar consonants merged with plain velars (*k, *g, *gh). ... Species See List of Quercus species The term oak can be used as part of the common name of any of several hundred species of trees and shrubs in the genus Quercus, and some related genera, notably Cyclobalanopsis and Lithocarpus. ... Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in Latium, the region immediately surrounding Rome. ... This article is about oaks (Quercus desert-oak is unrelated, and instead belongs to the genus Allocasuarina. ... Italo-Celtic refers to the hypothesis that the Italic languages and the Celtic languages are descended from a common ancestor, Proto-Italo-Celtic, making them genetically related more closely than to any other language outside that group. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... The Hercynian Forest was an ancient and dense forest that stretched eastward from the Rhine River. ...

*Perk^(w)unos, then, is the god of the *perk^(w)us, comparable to Germanic *Wodanaz being the god of the *wōþuz, by virtue of the same suffix *-no-^[2]. The 6th century Vadstena bracteate, showing a horse, a bird and a human head commonly identified as an early form of Scandinavian Odin. ... Óðr is the husband of Freyja in Norse mythology. ...

The original meaning of this u-stem *perk^wu- appears to be concept of an oak, a coniferous forest, a mountain forest, or a wooded mountain:

• "oak": Latin quercus, Old High German fereheih "oak", Celtic Hercynia silva. The oak is quite a common motif in myths about Perkūnas. Cognates include Sanskrit parkatī "fig tree", the Venetian and Celtiberian ethnonyms Quarquēni and Querquerni, the Ligurian Nymphis Percernibus, Old Norse fjörr "tree", Anglo-Saxon furh (Modern English fir), Old Norse fura, Old High German forha (Modern German Föhre) "pine tree", Old Norse fyri, Old High German forh-ist (Modern German Forst) "pine forest", Old High German Fergunna (the Erzgebirge), Anglo-Saxon firgen "wooded height", Gothic fairguni "mountain".
• A possibly related word *peru-r/n- for "rock" or "mountain" is reconstructed from Hittite peruna "rock", (Old german pereg, which developed into Modern German Berg ( hill, mountain). Sanskrit parvata "mountain" (Parvati, daughter of Himavant), Thracian per(u) "rock".

Fittingly, there is a sanctuary to Perun located on a height called Perynь near Novgorod and the Pirin mountain range in south-western Bulgaria. Latin is an ancient Indo-European language originally spoken in Latium, the region immediately surrounding Rome. ... This article is about oaks (Quercus desert-oak is unrelated, and instead belongs to the genus Allocasuarina. ... The Hercynian Forest was an ancient and dense forest that stretched eastward from the Rhine River. ... In literature, a motif is any recurring element that has symbolic significance. ... Venetian or Venetan is a Romance language spoken by over two million people, mostly in the Veneto region of Italy. ... The Celtiberians dwelt in the Iberian Peninsula and spoke a Celtic language. ... Ligurian may mean one of several things: Pertaining to the ancient Ligures Pertaining to modern Liguria Ligurian language This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Old Norse or Danish tongue is the Germanic language once spoken by the inhabitants of the Nordic countries (for instance during the Viking Age). ... FIR may stand for: finite impulse response (a property of some digital filters) far infrared, i. ... In the 19th century the Erzgebirge mountains were a centre for lace making. ... Because of technical limitations, some web browsers may not display some special characters in this article. ... The Hittite language is the dead language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who once created an empire centered on ancient Hattusa (modern BoÄŸazköy) in north-central Anatolia (modern Turkey). ... The Sanskrit language (Skt. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article may require cleanup. ... Himavat () is the Hindu God of snow, a personification of the Himalayan mountains. ... This page is about a Slavic god. ... Velikiy Novgorod (Russian: ) is the foremost historic city of North-Western Russia, situated on the M10(E95) federal highway connecting Moscow and St. ... Vihren from the south The Pirin Mountains (Bulgarian: Пирин) are a mountain range in southwest Bulgaria, with Vihren (2,914 m high) the highest peak, situated at , . The range extends about 40 km northwest-southeast, and about 25 km wide. ...

As seen from the cognates above, the name of the thunder god is only to be ascertained in Baltic and Slavic, but mythological connections of the thunderer with oaks, or wooded mountains may be reconstructed to be associated with the Proto-Indo-European word. Baltic can refer to: The Baltic Sea Council of the Baltic Sea States - an intergovernmental organization Baltic sea countries - countries with access to the Baltic Sea The Baltic region (Balticum) Baltic States - the independent countries of Estonia Latvia Lithuania Baltic Republics - term refers to the three Baltic states under the... Slav, Slavic or Slavonic can refer to: Slavic peoples Slavic languages Slavic mythology Church Slavonic language Old Church Slavonic language Slav, a former Jewish settlement in the Gaza Strip. ...

Further etymologization was attempted with reference to a verbal root *per- "to strike", in reference to the thunderbolt and the violent nature of a thunder god in general. Typical cartoon representations of thunderbolts A thunderbolt is a traditional expression for a discharge of lightning or a symbolic representation thereof. ...

This is well attested (it survives for example in press). A velar extension *per-g- is known from Armenian harkanem "felling trees, slaying", Old Irish orcaid "slay" (e.g. in Orgetorix) and Hittite harganu- "destroy". Parjanya is consistent with such a voiced velar, and rather than being cognate to *Perk^(w)unos appears to be an independent derivation from this root. Old Irish is the name given to the oldest form of the Irish language which can be more or less fully reconstructed from extant sources. ... Orgetorix was the leader of the Helvetii people who devised the plan to migrate from Helvetian territory (modern day Switzerland to Gaul (modern-day France). ... The Hittite language is the dead language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who once created an empire centered on ancient Hattusa (modern Boğazköy) in north-central Anatolia (modern Turkey). ... Monsoon in the Vindhya range. ...

Compare Old Slavonic *pork and *pork-os, Old Polish "prok", an instrument for throwing stones, "slingshot" and *pork-t-is "slingshot"^{[citation needed]}.

A closer relationship of the verbal root to the theonym is not apparent, because of the missing *-k^wu- extension, unknown as an Indo-European suffix, and the semantic distance between "slaying" and "tree" or "mountain".

According to Julius Pokorny (IEW), Russian Perunъ "thunder god" and perun "thunderbolt" which likewise lack the velar element are indeed influenced by the root discussed, the activity of "striking down" being associated with the Balto-Slavic theonym by popular etymology. Julius Pokorny (1887–1970) was born in Prague and studied at Vienna university. ... The Indogermanisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (The Indo-European Etymological Dictionary) by the Czech scholar and Irish nationalist Julius Pokorny, was published in 1959. ... A fake etymology is an invented explanation (etymology) for the origin of a word. ...

Notes

1. ↑  Frisk, Greek Etymological Dictionary [3]
2. ↑  termed "Herrschersuffix" by Wolfgang Meid, Beiträge zur Namenforschung 8 (1957).

See also

• Tarhunt
• Thor's oak
• Indra
• Thunderstone