Re: Celtic months (was: Some suggestions)

["Raymond A. Brown" <raybrown@clara.co.uk>]

At 10:19 pm -0500 28/1/99, Padraic Brown wrote:
>On Wed, 27 Jan 1999, Raymond A. Brown wrote:
>
>> >> Legal Kernu 'Cutios' (April) might be cognate with Céiteann (May) and
>> >
>> >If Ceiteann means 'head of summer', then no, as head was pennos (Pensamos,
>> >perhaps).  Cutios is left unrevealled.
>>
>> But 'ceud' in Gaelic is 1st, not head.  'Ceiteann' might be 1st (of
>>summer) ?
>
>I checked out my Gaulish source for this.  cintos is "first";

Yes, of course - it's one of many examples of the last of -n- between vowel
& consonant in Gaelic languages.  I should've remembered Welsh 'cyntaf'
which is derived from 'kint-' with an added superlative suffix.

>Cutios might
>possibly be connected with the root cuti- "anger" or "rage"; though
>that's a guess.

"The angry month"?  I guess that's possible.

It seems then that only Samonios has a cognate in the Scots Gaelic month names.

Ray.