INDO-EUROPEAN POETICS

and
THE LATVIAN FOLKSONGS

Didier Calin

Riga 2008-2012
 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
Languages:

Alb. Albanian Umb. Umbrian

Arm. Armenian W Welsh
Blt. Baltic
Br. Breton
C Cornish
Clt. Celtic
E English
Fr. French
Ga. Gaulish
Germ. German
Gmc. Germanic
Got. Gothic
Gr. Greek
HierLuw. Hieroglyphic Luwian
Ht. Hittite
IE Indo-European
In. Indic
Ir. Iranian (Avestan unless indicated
otherwise)
Khot. Khotanese
Lt. Latin
Lith. Lithuanian
Lv. Latvian
Luw. Luwian
Lyc. Lycian
Lyd. Lydian
Mil. Milyan
Norw. Norwegian
OE Old English
OHG Old High German
ON Old Norse/Icelandic
OIr. Old Irish
Os. Ossetian (Iron unless indicated
otherwise)
Osc. Oscan
OSl. Old Slavic
Pal. Palaic
Pers. (modern) Persian (Fârsi variant)
PIE Proto-Indo-European (comprising
Anatolian)
Pr. Prussian
Toch. Tocharian
Others:

A Accusative
D Dative
G Genitive
L Locative
Pl. Plural
V Vocative

NOTE ON TRANSLATIONS
Rigveda (RV), Atharvaveda (AV) and White Yajurveda (VS): Ralph T. H. Griffith 1895-
1899;
Black Yajurveda (TS): Arthur Berriedale Keith 1914;
Mahābhārata: J.A.B. van Buitenen 1973-1975;
Avesta: James Darmesteter 1882, except Yasna (Y): L. H. Mills 1887;
Homer, Iliad and Odyssey: Samuel Butler 1898-1900;
Hesiod (and “Hesiod”): G. W. Most 2006-2007;
Epic Fragments, “Homeric” Hymns and Epigrams: M. L. West 2003;
Aeschylus: A. H. Sommerstein 2008;
Alcaeus, Alcman, Anacreon, Bacchylides, Corinna, Praxilla, Stesichorus, Timotheus,
Scolia and Anonymous Fragments: D. A. Campbell 1982-1993;
Alexander of Aetolia, Hermesianax: J.L. Lightfoot 2009;
Apollonius Rhodius, Pindar: William H. Race 2008 and 1991 resp.;
Callimachus, fragments: C. A. Trypanis 1958;
Callimachus, Hymns and Epigrams, Aratus, Lycophron: G. R. Mair 1921;
Euripides: David Kovacs 1994-2002;
Mimnermus, Theognis: D. E. Gerber 1999;
Nonnus: W. H. D. Rouse 1940;
Ovid, Fasti: James George Frazer 1931;
Sophocles: Hugh Lloyd-Jones 1994;
When parts of their translations have been modified, changes are indicated between [].
Other translations are mine.

CONTENTS
[...]
ζ.II.C Blood
ζ.II.C.1 blood and tears
[...]
ζ.II.C.1 *ˇshË ... héru- – blood and tears

Hittite ēshar ‘blood’ and ishahru ‘tear(s)’ are systematically associated in many texts of
ritual or religious character, a.o. in KBo XII 8 iv 32; XXX 31, XXXII 33 i 10 and:

KBo XV 42 ii 9-11 KUB xliii 58 Vo. i 6ff

sumes-a DINGIRMES-as nu-za DINGIRMEŠ
idāla[wa]z uddānaz idālawaz uddanaz
linkiyaz hurdiyaz linkiyaz hūrdiyaz
ēshanaz ishahruwaz ēshanaz ishahruwaz
QATAMMA parkuwaēs ēstin [h]ūmandaz-ia parkuwaēs ēsten

May Ye likewise be pure, Ye too Gods, And Ye gods, may Ye be pure

of evil words, of evil words,
of perjury, of perjury,
of curse, of curse,
of blood and tears! of blood and tears,
and of everything else!

KUB vii 41 Vo. 18f KBo XI 1 Vo. 45

ēshar hurtain idala]ui hurtāi ēshani ishahrui
[kurkurain] ishahru wastain

Blood(shed), curse, mutilation, To the evil curse, the blood and tears.
tears and sin.

KUB xxxiii 66 Vo. ii 3-13

The palms (gave) it to the fingers, the fingers to the fingernails, the fingernails to the Black Earth (...)
but in the sea are kettles of copper, (...) The Sun-goddess
ēshar dais put blood in them,
(...) ishahru dais she put tears in them.

KUB i 16 + xl 65 iii 7+12+12a

ishahru-sm[itt-asta sa]nhun (...) I sought tears for them (from my daughter)
(“if I had given you more (from this land)”)
ēshar-man ekun (...) I would have been drinking its blood.

The same association of words – asins and asara, etymologically related to Hittite ēshar
and ishahru1 – is found in Latvian in reference to two mythical rivers flowing under a
bridge made of the bones of dead warriors (see below and next chapter):

1
PIE *ˇshË, G *ÕshÊs, coll. *ÕshÌr, G *(»)shnÕs, L *oshÕn ‘blood’: Ht. ēshar, G ishanas = /ishnas/; Pal.
ēsha (< *ÕshÌr)/ēshur; Luw. āsha(r); HierLuw. /āshar/; Lyc. (derivative) esede-; Mil. esẽne-?; In. ás®k, G
asnás; Gr. éar/eĩar; Arm. ariwn; Lt. aser and probably sanguen; Lv. asins/asens; Toch. A/B ysār/yasar.
PIE *héru/déru/shéru ‘tear’: Ht. ishahru; In. áþru; Ir. asru-; Pahlavi ars; Khot. ˜ÿka-; Pers. ašk; Gr.
dákru; Lt. lacrima < Old Lt. dacruma; Arm. artawsr; OIr. dér; W deigr(yn), Pl. dagrau; Br. dàer, Pl.
dàeroù; Gmc. *tagra-/tahra- (Got. tagr; ON tár; OE tēar > E tear; OHG zahar > Germ. Zähre); Blt. *ašara
(Lith. ašara; Lv. asara); Toch. A ākär, Pl. ākrunt; Toch. B Pl. akrūna.
Ltdz 22213-31
(...) Divu upes ašņa tek
No kalniņa lejiņā:
Viena tek melna ašņa,
Otra gaudu asariņu.
Pār abām upītēm
No kauliem tiltu taisa. (...)

Two blood rivers flow

Downwards from the hill:
One flows made of black blood,
The other of bitter tears.
Over both rivers
A bridge of bones is built.

So does the Netherworld stream of Acheron flow, which

in ten thousand streams gushes with tears and pains


  (Licymnius fr. 4 (770 Loeb)).

Sometimes only one of both words is found in each of two versions of the same Daina:

LD 31928 LD 31928-2
(...) Karā bija grūts mūžiņš Karā bej gryūta dzeive
Tēva dēliņam, Munam dēļeņam,
Karodziņu nesti, Karūdzeņu çelt,
Zobentiņu celti, Ar zūbynu çērst,
Ienaidnieku pulciņā Īnaidnīku puļçeņā
Asintiņas liet. (...) Asareņis līt.

Father’s son had a hard life in war: My son had a hard life in war:
Carrying the flag, Lifting the flag,
Lifting his sword, Chopping with his sword,
And shedding blood among the foe. And shedding tears among the foe,

and this same variation, where BLOOD and TEARS seem interchangeable, is found in
Hittite rituals2:

KUB xxx 36 ii 14-15 KUB xxx 33 i 18

[iyauwa]n ēshar pangauwas [iy]auwan i[sha]hru panqauwas
EME-an (= lālan) [anda ishiy]aweni EME-an (= lālan) a[nda ishiyaweni]

we shall bind we shall bind

the iyawar?, blood(shed), the iyawar?, tears,
3
and slander of the multitude. and slander of the multitude.

2
see Craig Melchert 2006.
3
note the typical poetic alliteration ēshar – ishahru – ishiyaweni.
The combination of both áþru and asn-, identical in their PIE origin to Hittite and Latvian
ishahru/asaras and ēshar/asins, is attested only once in all the four Vedas, namely in the
Vājasaneyi-Samhitā:

VS 25.9
áþrubhir hr˜dúnŸr d¨ÿ£k˜bhir asn™ rákÿ˜Ðsi

(I gratify)
Hailstones with his tears; Thunderbolts with the rheum of his eyes; Râkshasas with his blood.

Comparing the creation myth found in the Edda with the Pahlavi one in the Rivâyat, we
notice that BLOOD and TEARS (Pahlavi ars < *héru-!) are paralleled as the origin of sea
and water4:

Vafþrúðnismál 21 Rivâyat 46
himinn ór hausi, 4- u-š nazdist asmān az sar be brēhēnīd
(...)
en ór sveita sær. 11- u-š āb az ars be brēhēnīd

the sky (was created) from his skull, and he created first the sky from the head,
and from his blood the sea. and he created water from the tears.

Schematically:

sky: asmân = himinn (*émÌn) < head/skull: sar, hauss

water/sea < tears: ars (*héru) < blood:
sveiti

A kenning for ‘sea’ in Skaldic poetry is thus Ymis blóð “blood of Ymir”, for example in
Ormr Barreyjarskáld, 2.2
gnýr Ymis blóð the Blood of Ymir is roaring,

and “earth’s blood” for ‘water’: jarðar dreyri, foldar sveiti,

while ‘blood’ can be paraphrased as “sea of pikes”: fleina sær.

In the Middle-Persian Bundahišn, TEARS and BLOOD follow each other in a list of the
seventeen species of liquid, as the ninth and tenth liquids:

Bd 18.43.11f
nohom ars ī gōspandān (ud) mardōmān,
dahom xōn ī gōspandān (ud) mardōmān,

4
while TEARS ars besides āb in āb az ars < *h˝p- héru- parallels Lv. BLOOD asins besides the cognate
upe in asins upe < *ÕshÊs h˝p-, see next chapter.
ninth, the tears of animals and men,
tenth, the blood of animals and men.

Elsewhere, the formula āb az ars of the Rivâyat is reflected by changing TEARS – ars – by
BLOOD – xōn – and reversing the sequence
WATER < TEARS
into
BLOOD < WATER:

Bd 26.6.12
(for at that time one will demand)
az āb xōn blood from the water.

Although Lithuanian no longer has the word akin to Lv. asins, Ht. ēshar, etc., it uses the
other IE word for “blood (outside the body)”, *krÕ■hs- (In. kravís-; Gr. kréas; Lt. cruor,
etc.) to describe a similar bloody river and to create a comparable link between BLOOD
AND TEARS:

Atlėkė juodas varnas5

(...) Aš buvau didžiam kare:
Ten didį mūšį mušė,
Ten kardų tvorą tvėrė,
Pučkelėmis duobę kasė,
Ten kraujo upė bėgo,
Ten gul ne viens sūnelis,
Ten verkia ne vienas tėvelis.
Ui, ui, tai mano žiedelis!
Negrįš mano bernelis,
Krint mano ašarėlės. (...)

I was in a big war:

There they fought a big battle,
There fences of swords were made,
And bossed pits dug,
There flowed a river of blood,
There did many sons lie,
And many fathers cry.
Alas, there is my wedding ring,
My child shall not return,
And my tears are falling.

The Greek innovation haĩma has supplanted the very rare éar/eĩar in its collocation with
dákru in Greek poetry:

Euripides, Helen 365

5
in Resha 1958, p. 170f.


 


much blood, many tears.

However, (mélan) haĩma and the rare mélan eĩar

– compare Ltdz 22213-31 melna ašņa of black blood

(< IE *mÕlÊ/melin†m ˇshË)6 –

are objects of the same verb dáptein ‘to devour’ in the following fragments:

“Hesiod”, fr. 305.7-9 (Loeb) Callimachus, fr. 523

(Spartus and Omargus were)




the first to drink the black blood
of their master.
   
These were the first to eat and he

       

and to [devour] his blood. devoured the black blood;

(mélan) haĩma and (mélan) eĩar are thus semantically, metrically and poetically identical
and interchangeable. Had Euripides used the more archaic eĩar instead of the common
term haĩma, he would have granted us a perfect match *polù eĩar, polù dákru

To ‘DRINK (BLACK) BLOOD’, (mélan) haĩma pi-, is formulaic in Greek:

“Hesiod”, Shield 252 Sophocles, The Women of Trachis 1055f


 




drink black blood Already it has drunk my fresh blood,

Aeschylus, Euminides 980




 

  

and may the dust not drink up the dark blood of the citizens,

Theognis, 1.349




 May I drink their dark blood!

and finds equivalents – allowing us to posit a PIE *pÃh(i/s)- ˇshË –

in epic, post-Vedic Indic:

6
also in LD 34136 Melni kraukļi gaisā skrēja, /Melnas asnis laistīdami (...) (Black ravens flew in the air /
Sprinkling black blood); Tdz 55338 melnas asinis; 55338v1 melnas asins; 55338v2 malnuos asins.
MBh 1.141.16a
pŸtv˜ tav˜s®g when I have drunk your blood,

MBh 3.221.44cd
þar˜þ ca daitya k˜yeÿu pibanti sm˜s®g ulbaõam

And the arrows hitting the Daityas’ bodies drank plenty of blood,

MBh 10.7.36a p˜t˜ro 's®g drinkers of blood,

10.7.43a pibanto 's®g drinking the blood,

and with þoõita- instead of as®k and bh¨mi× as the subject:

MBh 2.68.31d
= 3.13.5d = 3.48.35d = 3.232.20d = 6.3.34d = 7.166.27d = 8.49.112b = 8.52.14d
bh¨mi× p˜syati þoõitam the earth shall drink the blood,
8.69.17d bh¨mi× pibati þoõitam the earth drinks the blood.

Similarly in Hittite, where the subject is likewise the earth7:

KBo X 45 iv 1+4
nu GE6-is KI-as (= dankuis taganzipas) (...) May the Dark Earth
ēshar (...) GAM (= katta) pāsu swallow down the blood!

KUB xliii 38 Ro. 14-16

kī-wa (...) sumenzan-wa ēshar this is your blood
nu-wa-kī [mahhan] and like the earth
[tag]anzipas kat[ta] pāsta swallowed it down,
[sumenz]ann[-a ēshar] may the earth likewise
taganzipas katt[a QATA]MMA pā[s]u swallow down your blood,

in Tocharian – with yok- < *Ågh■- instead of *pÃh(i/s)-:

THT 250 a2 (Toch. B)

He ate from your brainpan,
yaþac ya[sar] he drank your blood,

H add. 149.88 a38 (Toch. B)

7
NOT with the usual word for ‘drink’, ē/aku-, but with the cognate pās-! A comparable collocation of pōto-
and sanguen is found in Ovid’s Fasti, VI.(131-)138:
There are greedy birds (...) They fly by night and attack nurseless children (...)
et plenum poto sanguine guttur habent and their throats are full of the blood they drink.
8
see Schmidt 1997, p. 259.
sa y˜þ yasar mŸsa kektseñmeÐ You drank the blood and flesh from the body,

and in Khotanese with lexical replacement:

Z 24.412
þþand˜ nä kh˜þäte haÐjsaÿ÷äna h¨ñu

The earth drinks their blood with a purpose,

KBT 144
ysŸräjä h¨ñä kh˜þŸdä

They drink the heart’s blood.

Haĩma... dákru(a) is attested from the Iliad to the 5th century BCE poetry:

Il. 7.425f






they washed the clotted gore off them, shed tears over them,
and lifted them upon their wagons.

Timotheus, Cyclops fr. 1 (780 Loeb)

And into it he [= Odysseus] poured one ivy-wood cup of the dark immortal drops (...)
and so he mingled

 the blood of the Bacchic god

 with the fresh-flowing tears of the Nymphs.

The same way death is omnipresent in the use of the formula by the singers of Baltic
Dainas and ancient Greek poems, BLOOD AND TEARS refers to a personified Death in the
following verses:

“Hesiod”, Shield 264-270

Beside them stood Death-Mist (...) From her nostrils flowed mucus, from her cheeks
 blood
was dripping down onto the ground. She stood there, grinning dreadfully, and much dust, wet
 with tears
lay upon her shoulders.

BLOOD AND TEARS – in this same order in all the examples above (except Vedic) as in the
following ones – is also attested in Khotanese, Latin and Old Irish literature (with dér as
the same etymon as ishahru, asara, ašarėlė and dákru):

Z 20.54
(...) h¨nä (...) ˜ÿke (...) blood... tears,

Virgil, Aeneid 12.29f

Uictus amore tui, cognato sanguine uictus,
coniugis et maestae lacrumis

Vanquished by your love, vanquished by the kindred blood

and by the tears of a sorrowful consort.

Triad 126
trí bainne cétmuintire: bainne fola, bainne dér, bainne aillse

Three drops of a wedded woman: a drop of blood, a tear-drop, a drop of sweat.

Lastly, Skaldic kennings for BLOOD are

tár varmra benja “TEAR of warm wounds”
and
Laufa tár “TEAR of Laufi”
(Laufi being the name of a legendary hero’s sword).