talu
| Attestation: | BG·31 (talu) (1) |
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| Language: | prob. Celtic |
| Word Type: | proper noun |
| Semantic Field: | personal name |
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| Grammatical Categories: | nom. sg. |
| Stem Class: | on |
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| Morphemic Analysis: | tal-ū or dall-ū |
| Phonemic Analysis: | /talū/ or /dallū/ |
| Meaning: | 'Talu' (?) |
Commentary
Probably a hypocoristic on-stem personal name (Morandi 2007: 299 f., no. 27). Morandi 2003: 128 (no. 5) identifies the base as tal- 'forehead', which is predominantly attested as second element of compounds, but also as first element in derivations (e.g. talussa, talutius); talu could also be an abbreviation of such a name. Morandi also points to potential attestations in Etruscan context: Sp 2.121 mi taluś (Spina, a loan from Celtic?) and Vs 1.337 av(le) talus (Volsinii, a loan from Sabellic? see literature in Morandi). An alternative etymology is dall- 'blind', which is not as common in personal names (and not at all attested in Cisalpine Celtic), but is attested as a simplex on-stem name dallo (CIL III 3594, Aquincum, Meid 2005: 192).
Michela Vignoli, Corinna Salomon
