sipiu

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Attestation:	BI·8 (sipiu koil[ ]ios) (1)
Language:	unknown
adapted to:	Celtic
Word Type:	proper noun
Semantic Field:	personal name
Grammatical Categories:	nom. sg. masc.
Stem Class:	on
Morphemic Analysis:	sip-(i)i̯-ū
Phonemic Analysis:	/si/īp(p)/b(i)i̯ū/
Meaning:	'Sipiu'

Commentary

Individual name of uncertain etymology, also attested as base of a patronym sipionios. Comparanda for the base in Gaulish inscriptions are sparse (cf. Cresci Marrone & Solinas 2013: 30) – AcS II: 1538 lists siberis and sibōra in Galatia, as well as (p. 1576) sippia in Moesia and CIL V 2327 siponis (gen.) in Adria. A base sīp- could be derived from the root PIE *sek^u̯- 'follow', but the irregular lengthened grade (*sēk^u̯i̯on- > *sīpi̯on-) requires explanation. A raising of short /e/, to allow a comparison with names in sep(p)- from the same root (Delamarre 2007: 166, 232, DLG: 271), would be irregular in this position, but cf. possibly sin- < sen- 'old' at the same find place (BI·7) (also maybe nimonikna). In light of the strongly Latin-influenced context of the attestations, a Celticised Latin name could be considered, but the options is this direction are no better: Lat. scip(i)i̯ō, itself etymologically unclear, is formally equivalent, but should have been borrowed with the anlauting cluster intact (unless – hypothetically – the cluster was already realised as [st^s] as early as the first half of the 1^st century BC).

David Stifter, Corinna Salomon

Bibliography

AcS	Alfred Holder, Alt-celtischer Sprachschatz, Leipzig: Teubner 1896–1907.
CIL	Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. (17 volumes, various supplements)
Cresci Marrone & Solinas 2013	Giovannella Cresci Marrone, Patrizia Solinas, Microstorie di romanizzazione. Le iscrizioni del sepolcreto rurale di Cerrione, Venezia: Edizioni Ca' Foscari 2013.
Delamarre 2007	Xavier Delamarre, Noms de personnes celtiques dans l'épigraphie classique. Nomina Celtica Antiqua Selecta Inscriptionum, Paris: Errance 2007.
DLG	Xavier Delamarre, Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise. Une approche linguistique du vieux-celtique continental, 2nd, revised edition, Paris: Errance 2003.