On a Hittite lexicographic project.

• Author: Hoffner, Harry A., Jr.

One must certainly admire the pace at which Jaan Puhvel is producing his Hittite Etymological Dictionary, although in fact volume five (2001) is appearing four years after volume four (1997). This is a much smaller volume than its predecessors, even though with the aid of the CHD L volume, which Puhvel quotes at great length, much of his interpretive work was done for him. As in previous volumes, one finds at the end a section of corrections and additions to previous volumes. I will not attempt to evaluate them, since that would mean reviewing more volumes in the set than this one.

The complaints raised by this and other reviewers of earlier volumes as to the general layout and methodology have been largely ignored, or at least rejected in silence. One of the most inconvenient features of this dictionary is the lack of dummy entries with cross reference to the lemmas under which the words in question are discussed. With the appearance of volume five and its section entitled "Index to Volumes 1-5" a user might have expected an index to Hittite words discussed, since many of them are to be found out of their alphabetical order. Alas, many other languages are indexed, but not Hittite itself! This is a grievous mistake, which I sincerely hope can yet be remedied by a small supplement. Another serious flaw is the lack of any attempt to date the forms according to the established dating of the texts. The importance of this has been shown time and again. Later spellings can only be understood in the light of earlier stages. Only rarely does the author write "Old Hittite" by a reference. But even here one doesn't know if he means "Old Hittite composition (in later copy)" or "text written in the Old Hittite script." I have complained in my earlier review of volume four about the non-standard abbreviations used (Hoffner 2000). In the "List of abbreviations (addition to volumes 1-4)" a new one which will cause confusion has been added. "KBoVM" is Puhvel's abbreviation for what most of us are now denoting as "VS NS 12" or "VS 28." Since "KBo" is the standard abbreviation for the series Keilschrifttexte aus Bogazkoy, "KBoVM" is going to strike many users as a typo for this well-known series.

I realize that not all Hittitologists feel qualified to make independent judgments on the dating of individual texts, but it does appear that enough of a general consensus has emerged to make it mandatory for lexicographers to distinguish spellings of words in Old Hittite manuscripts (CHD siglum "OS") from those in later texts. Here the various writings of the "dat.-loc." of lahha- are given without any hint of which ones are diachronically anterior.

We all admire Puhvel for his considerable achievement, especially volumes three and four, which covered terrain not yet treated by other projects such as the CHD or H[W.sup.2]. I also admire the good coverage he gives to secondary literature (editions, etc.). And considering how long it is taking the CHD and H[W.sup.2] to advance toward completion, Puhvel is to be commended to staying on a good schedule of production. In spite of the criticisms voiced below, all Hittitologists should feel a genuine debt of gratitude to Puhvel for his hard work in producing this dictionary.

The following are specific corrections:

lahha-: Puhvel uses English words (especially in his lemmas) in a playful manner which can be quite misleading. The word "warpath" to my knowledge is exclusively used in the phrase "be on the warpath" when referring to Amerindian braves. The word seems quite inappropriate for Hittite kings who did not put on war paint or do dances prior to battle. One finds rather too many cases of inconsistent and inaccurate rendering of the same words in consecutively cited passages. [.sup.D]UTU-SI (literally "my sun-god") is rendered, following the CHD, "his majesty" in ABoT 14 v 12, but "the king" in KUB 14.1 rev. 13 (both on the same page). The pres. sg. 2 verb is rendered "thou goest" in one passage, but "you summon" in another. Cf. p. 5 "thy majesty, our master, hast been ..." (Note that here, without expressed pret. e-es-ta, it is unlikely that the tense is past; rather "You, your majesty, our lord, are a campaigner.")

Puhvel is quite right that the CHD proposal of two types of journey, one a military campaign and the second a commercial trip, has not withstood the test of time. Were I rewriting the CHD L words today, I would certainly not make this distinction. It is quite possible, however, that a non-military sense inheres in several of the occurrences of the derived noun lahhiyala-, as the CHD correctly noted.

I am disappointed that Puhvel refuses to distinguish the (singular) case in -a which the CHD terms the "allative" from the dative-locative in -i. I have never seen the cogency of either Kammenhuber's or Puhvel's positions on this matter. Fortunately, most Hittitologists do recognize the distinction, which of course only applies to Old and Middle Hittite, not to the latest phase of the language, when the allative uses were assumed by the locative.

Puhvel's attempt to show how KASKAL (palsa-) differed from lahha-, while correct in discarding the civilian connotation for the latter, is unduly restrictive for palsa-. It is my impression that "trek" in standard English always refers to a journey which is especially slow and arduous. In my judgment palsa- simply means "journey, trip." The bilingual passage from the Proclamation of Telepinu in no way equates Hittite lahha- "campaign" with Sumerian KARAS "army camp." Locomotion never inheres in KARAS; it is a location, "encampment," or a group of combatants, "expeditionary force, army."

lahhiyai-: Of the eight(!) translations proposed for this verb, the last three--"take on, confront, brave"--can safely be ignored. Since, as the CHD (sub 1 b) correctly notes, the same text clearly distinguishes the acc. [.sup.URU]Kammaman RA-zi from [.sup.URU]Kammama lahiyaizzi, the form [.sup.URU]Kammama cannot be intended as an acc. "stem form." Since the allative is non-productive in NH, one would think that a dat.-loc. of this toponym is intended. Therefore, since "attack GN" in English sounds like an acc., Puhvel would have done better to stick with "operate against GN." Since "leafy mountains" hardly pose a danger to the king and his armed troops, it would be better not to translate here "go brave the leafy mountains," but rather (so CHD) to take the acc, here as acc. of extent ("Go campaign throughout the wooded mountain areas"). The same is true of KBo 12.59 (cf. McMahon, Hittite State Cult, 132f., cited by Puhvel), where ID has to be understood as "river country" since this is the acc. obj. (of extent of territory) of not only lahhiskizzi "campaigns...