It is not trivial to add new glosses to this database. It basically means I have to go back and consult all of my sources again. Some are only available via interlibrary loan, which means it could be some time before I obtain them.
At any rate, I’ve decided to add 8 more, to bring my total to 350. I had previously had 340, then added cat in memory of my cat, and grape because I received some questions about it. Here are the 8 I have selected, and why:
honey – Language Log has had some interesting discussions about Wanderwörter, and one of them was honey. I don’t expect any surprises here, just forms based on Old Turkic *bal.
wool – I chose this because it’s likely to be found in most Turkic languages as it is a culturally salient material. Also, it’s phonologically interesting. Doerfer reconstructs the Old Turkic form as *yuŋ. This leaves a lot of room for sound changes to occur as the combination of a palatal initial, back rounded vowel, and velar nasal should do interesting things to each other.
dream – This is one of those words that comes up a lot in the reconstruction of Proto-Turkic. It ends in an /š/ sounds (PT *tǖš?) and has a long vowel, so it’s got a lot to say about the Bolgar-Common split and the development of long vowels.
copper – Copper is another major Eurasian Wanderwört. This is one where I don’t know what to expect, so I’m excited. For most of the rest of the entries I have some idea as to the Proto-Turkic form; here I have no idea. Maybe it’s just a bunch of borrowings…who knows! At least now it can join gold and silver in the pantheon of precious metals.
crane – I chose crane because it’s a culturally salient bird and because I believe it’s got a palatal nasal after a consonant (PT *turńa?). I’m taking a chance on this one…
onion – Mostly because I’m curious. Sometimes it’s exciting when a common word can’t be traced to common proto-form. I suspect there’s been a lot of borrowing. We’ll see.
most – This is a grammatical particle that I should have had from the beginning. Central Turkic can be reconstructed as *eŋ. I’m curious about Siberian and Bolgar. I don’t think it’s in Doerfer, which is a bummer.
navel – This is another form commonly seen in Turkic reconstructions, as it’s a common two-syllable word.
There are so many more I could add. We’ll see whether I end up adding them. I’m still tempted to add words for genitals and bathroom stuff, as well as needle, dawn, eyelash, learn, frog, hammer, axe, fly, footprint…
I’ll have a few entries for each of these forms later in the day. I expect this will boost my numbers very quickly.