Slovenian Dialect Jeraj ‘Gavun, Atherina’

Abstract

The Slovene dialect ichthyonym jeraj ’gavun, Atherina’ [jəˈraj], before the reduction [jeˈraj], in the Trieste area, was borrowed from the plural form which belonged to a now already substratum of the Friulian sphere, in which the name *jeˈra: l ‘gavun, Atherina’ developed from romance *geral. The confirmations for it exist in the Istrian Venetian geràl ‘Atherina hepsetus’ (Izola), geràl ‘Atherina hepsetus’ (Koper) and geral ‘same’ (Rijeka). South of Rijeka, this noun in -al was not confirmed as a loanword in Croatian or as a Roman ichthyonym. It preserves the Latin gerrēs / girrēs m, g -is ‘small, poorly valued sea fish’, which was also the starting point for a Croatian dialectal loanword gira ‘Atherina boyeri’ (with a diminutive girica ‘same’) of Dalmatian origin.