Þ

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Character
Customary name:	thorn

Variants and attestation

Transliteration	Sinistroverse		Dextroverse
	Glyph	Number	Glyph	Number
Þ		3		2
Þ2		0		1
Þ3		12		2

Commentary

• the arrow-shape a variant of Tau?
• identification of (Sanzeno) and (Magré) as characters for a dental affricate: the evidence of þinake

On the question of Þ4 s – labial or dental?

How the letter was identified by various scholars in the past: Marstrander, Mancini, Marinetti, Schumacher, Morandi

The letter variant Þ4 s is documented as of now in only three words: Þ4 s ?erisna, Þ4 s u?iku and ()Þ4 s ?ani(u)n (with standardised orthography). The only exception (VR-1 ?inesuna) is inconclusive. For a dicussion of the relevant forms in SL-2.3, see there.

• ?erisna: Attested with Þ4 s in SL-1 (Þ5 s), SR-4, SR-6, possibly SR-9, and problematically in NO-13. SR-9 was used by Schumacher (p. 309) as an argument for a dental reading, identifying the two preceding letters in the inscription as and arguing that θśi- was a way of writing a dental affricate (in this database transcribed þ) by a person who did not know the special character Þ4 s (possibly at a time before that character was introduced). While it is true that the hasta before does not seem to bear any additional mark, and certainly no readily identifiable dot, the reading is equally doubtful, and cannot be used for identifying the phonetic value of Þ4 s. The first letter of NO-13 features both a dot and some intersecting bars, and was interpreted by Schumacher (p. 309 f.) as an effort of the writer to make a compromise between the characters Þ4 s and , thereby confirming the identification of the former as a dental. (For the reading of (Sanzeno) and (Magré) as a dental affricate see above). Apart form the unconclusive SR-9, the sequence ?erisna is never attested with an anlauting dental, whereas it is in two instances attested with anlauting labial perisna (BZ-4 and BZ-26). The first letter in NO-13 might as well be considered a compromise between Þ4 s and (though the latter would be turned against writing direction). A further argument for an anlauting dental þerisna is furnished by Etruscan. details Eichner
• u?iku: Attested three times with Þ4 s. In two cases (VR-3, HU-7), the inscription also contains the word ?anin written with the same character (see below). In VR-3, the character appears as Þ5 s, and has generally been interpreted as Phi (references). In the third case (NO-3), however, the letter Phi in the form appears alongside Þ4 s. A verbal form upiku with a labial is amply attested: again BZ-4, which also contains one attestation of perisna, BZ-3, IT-5 and NO-15. The latter is the most important document in this context, as it also contains the character , thereby excluding the two being variants of each other. A verbal form with a dental in the relevant position is attested twice: uθiku in PA-1 (in which at least one writing mistake has been identified), and utiku in NO-17, where a reading instead of is not impossible ( is turned against writing direction), but neither probable.
• ?ani(u)n: Attested twice with Þ4 s, in the abovementioned inscriptions VR-3 and HU-7; in the former in what is probably an inflected form ?anini. The word is in four instances attested with anlauting labial p: BZ-3 (also containing upiku), NO-16, SZ-16 (panin) and NO-2 (apparently unfinished).

To summarise: While parallel attestations of the words in question with labials predominate clearly, and the evidence of NO-15 shows that and Þ4 s are not distributed complementarily, the two clear instances of u?iku with a dental are hard to reason away. The only way to get around this problem is to posit two separate verbal bases upi- and uti- / uθi-, which is of course not unthinkable, but not particularly elegant, considering the restricted vocabulary of the Raetic corpus. As concerns the formal development of the character Þ4 s, the obvious option in case of its identification as a character for a labial is the interpretation as a variant of Phi – however, NO-3 demonstrates that Þ4 s and are discrete units as well. It would have to be assumed that at the time of the inscriptions which have come down to us, Þ4 s was an independent character for a labial which was not identified with Phi by the writers. This leads to the question of inhowfar the use of different characters for stops in Raetic inscriptions (here Pi vs. Phi) reflects a phonetic reality, and if it does, what this reality is. For a formal development of Þ4 s from a character for a dental, i.e. Zeta, see Marstrander 1927: 20 ff. Marstrander assumes that the "dumbbell" form Þ6 s, found only in SL-2.3, is an intermediary form between Zeta and Þ4 s, citing similar forms in Sabellian inscriptions.

[Notes: (with circle only in the embossed inscriptions on helmets?) see SL-1 and SL-2.3. If the same development as in Sabellian occurred here - is the variant with one head primary (developed from the arrow-shape Tau, with the form in SL-2.3 singular; possible reasons see there), or ist the variant with head and foot primary (developed from Zeta; then why only documented once - and wherefore simplified?)]