Shant Means Lightning

[Arpa]

Shant means lightning.

 

Also flash, spark, cinder.

 

The most famous namesake is Levon Shant, writer, poet, teacher, activiist best known for his drama Ancient Gods (Hin Astvatsner).

 

http://armenianpoetry.com/arm/1656.html

 

Those who can read ArmFont let’s go to the poetry site, to Petros Durian, Trtunjq/Protestations and count how many times he uses the word in a variety of forms, I.e. noun, adjective and verb.

 

A partial list.

 

"AyzhmAn togh vor shant m’llam alcazar, pllvim anvand, mrenjem andadar.”

"Ayl anyn Astsun, shateru armat"

"Ayl, oh inch ksem…shantahare zis"

 

Shant, also at times spelled shand (we will see why), seems to go all the way to Sanskrit in the form of “cand” but more so to the PIE “skand/skad”, appears in the Greek “xandoros” meaning charcoal, (does the Armenian “khandzel/to singe make sense?). From there we proceed to the Latin and find words such as “incanda/incenda” (the reason why at times we spell it as shand) as in incendiary and the English “cinder”. Basically “shant” in its original seems to mean “spark”, but in the Armenian we usually use “kayts” as in Raffi’s “Kaytser”.

 

Shant more often than not is used to mean lightning. We have other words to mean the same as kaytsak, paylak etc. Many words have evolved, as verbs and adjectives ,such as shantahar-el, to strike with lightning , lightming struck, shantargel, lightning rod etc., ie lightning preventer.

 

As to Grepppin’s Hittite origin, it would be interesting to know how.

 

One more word to consider would be the Armenian khand which is often used to mean enthusiasm as in khandavar-el.

Edited May 8, 2005 by Arpa

[shaunt]

Great post Arpa!

 

You are always providing either the dough for the cake, or the icing.

 

Edit: I was looking at several Armenian history books, and came to one titled "The Pre-History of the Armenians" or something like that, by Kevork Soultanian (Maybe it was with a G). He had something interesting to say regarding this topic. I am going to post it here, and hopefully it will spark further discussion.

Edited May 19, 2005 by shaunt

[Artsakh]

Shant means lightning.

 

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look who learned a new word

[vava]

look who learned a new word

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you're point?

[ED]

Aրփա? հմմմմ,.....

նորեն կորավ մեր Հոպար Aրփան

 

Հարություն տղա, էդպես ել չըշտկեցիր! էս ....A-ան

[Harut]

ժամանակ չկա... առայժմ Ա մի օգտագործեք...

[shaunt]

Asteropaeus means 'flash of lightning' and is the Greek translation of the proto-Armenian name Qatazilu meanin 'overflowing with sparks' = 'lightning.' This was the name of the first proto-Armenian king of Kummukh in Aram. The classical Armenian recomposition of this name was Ampak meaning 'source of lightning' = 'lightning,' which is the same as the modern word 'kaytsak' meaning 'source of sparks' = 'lightning.`

 

Sanduarri

This name means 'fiery brave person' ('sand' > 'shant'/'shand' = 'thunderbolt, fire, spark' + 'u(w)' = 'person, being' + 'arri' = 'brave, courageous.') His Classical Armenian recomposed name, in Khorenatsi Book 1.19, is Arnak, which means 'source of bravery' ('arn' = 'brave, courageous' + 'ak' = 'source.')

 

Gabriel Soultanian, The Pre-History of the Armenians, Volume 1

 

This book is simply amazing. More thoughts on it later.