TITLE:PERKELE!!! by Peto PALETTE:0223 089a 0b9a 06ca BRUSH:02 3 PERKELE!!! 2 by Peto 2PERKELE1 (devil) is the Finnish national interjection. It's like an aspirin: saying it makes us feel better! Many of our neighbour nations have noticed it, too: there are 2PERKEL1 in Swedish (dialects), 2PERGEL1 in Estonian, 2PERKELEH1 in Carelian and 2BIERGELE, 2BÄR'GALA, PIER'KAL, PÄR'KAL, BAER'GALAK, PAERGALOH1 and 2PEÄRGGAL1 in different Saamish dialects. However, although PERKELE is a very important part of Finnish national character, only a few people know that PERKELE wasn't originally a Finnish or even Finno-Ugric word. It's an ancient Indo-European loanword which Baltics (ancestors of Lithuanians and Latvians) loaned us 3000-4000 years ago. 3PERKUNAS1 was an old Baltic god of thunder. Because we Finns already had our own god of thunder (Ukkonen), PERKUNAS became our enemy: Devil. When the Bible was translated into Finnish thousends of years later, the name of God's enemy became PERKELE. This Baltic god of thunder (PERKUNAS) is really a very old Indo-European god (much older than Zeus or Juppiter!). Old Slavic 3PERUNU1 was god of thunder, too. Quite interesting: 3PERUN1 in many modern Slavic languages, 3PERKUNAS1 in Lithuanian and 3PERKUONS1 in Latvian means nowadays simply 'thunder' (like Finnish 'ukkonen', too!). On the other hand, old Indian 3PARJANYAH1 was god of rain, not god of thunder, but it's possible he was originally the same god. Also 3FJORGYNN1 (one of the names of Odinn, Scandinavian high god) was originally the same god, but the time changes languages sometimes very much as you can see. The language changes can be very ironic: Albanian 2PERENDI1 means simply 'God' and - as I told - Finnish PERKELE means God's most evil enemy: 'Devil'! However, the original meaning of this wasn't "god of thunder" or any other god. In the beginning (about 3000 B.C.) there were word 3PERKWUS1 (evergreen tree) and its variation 3PERKWUNOS1 (worldtree) which were both sanctified for god of thunder. The worldtree was very important in the ancient Indo- European religion, but it would take too long to explain all. I tell only that the worldtree was a huge tree between earth and sky. Its top was in the heaven and its root was in the hell. Sometimes worldtree was also imagined as giant, pillar or mountain. This explains why Sanskrit 3PARVATAH1, Gothic 3FAIRGUNI1, old English 3FIRGIEN1, old high German 3FERGUNNA1 and Gaulish 3ERCUNIA1 mean 'mountain' or 'mountain range'. The last-mentioned ERCUNIA became a very famous place name: it's the same 2HERCYNIA1 which was mentioned by Gaius Julius Caesar in 'Gallic War' and Publius Cornelius Tacitus in 'Germania'! Now we have dealed with descendants of PERKWUNOS, and it's the good time to handle also its older brother: PERKWUS. As I told PERKWUS meant originally some evergreen tree. Still, it's quite hard to find out which tree it was, becauce modern descendants of PERKWUS mean so different kinds of trees. Latin 2QUERCUS1, Italian 2QUERCIA1 and Langobardian 2FUREHA1 mean '(Italian) oak'. (Langobardians were a Germanic tribe which ruled North Italy in 568-774 AD. If you see a long bearded man in Lombardia, he is certainly Langobardian!!!) Italian oak is evergreen unlike North European oaks. Only evergreen trees in the Northern Europe are conifers like pine and spruce. That's the reason why Swedish and Norwegian 2FURA1, Danish 2FYR1 and German 2FÖHRE1 mean 'pine'. Also old English 2FURH1 means 'pine', but new English 2FIR1 means 'spruce'! But the confusions don't finish here: Sanskrit 2PARKATI1 means 'sacred fig tree', Irish 2CEIRT1 means 'apple tree' and Welsh 2PERTH1 means 'bush'! PERKELE! I'm quite sure that my dear readers wonder now what the hell that fucking Finn is writing. As I told the language changes can be very strange. Trust me, I know what I'm doing.