Etümoloogilisi märkmeid (VII)
Etymological Notes (VII)

Summary/Abstract: Etymologies for the Estonian words amelema, (liiva)soss, sõus and viisakas are presented, concluding that 1) the verb amelema ’make love to’ is an irregular variant of the verb jamelema ’to speak or do nonsense’ (a secondary derivative of the word jama ’nonsense’), and it was introduced into literary Estonian from Mulgi dialect (probably by writer August Kitzberg); 2) the noun (liiva)soss ’sandy piece of land’, in dialects also suss, is a Russian loan (< Russ. сушь ’dry land’); 3) the Western dialect word sõus ’shallow (reedy) place in a river’ is a Baltic loan (cf. Lith. sausas ’dry’); 4) the adjective viisakas ’polite’ has been derived from the Low-German loan viis ’mode, manner, way, fashion’, as has been presumed by Julius Mägiste, and not from the Finnic (Finnish, Karelian etc.) word viisas ’wise’, which solution is suggested by Finnish etymological dictionaries.

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