Dall'etrusco 'puia' al greco ὀπυίω: alla ricerca di un'antica isoglossa indoeuropea

This paper investigates a potential ancient Indo-European isogloss linking the Etruscan noun 'puia' ("wife") with the ancient Greek verb ὀπυίω ('opuio', "to marry, take a wife"). Rejecting previous etymological attempts to connect 'puia' to the root *pa- ("to produce" or "to protect"), the author proposes a rigorous glottological and comparative analysis centered on a highly polymorphic and polysemic Indo-European root fundamentally meaning "to bind," "to tie," or "to weave together." Through an extensive mapping of historical derivatives across multiple Indo-European branches - including Sanskrit ('vabh'-, 'vadh'-, 'vit'-), Greek (ὅμνυμι, ἵτυς, εἰλύω), and Latin ('vannus', 'vitis', 'vincio') - the study tracks how this primary notion of physical binding evolved into complex cultural, legal, and spatial concepts, such as sacred oaths, circular objects, and territorial boundaries. Ultimately, the paper demonstrates that both the Etruscan legal definition of a wife and the Greek marital verb share this underlying conceptual framework, wherein a wife is structurally understood as "she who is bound to her husband." This shared semantic development reflects the patriarchal social structures characteristic of Indo-European facies, providing significant new insights into the linguistic substrate of ancient Italy and the Mediterranean.