Ar 7:56 PM +0200 6/24/98, scríobh Christian Chiarcos:

>> This translation is really senseful, because white has always been one
>> of the colours of Annwn (by the way, is this connected to dwfn "depth"
>> ?).

Christian,

Yes, maybe.  The earlier spelling/pronunciation, as I guess you know,
is Annwfn, which Pokorny derives from *an-dubno- ("Un-, Außenwelt").
Pierre-Yves Lambert derives it from *ande-dubno- ("le monde d'en bas")
and finds a reflex of "ande-" in Old Irish "an-dé" ("dieux d'en bas").

Anyway, "dwfn" (Middle Welsh "dwvyn") can mean both "world" and "(the)
deep", which parallels OI "domun" (= world) and "domain" (= deep), both
of which, according to both Pokorny and Kim McCone, come from the IE root
*dheub- (deep, hollow)... which also gives English "deep" and the Gaulish
variants "dubno-" and "dumno-" (Dubnorix and Dumnorix, for example).

On the other hand, McCone provides an alternate etymology of OI "domum"
and Welsh "dwfn" (world), based on the idea of "black earth, soil", as
follows: *dub-no-s <- *dub-ro-s <- Common Celtic *dub-u-s <- IE *dhubh-
(to smoke; hazy; darkened).

What do you think?

Dennis King