Hungarian Historical Phonology ját

(dial.) ját 'Namensbruder'

First attestation/Old Hungarian data

[coming]

Important dialectal forms

lyát

lyátok

lëát

jád

(ÚMTSz: 1141, s.v. ját)

Uralic/Ugric/Pre-Hungarian reconstruction

Disputed:

UEW: PUg *jȣttɜ 'friend, fellow; Freund, Kamerad'

Status of the Ugric etymology

Implausible

Loan etymology

Hu dial. lyát ← Romanian leat ‘same age group (in the army)’ (Bakos MNy. 64: 72; WOT: 1232)

Hu ← Turkic *jat, cf. East Old Turkic āt ‘name’, Chuvash yat id. (criticized by WOT: 1232, reference to the initial suggestion missing)

Cognates suggested in earlier research

UEW:

Khanty: East (V) jö̆t 'mit', (Trj) jŏt

Mansi: South (TJ) jit, East (KU) jat, West (P) jät, North (So) jot

Commentary

Even though the word is listed among the plausible Ugric cognates in UEW, the etymology is completely irregular. UEW assumes that the front-vocalism in Ob-Ugric is due to influence from *j, but this is an ad hoc explanation that lacks parallels. The Ugric etymology is also considered implausible in WOT (1232).

UEW notes that the Hungarian word ját cannot be borrowed from Romanian leat (the Romanian origin of the Csángó dialect words leát 'egyidős', lyát 'egyidős, bajtárs' is accepted in the UEW) but it is in argued in WOT that ját is a secondary form that developed from dialectal lyát and that this was borrowed from Romanian.

The phonological side of the Turkic etymology is not discussed by WOT, as the Romanian loan etymology is considered better, but the problem seems to be that there is no evidence for a West Old Turkic reconstruction with word-initial *j-.

Conclusion

No Proto-Ugric word can be reconstructed.

References

UEW s.v. jȣttɜ: Proto-Ugric Uralonet