Proto-North Caucasian: *jǝ̄mcō
Meaning: bull, ox
Notes: One of the most common and widely accepted NC roots. See Trombetti 1923, Trubetzkoy 1930, 276, Яковлев 1941, Балкаров 1969, Шагиров 1977, Abdokov 1983. Correspondences are fully regular (except only the initial l- in Khin., which has probably appeared under the influence of lix 'ox' and läq 'calf'). We must note, however, that the usual Nakh material compared with this root is not PN *jētt 'cow', but PN *psṭu 'ox, bull' which can not be related to this root phonetically (the reduction of the syllable *jǝ̄- can not be explained in any way) and goes back to another PNC root (*ćwijo 'man, male' q.v.). On the other hand, PN *jētt is a perfect phonetic match for *jǝ̄mcō (if we take into account the absolute regularity of the phonetic process *-mC- > *-tt- in PN).
The comparison of this root with PK *wać- 'ram' (Климов 1965) is not very persuasive for semantic reasons. Perhaps, some traces of this root in Kartvelian (as a loanword, possibly from Tsez. languages) may be seen in Georg. dial. aš, iš, išo 'addressing an ox, bull', išia 'bull-calf'(a term of endearment) (see Kavtaradze 1972).
