*b/m-laŋ

This etymon has been identified in Himalayish, Jingpho, and Qiangic, though more support from the latter group would be welcome. The PTB root initial is taken to have been a *lateral, with both a labial nasal and a labial stop prefix attested.

According to K. P. Malla, the second syllable of Newar mi jɔ̃ ‘male’ is from Skt. jana- ‘man’, not from the present root. The first syllable is from the widespread TB morpheme #1002 PPC *r-mi(y)-n PERSON / MAN.

J. Sun 1993:131 reconstructs Proto-Tani *mrak, but the forms he cites are better assigned to #548 PTB *s-nyak ⪤ *s-nik PENIS / COPULATE, above.

This root seems distinct from #1624 PTB *la MALE.

Also to be brought into this etymon is WB lâŋ, which (as suggested in Matisoff 1995:52-3 [“Sino-Tibetan palatal suffixes revisited”]) is to be compared with Chinese 郎 (Mand. láng) [WHB *C-rāŋ], now meaning ‘young man; bridegroom; clf. for sons’. This word is glossed only as ‘place name (Tso); double roof, one roof above the other’ in GSR #735r. However, it would be rash to infer that the synchronic meaning did not exist at all in spoken OC.

See the remarks by Handel, below.

郎 OC *lɑ̂ng, GSR #735r ‘husband, young man’ ; Li 1971: *lang; Baxter 1992: *C-rang; Mand. láng.

The meaning ‘husband, young man’ is not attested until quite late. It appears to be derived from the basic sense ‘veranda or corridor (of a palace or mansion)’ via ‘official (doing duty there)’, making it an improbable cognate to PTB roots meaning ‘male’, cf. Schuessler 2007:344.¹ Furthermore, nearly all scholars are now in agreement that Middle Chinese l- derives from earlier *r-, and does not normally correspond to PTB *l-.
[ZJH]