BALTIC kalu̯ā “HILL”

. The purpose of this contribution is to separate Baltic *kalu̯ā “hill” from Baltic *kalnas “mountain” and to connect it with Indo-Aryan *kū́lva- , Iranian *karu̯a- „thin-haired“; Greek *κόλϝος “docked, hornless”; Italic *kalau̯o-& *kalau̯ā “bald (head)”, and the Pre-Romance oronym *kalauos , besides the Gaulish cognomen calaua . The semantic shift from “bald” to “hill” is supported by numerous examples of “bald hills”.

176), seeing both the parallel semantic motivation and word-formation in the river-name Horbač, flowing in the neighboring village. He also referred to L ew y (1904,74) and G e r u l l i s (1922,99,176), identifying the Prussian counterparts of Nesselmann's Lithuanian kalvakà in two toponyms from Sambia, both recorded to AD 1258: Myntite colowach and Sunecolowach (cf. Prussian sunis "dog"). The specific vocalization of the limnonym Kolovač indicates the East Slavic pleophony. If this is the case, the Prussian toponyms formed by colowach should also have been mediated through an East Slavic setting.
1.6. Outside the core Baltic language territory, the Baltic root *kalv o can be identified in the hydronym Kalwy, belonging to the basin of the Warta river, which is a biggest tributary of the Odra river (O r el 1997, 338; he preferred the identification of Baltic "smith" here).
2.1. But the accentuation of Lithuanian kalvà does not support the presence of any laryngeal, while Latvian kal̂va "hill, knoll; isle on a river, peninsula, bay, sand bank" confirms its presence.
Ya m a z a k i (2009,456) thinks that … the original accentuation of Lithuanian kalvà must have been acute, and that it has undergone métatonie douce in the prehistory of Lithuanian rather than the Saussure effect on the Proto-Indo-European stage.
3.5.8. Another example of the 'bald' semantic motivation can be found in the Czech oronym Plešivec 8 , designating 16 mountains and hills only in Czech Republic, further e.g. in Slovenia. Its etymology is also transparent: from the Czech adj. plešivý "bald", and further pleš "bald head", similarly Slovenian pleš etc., cf. Old Church Slavonic plěšь "bald" (M a c h ek 1968, 459).
3.5.9. In Moravia, Lysá hora (1234 m), is the highest top of the Beskydy Mountains; in Poland, Łysa Góra (595) is the dominant top in the Łysogóry range. Czech lysý and Polish łysy mean "bald".
3.5.10. In USA, there are at least 50 mountains called Bald Mountain(s) 9 .