The Cratylus has puzzled many readers with its lengthy discussion of the 'true meanings' of more than a hundred Greek names. This book aims to give a coherent interpretation of the whole dialogue, paying particular attention to these etymologies. The book discusses the rival theories of naming offered by Cratylus, Hermogenes, and Socrates, arguing that Socrates presents a prescriptive theory, laying down what names should be, rather than describing what they are. This distinction between prescriptive and descriptive theories is elaborated and used to illuminate the etymologies...

The dictionary offers a complete compilation and a historical-comparative reflection of the hereditary lexis of the Kartvelian (South Caucasian) language family. It represents the latest stage of etymological research, contains a wealth of new lexical entries, corrections of earlier attempts and new reconstructions. The introduction provides a survey of general data of the four Kartvelian languages (Georgian, Mingrelian, Laz, Svan), characterizes the historical-comparative research in short and provides a detailed description of the system of regular phoneme correspondences. The main chapter...