On Some Armenian Reduplicated Nouns: mamul, mamur, and mamur

There are several reduplicated nouns in Armenian, including both the Classical language and modern dialects, that share a common phonetic shape of mamuR-, where-R-stands for any liquid, and more generally mamuC-, where-C-stands for any consonant; three of these nouns are given in (1): (1) a. mamul 'press; vice' (Classical) b. mamur 'sawdust' (modern dialectal) c. mamur 'moss' (Classical). There are as well at least two other nouns with the same phonetic shape, as given in (2): (2) a. mamux 'sloe; wild plum' (Classical) b. mamuk 'spider' (modern dialectal). I will concentrate here on the first group, for those words-unlike the ones in (2)-present a relatively clear picture as to their etymology, in terms of related forms within Armenian and/or cognate roots or formations elsewhere in Indo-European, and moreover are more closely connected phonetically, all ending in a liquid. For the purposes of this presentation, having some idea of the etymological starting point is crucial, as is a high degree of phonetic similarity. Still, as we shall see, the words in (2) may prove to be important.