The evidence of Semitic-Indo European contacts is plentiful. Here is a little brain teaser.
Jerusalem holy city in ancient Palestine comes from the Greek Hierousalem which comes from the Hebrew Yerushalayim. This means literally “foundation of peace,” from base of yarah “he threw, cast” plus shalom “peace.”
Hierapolis, εράπολις – Greek “holy city” – ἱερός (hierós, “holy”) plus πόλις (pólis, “city”).
As to the “polis” its origins are in the “ancient Greek city-state,” 1894, from Greek polis, ptolis “citadel, fort, city, one’s city; the state, community, citizens,” from PIE *tpolh- “citadel; enclosed space, often on high ground, hilltop” (source also of Sanskrit pur, puram, genitive purah “city, citadel,” Lithuanian pilis “fortress”). So much the Online Etymological Dictionary.
But what of the “hieros“? I hate to resort to the Wiktionary but it is marvelously helpful this time telling us that the word comes from “Proto-Indo-European *ish₁ros. There are a number of candidate cognates with this word. Compare Sanskrit इषिर (iṣirá) and Oscan 𐌀𐌉𐌔𐌖𐌔𐌉𐌔 (aisusis).”
How about other languages?
Well, we know, strangely enough, the Gothic spelling of Hierapolis. It is Yairupulai:
If the ancient Jews did not call this city a “holy” city, why would the Greeks have? There are several possibilities, of course.
source of the above Gothic version – translation
An immediately more interesting observation for us is that the Gothic version of the Greek holy becomes Yairu. Yet the Goths, as all Germanic language speakers, were certainly aware of and capable of pronouncing the letter “H”. And so we come to this:
“year (n.) Old English gear (West Saxon), ger (Anglian) “year,” from Proto-Germanic *jeram “year” (source also of Old Saxon, Old High German jar, Old Norse ar, Danish aar, Old Frisian ger, Dutch jaar, German Jahr, Gothic jer “year”), from PIE *yer-o-, from root *yer- “year, season” (source also of Avestan yare (nominative singular) “year;” Greek hora “year, season, any part of a year,” also “any part of a day, hour;” Old Church Slavonic jaru, Bohemian jaro “spring;” Latin hornus “of this year;” Old Persian dušiyaram “famine,” literally “bad year”). Probably originally “that which makes [a complete cycle],” and from verbal root *ei- meaning “to do, make.”
Note too that the Gothic above is listed as jer not Yairu.
Or recall Jericho for that matter.
As regards Jerusalem, it has also been suggested that the name comes from the Canaanite god Shalim who was the god of the setting sun – Shahar being the god of the rising sun. The name may have been Urusalim – in which case it would mean the foundation of Shalim – perhaps the word shalom came to mean peace because of the association with the setting Sun. Shahar is also interesting as similar to Oster/Osiris/Ashur.
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