Namenkundliche Informationen (NI) (E-Journal)
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Additions and corrections to my Bavarian-Slavic phonetic transcrip- tion apparatus (with a glossary of names) – Slavia Tirolens: (Main Topic)
No full textIn this article, the author presents some adjustments and corrections to the apparatus of sound changes proposed in his previous papers (Slavia Tirolensis I–III). The updates have become necessary due to additional data from mediaeval toponomastic loans from Slavic into Bavarian in East Tyrol. The relevant data is also included in the article. The apparatus enables a step-by-step identification of each sound change undergone by such loans from the borrowed form until today’s local pronunciation of the names
The names of the Translatio s. Alexandri and Old Saxon in Fulda: (Main Topic)
No full textThe Translatio s. Alexandri describes the transfer of Alexander’s relics from Rome to Wildeshausen Abbey in 851. The text was written by the Fulda-based monks Rudolf and Meginhard just a few years after the events it describes and has been preserved in a contemporary manuscript, presumably Meginhard’s copy. The text is of key significance for the historiography of Saxony. However, less attention has been paid to date to the Old Saxon names. mentioned primarily in the accounts of miracles. From the perspective of Old Saxon, these are important both because they are relatively old compared to the rest of the Old Saxon tradition and because of the rare circumstance that the individuals named are often mentioned in conjunction with their village of origin. From the perspective of the Fuldian tradition, the names are of outstanding importance because they constitute authenticated Old Saxon evidence of the non Saxon monastery. Further (presumed) evidence of Old Saxon from Fulda can be compared directly with the names in the Translatio: the phonetic form of certain other names from Fulda sources (such as from necrologies and charters) also points to Old Saxon (discussed by Geuenich 1976). A single interlinear gloss from Fulda, which has so far been overlooked by Old Saxon research, can possibly be identified as Old Saxon. Last but not least, the Hildebrandslied displays conspicuous Saxonisms which, however, clearly deviate from the Old Saxon characteristics of the names (e. g. palatalization of g, disappearance of h). Both the lack of these characteristic sounds and the mechanical “undoing” of the second sound shift along with the unusual spellings for urgerm. *ē2 indicate that it was not a Saxon who was responsible for the Saxonisms in the Hildebrandslied.ⅺ
The growth of names in early medieval aristocratic groups: the Merovingians: (Main Topic)
No full textThe article discusses the names and name elements of the Merovingian dynasty. There were a number of name elements such as chlod-, child-, -mer/mer-, presumably original to the main Merovingian branch of Childeric and Clovis, but there were also the names of their deceased relatives. My focus is on the increase in names and name elements. (1) Theud-names were more than likely of Visigothic origin, presumably from a first marriage of Clovis with a daughter of the Visigothic king Theoderic. (2) An increase in Burgundian names is well-known, but (3) particularly the -oald-names must have an Agilolfing origin. (4) Sigibert and other sigi-names were conveyed to the royal house by the kings ‘of Cologne’; they are supposed to have stemmed from a Lower Rhine tradition. (5) The name Dagobert too had a non-Merovingian origin, presumably from a princely or royal family of the Chamavi, a Frankish tribe on the Lower Rhine. (6) Perhaps the -harja-names were also an increase in the name elements. Furthermore, the article deals with the names of (alleged Merovingian) pretenders. Names of the members of the royal dynasty and the increase in their names served to express claims to sovereignty over certain parts of the Frankish kingdom; therefore, there was no increase of names among the Late Merovingian ‘shadow kings’. The article shows that careful study of the changes in the names used by the Merovingian dynasty produces additional historical knowledge
Rezension zu Diana Ascher, Die Ortsnamen des Landkreises Fulda
No full textDiana Ascher, Die Ortsnamen des Landkreises Fulda. Fuldaer Studien Bd. 25. Freiburg, Basel, Wien: Herder 2020. 848 S. – ISBN 978-3-451-38925-2, Preis: EUR 88,00
The antiquity of the German-Slavic contact zone. The Hersfeld tithe register and its classification in terms of settlement history: (Main Topic)
No full textDue to the lack of written sources, the ancient world in the German-Slavic contact zone in eastern Central Europe has been largely a matter of archaeology alone. Proper names only begin to appear on record in medieval times. As a result, it is impossible to reconstruct an earlier onymic landscape. Among the early written sources, a document from the Imperial abbey of Hersfeld (“Hersfelder Zehntverzeichnis”) is an exceptional case in terms of its extensive content. Written in the 9th century, but preserved only as a copy from the 11th century, it lists more than 200 place names. In most cases these names are localized in a certain region west of the Saale river and north of its Unstrut tributary. For the most part, the names are of German origin, although there are also some of Slavic origin. Some years ago, this source was examined by an interdisciplinary research group. The onomastic outcome of this project (Zschieschang 2017) is described briefly in the present article. Some of the results of this study recently served as an argument in mediaevalist research (Warnke 2019). This research argues that the document originates from the 11th century and that there is no older original. This assumption deserves further in-depth examination in German linguistics (this is not part of the present article) in order to determine whether the place names – which clearly refer graphemically to the 9th century - could also have been recorded for the first time two centuries later
Agricultural Production in Luxembourg in the light of its Micro-Toponymy (Part One)
No full textThe following article offers insights into Luxembourg’s microtoponomastics and its value for local rural agricultural history. The focus is mainly on livestock farming and the production of cereals and other staple foods as attested by field names. Each section is accompanied by choropleth maps, the most relevant names being discussed in order to illustrate the distribution of the name type and the section for the whole Grand Duchy of Luxembourg
Rezension zu Inga Siegfried-Schupp, Von Angst und Not bis Zumpernaul. Siedlungsnamen im Kanton Zürich
No full textInga Siegfried-Schupp, Von Angst und Not bis Zumpernaul. Siedlungsnamen im Kanton Zürich. Mitteilungen der Antiquarischen Gesellschaft in Zürich, Bd. 91 (188. Neujahrsblatt), Zürich: Chronos Verlag 2024, 240 S. – ISBN: 978-3-0340-1750-3, Preis: CHF/EUR 48,00
Schüss and Susch – two Celtic Segusia names? (Main Topic)
No full textThis article discusses the etymology of two Swiss toponyms which share a similar etymology. (1) The Schüss (French La Suze) is a river in the Bernese Jura region of Switzerland. It is attested as Sushe in 1281 and perhaps even earlier as Secusiam in the Himerius-Vita from the 8th/9th c. In previous scholarship, the name of this river has been explained from Celt.*Segusiā, a derivation from the well-known base Celt. *sego-, ultimately from the root PIE *seǵh- ‘overcome, overpower’. A number of similar river names (and othertoponyms) such as La Suze < Secusia 1178, La Suize < Secucie ca. 1123 exist in France. (2) The village Susch, German (older) Süs, lies in the Canton of Grisons. Its name is first attested as Susis in 1161 and has similarly been explained from Celt. *Segusiā in previous scholarship. The morphological structure of the name is not clear. It seems likely that the form is a derivation with a complex suffix Celt. *-usiā- < PIE *-usieh-, cf. the name Celt. Bergusia (both a place name and a name of a deity). The naming of various objects (rivers, settlements, a mountain etc.) with the same name is perhaps most easily explained if we assume that *Segusiā was originally the name of a Celtic goddess (as already suggested by Hubschmied in 1938 for the Swiss river), although no decisive proof of such a goddess has been found so far
The conclusion of a “project of the century”, the St. Gallen Name Book: looking back at the last few years
No full textThis article is intended as an overview of the latter years of the now completed project “Die Flurnamen des Kantons St. Gallen (TopSG)” [The rural names of the Canton of St. Gallen]. This project, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and the Canton of St. Gallen, was housed at the University of Zurich. It marked the final stage of the “St. Galler Namenbuch (SGNB)” [Book of names of St. Gallen]. After presenting the long and turbulent history of the SGNB, this article focuses mainly on the results achieved between 2019 and 2022. Extensive phonetic recordings made from the Summer of 2020 onwards are of special interest. The paper discusses both the opportunities and the difficulties encountered during the project. A further goal is to provide a kind of Vademecum for similar projects concerned with toponomastics
Gender-neutral names in Czech
No full textGender-neutral names fulfill two basic functions: on the one hand, they are used either by individuals who take a critical view of gender stereotypes or else by parents who want to give their children the ‘space’ to form their own gender identity. On the other hand, gender-neutral names play an important role for non-binary people in that they signal a positioning outside the taken-for-granted understandings of femininity and/or masculinity in society. Gender-neutral names are an integral part of many name lexicons (DUDEN, Lansky, Internationales Handbuch für Vornamen etc.), in which they are included among other names. Compared to their use and registration rules abroad, the treatment of gender-neutral names in the Czech Republic appears to be very specific. Between 2006-2022 all civil registry offices in the Czech Republic used a single manual written by one author who interprets gender-neutral names as being applicable only to “transsexual” people. The manual offered lists of specific names and surnames for trans people - without definition, without explanation of the method, without justification for limiting their use to the trans population. Since July 2023, after criticism of the previous approaches to unisex names, the situation has improved to a certain extent. Registry Offices have been given a comprehensive list of unisex names with the note that these names are for the general public. Surname forms that do not signal the female gender have been recognized as gender neutral. This is a prerequisite for further work in favour of the rehabilitation of unisex names