[gothic-l] Goths, Gepids, Gaut

[keth at ONLINE.NO]

Hails Bertil!
you wrote:

>Gaut, at least in Swedish, was known as
>"avlaren" (the begetter).

Are there any mentionings of "Gaut" ouside of Icelandic
sources? (Saxo?)

>Important is Chapter 79, in in which Gaut (or Gapt) is mentioned
>as the progenitor of the Goths,


I believe this was Jacob Grimm's opinion, who was born in 1785.
No, but seriously, do you know if any work has been done
on this question since Jacob Grimm?


(Grimm believed that "Gapt" was a corruption of the "Gaut"
of the Norsemen, and the "Geat" of the Anglo-Saxons)


The name in question is not "Gapt" in all the Mss.
I do not know how the various Mss. are rated in terms of
reliability among each other. There is however one manuscript
called the "codex ottobonianus" in which the name is spelled
as "capit". The name of the father of the Amalians might
therefore equally well be read as CAPUT or "head" - fountainhead
or wellspring - of the Gothic rulers. (German perhaps "Haupt" ...
Gothic "Haubiþ" - Note that the Gothic form also has the "i" which
is in the Latin form "capit".)


>mentioned as the progenitor of the Goths, a Scandinavian war god.
>His son was hulmul (or Humli) the mythical progenítor
>of the Dani. Amal is not mentioned until the fourth
>generation.
>

Another interesting name is that of the "Gautigoth"
(Getica Ch. III), where we have the two variants Gaut and Goth
combined into a single name. Could that indicate that the
two names are not the same after all?


(I know there is also a reading as "Gautþiuda", but that involves
a departure from the Ms. spelling - which may be seen as a bit
drastic)


Golja þuk,
Keþ.



You are a member of the Gothic-L list.  To unsubscribe, send a blank email to <gothic-l-unsubscribe at egroups.com>. 

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/