[gothic-l] Re: ASILUKAIRNUS

[Ingemar Nordgren]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "faltin2001" <dirk at s...> wrote:
 

> I am interested in the word  "fairhwus" for world. Can you think of 
> an equivalent in another Germanic language. All the other words are 
> more or less easily recognisable but "fairhwus" is not, at least not 
> for me. Could it be a loanword? Old high German has "mittingart" for 
> world and "aerdha" for lat. terra. Also, "hliftus" for thief does not 
> remind me of a Germanic equivalent.

Hi Dirk,

This is a complicated word and there are only relative guesses about
the etymology as far as I (and Streitberger)  can say. Fairhwus is
principally the  same word as Fjörgyn, the mother of Þórr, who also is
called Jord/Earth. ON 'fjör', n. = leben/live, lebende Person/living
person, pl. 'firar´=men. In Ags. is the  phrase'mid firihun' OHG 'mid
firahim' meaning 'among the humans, the living'. The closest relative
is I think 'Fjörgyn' and 'fjör' in strict etymological sense and hence
we can  assume it means 'the humans living on the Earth' rather than
the more technical ´world'. In that case the Nordic 'kringla
heims´says a lot more. It is anyhow interesting since it indicates the
word has a religious origin. 

This is the best I can offer you!

Best greetings
Ingemar



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