LL-L: "Names" LOWLANDS-L, 02.MAY.2000 (08) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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From: Sandy Fleming [sandy at fleimin.demon.co.uk]
Subject: "Names"

Andrew Saffrey [3181SAFF at london-oratory.org] wrote:
> Subject: Borstal
>
> Also, did you know, the etymology of "Penguin"
>
> As in Penzance etc, "pen" in Cornish means head and "gwyn" means
> black thus
> Pen Gwyn.

"Gwyn" means "white".

This pseudo-etymological nonsense is the result of an effort by the English
(Elizabethian) government to lay a prior (ie anti-Spanish) claim to the
Americas by claiming that some Native Americans are descended from the
Welsh, specifically from Prince Madog (or Madoc) and his people who
(according to Welsh legend) claimed to have found a land beyond the western
ocean, and set out to live there permanently. A search was made of Native
American languages for Welsh cognates, and the "white is black" and "Welsh
and Native North Americans both had the same word for Antartic fauna"
example above just serves to show how desperate it got!

> While on the subject, does anyone know what "aber" means as in "Aberdeen,
> Aberavon and Aberystwyth"?

It's Brythonic (Welsh, Cornish &c) and describes a confluence, such as a
river mouth or where two rivers meet.

Sandy
http://scotstext.org
http://www.fleimin.demon.co.uk

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