LL-L: "Kinship" LOWLANDS-L, 04.APR.2001 (08) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 04.APR.2001 (08) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans, Ap=Appalachean, D=Dutch, E=English, F=Frisian, L=Limburgish
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From: Stefan Israel [stisrael at yahoo.com]
Subject: Kinship

Ron asked about kinship terms:

Here's a word my cousins in Holstein had for great-grandmother:
Tik-Tok-Moder (Urgrootmoder: ur- meaning here great, but
sounding the same as _Uhr_ "clock".)

> It so happens that the audience of my talk is currently
> dealing with two European countries: Norway and England (with
> some reference to other UK countries
> I have the following incomplete list for Old English:
>
> môdor (mother)
> fæder (father)
> sweostor (sister)
> brôðor (brother)
> dohtor (daughter)
> sunu (son)
> snoru (daughter-in-law [etymology?])

That word goes back over 6000 years, to Proto-Indo-European
*(s)nusos "daughter-in-law": OE snoru, early New High German
Schnur, , Crimean Gothic schnos, Latin  nurus, Greek nuos.  It
is tentatively connected to the _nubile_ root *(s)neubh- "to
woo, marry"

If this is of interest: sister (< *swe-sor) seems to have meant
"our own female": *swe- "one's one, plus the feminine formant
-sor.  The nephew word (_nepos_ in Latin,  meaning "grandson,
nephew") traces back to *ne-pot-s "the not-powerful one".
The father word seems to have been boosted by a root *pa'- "to
protect (a la pasture, pastor etc.); the mother word *ma'te'r
simply tacked the family-member ending -ter to the universal
_ma_ word for mother.

> (apparently no name for 'son-in-law'

I didn't find one either- they must have referred to such people
somewhere in the extant literature, but apparently they used
some other, less specific term (nephew? son?), which would
suggest that sons-in-law didn't have specific family duties as
sons-in-law.

> (apparently no names for 'uncle' and 'aunt' -- "father's
> brother" etc. instead)

I did find _eam_, related to German __Oheim_: uncle, esp.
mother's brother,
and _faedera_ "uncle, father's brother", and a citation "mines
faederan thridda faeder "my uncle's great-grandfather", plus a
gloss:
  1.faeder = pater (father)
  2.faeder = avus (grandfather)
  3.faeder = proavus (great-grandfather)
  feowertha faeder = abavus (great-great-grandfather)
  fifta faeder = atavus (ggg-grandfather)
  sixta faeder = tritavus (gggg-grandfather)

sunu "son" goes the same way:
 suna sunu =  nepos, neptis (grandson (or granddaughter?))
 thridda sunu = pronepos, proneptis (great-grandson)
 feowtha sunu = abnepos
 fifta sunu = adnepos
 sixte sune = trinepos

 faederan sunan = patrueles (decendents of father's brother)
             or = fratres patrueles

 mo'ddrian sunan = matrueles; = fratrueles (not in my
dictionaries, but I assume it's parallel to patrueles)

 mo'drige/moderge/moddrige:  an aunt (the dictionary doesn't
mention it being specifically a maternal or paternal aunt)
     It also means female cousin: consobrinus/-a "maternal
cousin"

faedren-brothor: a brother by the same father, full brother
faedren-maeg: paternal relative
faedrunga: a paternal relation, any parental relation

> Does anyone have an Old Saxon kinship term list?

fadar, fader
mo'dar
sunu
dohtar
swestar
bro'thar
*o'm on the basis of OE _eam_, German _Oheim_, OFris _em_?

Stefan Israel

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