LL-L: "History" LOWLANDS-L, 05.FEB.2001 (02) [D/E]

[Lowlands-L]

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  L O W L A N D S - L * 05.FEB.2001 (02) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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From: Stefan Israel [stefansfeder at yahoo.com]
Subject: "History"

Roger Thijs heeft geschreven:
Subject: historical backgrounds

> I like old stuff, and this Saturday on the Brussels flee
> marked I got, for a few dimes, a book from 1809:
> - title: "Antiquitates Belgicae of Nederlandsche Oudheden...

> Back to the old book: Where it may be rather correct for the
> actual politico-geographical
> situation of the time, it is quite original on some historical
> matters

Don't throw that away!  Its history is confused, but it is
historical confusion: it doesn't tell us what was going on 2000
years ago, but it does tell us what people -thought- had been
going on in 1809.  If you don't keep it, give it to a library or
a university!

The science of linguistics (an imperfect science to begin with)
had hardly even begun, so the author was free to indulge in
historical speculation (like the teacher of German I know of who
informed her class that Dachshunds mean "roof dogs"! (Dach =
roof, Hund = hound, but *Dachs* = badger.  She speculated that
they had short legs to walk on roofs, and didn't realize they
were bred to go into badger holes.)

> The Alsatians are also Saxons: "Edel-saxen":
> ... gelyk de Saxen, die een land, eertyds geheel boschagtig,
> bezaten,waer van de Holt-Saxen (dat is Hout-Saxen) geheeten

The author was half-right: Holsten was Holtsaten, and _Holt_
means woods, but a _sata_ meant a sitter/settler (cf. High
German _Insassen_).  By coincidence, Saxon/sahsan/Sachsen came
to be pronounced Sassen in Platt; maybe the author drew a false
connection between de sassesche spraek and words like Insassen.
I don't have any source handy for the origin of the name
Elsass/Alsace.  One researcher did seriously suggest that the
Alemanni (Swiss, Alsatians and Swabes) were indeed Saxons
(Frings early in this century): he noted that both have
Einheitsplural (only one ending, not 2 or 3 different endings
for verb plurals) and Nasalschwund: loss of n (finf > fiif
etc.).  Unfortunately, these features often happen, and the
Alemanni developed these features about a millenium after the
Lowland languages did.

> The saxons got their name from a kind of sickle:

Well, _sahs_ did mean short sword, and came to be used for other
cutting tools.  I haven't seen it used to mean sickle, but I
could imagine it eventually was so used.  Does anyone know a
modern word _Sax_ or _Sass_ that means sickle?

> I spare you all the whole story of the origin of the Saxons,
> an excerpt, p. 74:
> Saxons of Saxen - De Saxen, een volk van de Schyten afkomstig,
> zyn uyt Asia vertrokken ... etc. ... genaemt Sacae of Saci

The Romans didn't know what to make of the Germani, and tended
to explain them as a variant of the familiar Scythian barbarians
of Scythia/the Ukraine.  It's since been discovered that the
Scythians were fairly clearly an Iranic people from an entirely
different branch of Indo-European, but into the early 1800's,
that hadn't been clear.

> Shall I return the book to trash?

Mistaken history is still very much history!  Besides, it can
teach us some humility for the mistakes we may make ourselves.

Stefan Jsrael

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