LL-L "Etymology" 2010.04.20 (03) [EN]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 20 April 2010 - Volume 03
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From: Hellinckx Luc <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
 Subject: LL-L "Etymology"



Beste Henno & Roger,

You wrote:

> In connection with nouns and  verbs having undergone  umlaut, you wrote:
>
> ---So ke:ma < *kemba < Old Germanic *kambian, probably. It's a very
typical word, combining the old lengthening before mb, with the
palatalisation of the vowel (e> ie) and breaking. Dutch has "kammen", so no
lengthening or Umlaut-relic. German has "kämmen", so umlauted, as in
Frisian. I'd expect similar forms in Low Saxon varieties. Probably Dutch
also had umlauted forms, but many of those alternations where later
equalized by analogy: the noun is "kam", so the verb "should" be "kammen",
not expected "kemmen". Of course relics also exist in Dutch ("omhelzen" (to
embrace) next to "hals" (neck), "steden" (cities) as plural of "stad", etc),
but they are far more common the more East one goes.
> The noun in Frisian has no umlaut, but does have lenghtening: "kaam"
(comb), vs Dutch "kam". Also in "laam" (lamb) we have this, plural has short
a: "lammen". (note that West Frisian lost all -er plurals: we just say
"aaien" etc. In Saterlandic Frisian and North Frisian we still see -er
plurals).
>
> In Getelands (South-East Brabant) we have a noun with umlaut for 'lam':
lemme. The umlaut  is the result of the addition of the augmentative-suffix.
The original word does noet exist anymore.


Same here in Western Brabant. "Lemmen" is the original dialect word for
"lamb". Also in family name "Lemmens", opposed to western variant "Lammens".
Compare Northern German "Lemke".

True, the family name usually refers to a first name "Lambrecht" (< lant +
berht), but may also hint at the easy-going character of a person (~ gentle
as a lamb). Note that the expansion of "Lambert" was due to early Flemish
export, mainly because of the popularity of Saint Lambert of Maastricht.

Regarding "kam", I'd like to add that the old diminituve is "kemmeken" in
Brabantish. The word can regularly be found as the name for a former
brewery, because in the olden days, a brew kettle was suspended from a
comb-like rack over an open fire. The device, a chimney-crook (E) or haal
(D), thus became archetypical for a brewery:

http://tinyurl.com/y7sv4bd

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx, Halle, Belgium



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