LL-L "Etymology" 2010.02.25 (02) [EN-NDS]

[Lowlands-L List]

===============================================
L O W L A N D S - L - 25 February 2010 - Volume 02
lowlands.list at gmail.com - http://lowlands-l.net/
Archive: http://listserv.linguistlist.org/archives/lowlands-l.html
Encoding: Unicode (UTF-08)
Language Codes: lowlands-l.net/codes.php
===============================================

From: Jonny <jonny.meibohm at arcor.de>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2010.02.24 (09) [EN]

 Dear Heather,

you wrote about the changes of a word through the time:

fif aecc (five oaks) >> pickt oak >> pitt oak

I don't know if this is an example for 'endonym' vs 'exonym', but I've met
similar ongoings in our region.

A village which today is DE "Acht-höfen" ("Eight Farms") had been
"Nacht-höfen" ("Night Farms") in the 15. century. But there must have been a
forerunner, which I presume had dealt with anything close to "naechst-"
("next-") or "Nach(-bar)" ("neigh[-bour]").

In my home-village we have "Nallje", also written "Nallie". This probably
had been LS "(Dat) Neije", "(The) New", because it is found in several parts
of the village and always denotes a cadastral district which had be won from
the water (in the marshlands) in *younger* times, i.e. later than the
surrounding areas. I guess that it was the result of the fact that the
cadastre people didn't speak Low Saxon and just wrote it down close to the
way they had heard it being pronounced by the natives. The natives
themselves picked up this word, but after a short time nobody, neither the
natives nor any speaker of Standard German, knew any longer the relationship
between 'Nallje' and 'new'. This could be looked upon as 'endonym' to
'exonym' to 'endonym' to 'zero' ;-)!

In our Hannes homeland Mecklenburg I've seen a creek called 'Maurine' which
probably had been LS 'Mour-Rönne', meaning "runnel in the moor". I don't
know how the natives* name it today, but 'Maurine' obviously sounded
better in the ears of the officials.

*(Beste *Hanne*, weytst Du, wat Jouw'n Lüü' vandaog opp Platt tou de
'Maurine' seggen douht?)

I could list up examples over examples where old location names have
been fouled up beyond all recognition.

 With kind regards

Jonny Meibohm
Lower Saxony, Germany



==============================END===================================

 * Please submit postings to lowlands-l at listserv.linguistlist.org.

 * Postings will be displayed unedited in digest form.

 * Please display only the relevant parts of quotes in your replies.

 * Commands for automated functions (including "signoff lowlands-l")

   are to be sent to listserv at listserv.linguistlist.org or at

   http://linguistlist.org/subscribing/sub-lowlands-l.html.

*********************************************************************
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lowlands-l/attachments/20100225/b99a61aa/attachment.htm>