[gothic-l] Re: The Letter H

[Troels Brandt]

Hi Keth

Here are my questions and comments to the Scandinavian part:

--- In gothic-l at y..., keth at o... wrote:
> 
> Well, if the returning Heruls (as supported by the written sources)
> had forgotten their original language. But if they had kept
> their original Germanic language, they would have kept H.
> There is no loss of initial H in the Germanic languages.

We do not know if the Heruls originated as a separate people from 
Scandinavia. The statement from Jordanes is not certain, as he could 
refer to an event in the 5th or the beginning of the 6th century. 
They might be a Gothic tribe or something else. Neither do we know if 
they had another original language with or without an initial "H" in 
their name.

> 
> Eril develops a breaking around that time.
> Just like "Erde" -> Scandinavian IARD/ Old English EARTh
> You see the breaking of the initial E-vowel occurring both
> in Old Norse as well as in Old English.
> But the breaking is not realized in the same way in the two
> languages. In Old Norse initial e --> ja  and in
> Old English the initial e --> ea.
> Another example is "heart": Using German and Dutch as reference
> (because the bereaking never occurred in those two languages)
> We have German "Hertz", Dutch "hart".
> But English "heart" and Norwegian "hjarta"
> So that is rather a constand sound change rule in those languages.
> Note also that the eample "heart" shows that initial h
> is not affected by this change.
> 
> So according to this sound change rule we easily obtain
> Old English    Eril  --> Earl    and
> Old Norse     Eril --> Iarl.   (the "i" disappears through syncope)
> 
> So that is the easy part.

Does this mean that Eril originally was a word/name coming from 
Germany without a breaking E or was it originally a common Germanic 
word/name without a breaking E developing in different directions?

> The difficult part is to explain the connection between
> runic "Eril" and   Langobard/Gotic  "Herul".
> Because the latter is rather well documented.

Where is Herul documented in Langobardic or Gothic? Am I right when I 
suspect this to be the silent Latin "H" again?

> 
> But maybe it is Procopius that is the source of the English 
> scholarly usage of writing it as "Erul" without H.
> The German scholarly tradition is to keep the H.

This is a much later issue without connection to the above.

> But I'd still like to see the Procopius reference.
> (and why disregard Dexippos?)

See my earlier mail.

> 
> >If the name was written in runes we should according to Keth 
expect 
> >the name to be written as it was pronounced at that time and 
place. I 
> >agree, but do we know how "erilaR" was pronounced in the 5th and 
6th 
> >century as you indicated, Keth? 
> 
> I think so. Because runic inscriptions are from wide areas.
> And we know the approximate pronounciation of the vowels,
> because the languages were recorded later, also over a wide area.
> And some words found in runic inscriptions can also be compared
> wit the the same words as recorded in contemporary Latin sources.
> And since all words contain some vowels, and there aren't
> too many vowels either in early Gemanic, I think we know what
> sounds the runic vowels corresponded to.
> At least the literature that discusses runes has given phonology
> an especially important place, and the opinion seems to prevail
> that the pronounciation is known quite well (within reasonable 
limits).

Was this ErilaR without a breaking E?

> (example: the Kjølevik inscription: HadulaikaR ek Hagusta(l)dar
> hlaaiwido magu minimo, SW Norway ca. 400 AD - lots of initial H !
> Compare Hildebrandslied)
> 

I have never denied that "H" existed in Scandinavia, which is not the 
same to claim that there was an "H" in Herul.

Regards
Troels


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