[gothic-l] Re: Balkan

[dirk at SMRA.CO.UK]

--- In gothic-l at y..., "Nenad Mitovski" <mitovski at e...> wrote:
>
>         I became attracted to Gothic culture while I was trying to
find out
> origin of some geographic names in mountains of central Balkan
peninsula...
> Although there were numerous matches for "Gabar" (name of one
village), that
> word and similar words in Gothic language had to draw my attention
since name
> of that somehow hidden mountain is "German" (it is placed in
north-east of
> Macedonia among other larger mountains). It seems like name of that
village
> could have been "Gabaur" or something close to that. Name of that
mountain most
> likely was some old non-Germanic description of some Germanic people
living
> there.


Hi,

there are German placenames ending in -bauer, see for example
Montabaur.




>They could have been Saxon miners, but there are no mines.



Well, it is a wrong assumption that all Transilvanian Saxons were
miners. Most of them were not even Saxons either, but the term assumed
a legal meaning and was transfered to other foreign immigrants.
Interestingly, these imigrants adopted the name Transilvanian Saxons
for themselves and even contructed 'false' but widely believed tales
of their forefathers homeland in Saxony. (But that is what often
happened with origin-legends) From the 11th/12th centuries many
Germanic speaking people (often from the Rhineland) moved to the areas
of present day Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria and Moldova at the Black Sea
and so on. I guess most Germanic placenames and customs that may exist
in these areas are attributable to them rather than Goths.

cheers
Dirk


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