Was the word "kunig/kunigas/kunigur" a gothic word?

[Ingemar Nordgren]

Hi Arthur,Francisc, Michael, Michel, Ualarauans and other interested,

I feel that I must point out a circumstance we have not mentioned
until now. '*Kuningaz', '*kunigg' et c. seems in most languages have
been transformed to 'o' like 'konung' or 'ö'(Umlaut) 'König' or 'i'
'king', but also in modern Swedish (and Gutnisk) we have two words -
'konung' and 'kung'. In decided form it is 'kungen'. Konung is a more
formal official title but normally everybody use 'kung'.'Royal',
'Königlich' is in Swedish simply 'kunglig'.In older Sw. there also are
two forms registered, namely 'kunungr' and 'konungr'.In older Danish
it is kunung but now transformed to konge. Hence the original 'u' is
still kept in Swedish, and we as well in Scandinavian languages have
no decided particles before a word, but instead we use endings like in
Gothic.It seems Scandinavian languages  are less affected by the
soundshifts than the Continental languages, and accordingly possibly
might be closer to ProtoGmc, and hence also EastGmc.The possible
degree of Celtic influence treated by Michael I can not comment, but
note the parallels of words mentioned by Michael below. Still I would
suggest that the Swedish pronounciation of 'u' could be closest to
Gothic seen in this enlightment, since Gothic/EastGmc evidently (?)
was a result of the soundshift closest to ProtoGmc.

Arthur, I am sorry I do not know how to explain the pronounciation of
Swedish 'u', but I am convinced you can do it much better since you
actually speak Swedish and many other languages, and have studied
Germanistics in Europe. Note however that Danes have a 'u' closer to
English and the Continent, while Norwegian pronounciation is closer to
Swedish. You are a valuable asset to the list.

Best wishes!
Ingemar

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, Michael Erwin <merwin at ...> wrote:
>
> I still think 'king' comes from 'kin' or 'kuni' for the Gothic.
> 
> Of course one C-Gmc root can yield two Gothic words, as with mawi and  
> magatha, (or two English words, as with churn and quern, shirt and  
> skirt, ship and skiff, etc.) so that kindins and *kunig-- might come  
> from the same root. IIRC, mawi and magatha reflect changing word- 
> formation patterns within C-Gmc and Gothic, while shirt and skirt  
> reflect internal borrowing among Germanic languages.
>







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