Drus Griutinge - swesa namna

[llama_nom]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "ualarauans" <ualarauans at ...> wrote:

[...]
 
> Ana Danaprais staþam (et passim) "on the banks of the Dniepr" – it's 
> after ON Danparstaðir, isn't it? *Danaprs as I can gather is thought 
> to be an –i-stem fem. Jordanes used Danaper masc. and one time 
> Danaprum neutr. (Get. 30: magnumque illud Danaprum Taurumque 
> montem..., if illud is not a typo for illum acc. masc. here). The 
> formation is probably the same as in Danaster /-trum. In ON a re-
> distribution (Neuverteilung) of morphemes took place and the final
> –r- of the stem became a flective ending, hence Danpr, gen. Danpar. 
> Cf. also later Slavic forms: ORuss. DnEpru > Russ. Dnepr, Ukr. 
> Dnipro  - all masc. All this leads me to think that Gothic had a 
> form like *Danaprus M.-u or *Danaprs M.-a/-i, in which case gen. 
> would be *Danapraus or *Danapris. BTW., are you sure that it was 
> staþa "banks", not stadeis "places" (as in ON). Ana Danapraus 
> stadim? Or better as a compound *Danaprustadeis/-staþa?


Atlakviða, stanza 5 'ok staði Danpar' points to Go. stadeis, but 'á
Danparstöðum' of Hervarar saga could be either.  In one version this
is the name of the district, with Árheimar being the citadel, in
another version Árheimar is the district, 'á Danparstöðum' the citadel
-- so perhaps it was already unclear to compilers of the saga.  G.
Turville Petre notes in his edition of Hervarar saga, p. 83 "the word
probably means 'on the banks of the Dnjepr".  I guessed at *Danaprs,
fi., since river names are typically feminine in Old Norse -- assuming
that this was an ancient Germanic trend; also because of the noun
'ahva'.  Are there tendencies regarding the gender of river names in
Latin that Jordanes might have been following, or breaking with? 
Thomas Czarnecki reconstructed *Donawi for Danube (fi.?).  I'll look
into this though.  Are there any more rivers mentioned in the Gothic
Bible fragments besides Iaurdanus ahva?  Any Gothic river names that
have survived in Eastern Europe?



> Augeis kunjis "of Augis's kin"; Imrikins banins "of Imrika's 
> slayer" – what are these names? Are they attested (and what do they 
> mean)?


Jordanes names 'Augis' among the early kings/ancestors of the Goths. 
Hence Augeis kuni = the Gothic people.  Imrika = OE Emerca (Widsith),
OHG Embrica (Würzburg Chronicle), MHG Imbrecke (Biterolf); in German
legend, he and his brother Go. *Friþula were Ermanaric's nephews, the
Harlungen (perhaps Go. *Harjalingos), killed by their uncle due to
scheming-councellor-aggravated paranoia.


> 
> þairh Mairqiwidu "through the Dark Forest" – aha, here is Gothic 
> Myrkviðr finally! So you think that was originally a forest between 
> Goths and Huns (like in Hlöðskviða)? I heard a lot of theories about 
> its supposed historical location. One of them is that it = 
> Herodote's hYLAIH "forested region" between Dnieper and Don.


I don't know; it seems to be quite a well-traveled forest ;-)  Other
sources put it on the southern border of Denmark, or in the
Erzgebirge.  Hasn't it also been equated with the Moesian marsh?


> 
> faur Salwo swumfsl "by the Murky Lake" – and is there a proto-type 
> of this?


No specific prototype for the name, but the idea of a sinister lake
was looted from Beowulf where a deer is said to prefer giving itself
up to the hunters than to approach a haunted mere.  The episode with
the deer itself, of course, is from Jordanes.


> 
> Hraide "of the Hred-Goths" – I guess you have an example of such a 
> usage in ON or OE?



Yes, e.g. Widsith: "full oft þæ´r wíg ne alæg, þonne Hræ´da here
heardum sweordum ymb Wistlawudu wergan sceoldun ealdne éþelstól Ætlan
léodum."


> 
> und Hailago hlaiw, / þarei und hita standiþ "unto the Holy Howe, 
> there where it stands to this day" <= (Hlöðskviða 10) gröf þá ina 
> helgu, / er stendr á Goðþjóðu, right?


That's the one!


> 
> Uldinis ... arbjans "Uldin's heirs" – I guess it's the same Uldin 
> who was mentioned as a leader of the Danube Huns about 400 CE. Could 
> the Huns of the Invasion time (375 CE) be called "Uldin's heirs"?


I considered this and have two excuses prepared ;-)  (1) Legendary
chronology is naturally vague and anachronistic, even in direct
speech, cf. the quote from Widsith above (this is my main excuse!) --
just the sort of traditional epithet or kenning that appears in
Germanic epic poetry, not always with strict regard to its immediate
context; (2) different Uldin maybe?  An ancestor of the one who made
himself known to classical historians?


> Balþs Balambairis "Bold Balamber". Jordanes' Balamber which also 
> reads in codices as Balamir and Balamur has been often thought to be 
> a distortion of Gothic Walamers (through Greek intermediation, cf. 
> BALAMEROS in Priscus 28 – a "Scythic" name). Maybe there was a 
> Hunnish name later Gothicized (like in the case of Attila, Rugila 
> etc)? I'd use *Balamers, if not Walamers. Keeping the rhyme, Balþs 
> Balamers...


I had read this theory, but the alliteration was hard to resist.  So I
went with the hypothesis that it was indeed a Hunnish name, and that
the more Gothic-looking versions were partial assimilations to names
such as *Walhamers.  Alternatively, we could argue that the name had
been garbled in the traditions preceding the poem, and that not all of
its sources were oral.


> Alisins geza "Alisa's stronghold" – again a name which I 
> can't "decipher".


'baurg Alisins' "Alisa's stronghold", cf. OE Elsa, MHG Elsan, a Gothic
noble who allies himself with Dietrich on his return from exile. 
'geza' was my solution to that perennial question "what's Gothic for
yesterday?"  I was thinking of ON 'í gær', with a dative ending in
place of original locative by analogy with 'himma daga'.  Another
alternative would be 'gezis', cf. 'gistradagis' "tomorrow" -- but I
wondered if that might have more of the sense of regular occurance:
the hay is cast into the over every tomorrow, as a general rule,
whereas this is one specific yesterday.


> 
> Humlins magiwe "of Humla's boys" – maybe Humila is better for ON 
> Humli? Or that would yield *Hymli?


I think you're right about *Humila.  The medial vowel would have been
lost in ON before i-umlaut, cf. ketill, dat. katli.


> 
> Unwen – Jordanes Hunuil? I heard there was an OE parallel name, 
> right?


Yes.  Widsith has OE Unwen.

113 Emercan sohte ic ond Fridlan . ond Eastgotan,
114 frodne ond godne . fæder Unwenes. 

See Chambers, p. 219 "The name means a son born beyond hope.  He must
have been a famous hero to have been remembered in England till after
the Normal Conquest (see Appendix K).  Yet he does not succeed his
father Ostrogotha in Gothic story: he was therefor persumably cut off
in his youth.  Was it in this connection that Ostrogotha, like
Thurisind and Olaf Peacock, showed his characteristic patience?"

The subject of another poem...?  (The other references are to
Langobard and Icelandic history.)



> 
> ibnan / Airpamarhin "Erpamarha's equal". In the text (Get. 43) it 
> stands as Eterpamara. What is this Et-, if we accept your 
> reconstruction?


I'm hypothesising that Lat. 'et' "and" has somehow become attached to
the name in the course of transmission, since it makes good sense as a
Gothic name without the 'et' (Dark Horse, Chestnut Horse), and not
much sense with.


> Are there other examples where marha is attested as 
> a weak noun in Germanic names?


I'm not sure, but there are the Anglo-Saxon leaders Hengest and Horsa.

Thanks for all the comments!

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