Warrior Class

[ualarauans]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, Justïn <justinelf at ...> wrote:
>
> I definitely see the need for the semantic difference, but is 
there a
> reason I should prefer kaballareis over knaíhts?

Well, that's a matter of personal taste. Speaking for myself, I 
wouldn't use *knaihts because:

1. Its "real world" cognates are not attested outside West Germanic. 
That is, not only in Gothic is it unknown, which fact could be 
explained by scarcity of the delivered vocabulary, but also in North 
Germanic. This makes me think that the formation (kneht) was 
dialectal and perhaps relatively late as well and thus impossible to 
exist in Gothic even theoretically.

2. The basic meaning preserved in the continental languages 
is "servant" rather than "knight". Yes, the semantic development 
from "servant" to "(noble) warrior" was not unique with this word, 
cf. OGrm. *þegnaz. But then, why not take attested magus, for 
instance, and specialize it? Or to use a composite *drauhti-magus 
(ON dróttmögr) – cf. attested þiu-magus "slave"?

3. Subjectively, I wouldn't like reconstructed Gothic to be too much 
close to Modern English or any other modern language, without 
sufficient reasons as it seems to be here :)

> My first preference
> would be knaíhts because of the Germanic connotation verses a
> Romantic interference, though I am aware of the Gothic exposure to
> Romance languages via Spain, etc.

Yes, amongst Gothic warfare terms we already have militon "to do a 
military service" < Lat. militare, and annons "soldier's salary"
< Lat. annonae. These both are absent in other branches of Germanic. 
And they illustrate the contacts with the Roman military 
organization, long before the Goths arrived in Spain etc. The words 
were there already in the 4th ct., with Visigoths residing north of 
the Danube. I don't know since when caballarius started to refer 
to "heavy-armored horseman" in Vulgar Latin, and where this happened 
first. The Visigoths could have taken it from lingua militaris of 
their Roman allies, themselves being formally a part of the Roman 
army. And, curiously as it may seem, Isidor of Sevilla (570-638) 
used caballarius in the meaning "stableman", if I don't mistake, and 
he was a Visigoth.

Kaballarja in the deed is a toponym. *Kaballareis could be 
a "knight" quite well.

> Would not knight [horseman] have possibly found its way to a noble
> connotation in Gothic culture theoretically?  Did it finds its way
> there in any culture other than Anglo-Saxon?

Kneht – not outside English, for all I know. "Horseman" > "knight" – 
practically everywhere in West Europe.

P.S. How about translating the wiki article "Knight" into Gothic? :)

> --- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "ualarauans" <ualarauans at ...> 
wrote:
> >
> > Some thoughts on Gothic knights.
> >
> > In most European languages (all except English afaik) "knight"
> > is "horseman", literally. Although the Goths didn't have knights 
in
> > the proper sense of the word, they did have cavalry. The 
Ostrogoths
> > are said to borrow the practice of the mounted warriorship from
> > their Hunnish and Alanic neighbors. They must have had a word 
for a
> > horseman, right? Of course, they could have borrowed the item
> > together with the word for it. Not that they had never seen a man
> > riding on horseback before they contacted East European nomads. 
The
> > hypothetical loan could refer to some particular kind of cavalry,
> > e.g. auxiliary Alans. The problem is we don't know the Alanic or
> > Hunnish word either. Modern Ossetic has baræg for "horseman", 
but I
> > don't know if it's not a later loan from some North Caucasian
idiom.
> > Somehow it doesn't look like inherited Iranian. I'd expect
something
> > with Ir. aspa- (Oss. jæfs-) as the first element. Maybe the Goths
> > would substitute it with their IE cognate aihva-, who knows...
> >
> > To construct the word from the Germanic vocabulary, I can think 
of
> > substantivized *reidands (declined like frijonds). *Reidareis
> > suggested by Llama seems OK, too, only I haven't seen -areis 
added
> > to a strong verb. Which doesn't mean this was absolutely 
impossible.
> >
> > Finally, there's an option of "going Romance" and constructing
> > *kaballareis M.-ja, after French chevalier, Castilian caballero,
> > Italian cavaliere etc. We have Kaballarja attested (in Arezzo
deed).
> > Personally I like it best. Neo-Gothic lexicographs can load it 
with
> > all that feudal semantics we associate with knights. And there 
will
> > be a diffenece between "knight" (kaballareis) and "horseman"
> > (reidands) to be made.
> >
> > Ualarauans

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