[gothic-l] Translating creeds?

Sun Jan 4 00:58:03 UTC 2015

Why the Gothic month-names should line with those in Slavic rather than those in the other early Germanic languages escapes me. The names of the months in Old English, for example, do in fact appear to relate to the rhythms of agricultural life and pagan beliefs, as one would expect of an proto-calendar: 

 se aerra geol = 'the earlier Yule (month)'
 se aefter(r)a geol = 'the later Yule (month)'
 solmonath = 'mud-month'
 Hrethemonath = 'Hrethe-month' (Hrethe is apparently an earlier heathen deity)
 Eastermonath = 'Easter-month' (likewise the name of earlier heathen deity it seems)
 thrimilcemonath = 'thrice-milch-month'
 se aerra litha = 'the earlier summer-solstice-period'
 se aefter(r)a litha = 'the later summer-solstice-period'
 weodmonath = 'weed-month'
 haligmonath = 'holy-month'
 winterfylleth = 'winter-filth'
 blodmonath = 'blood-month'

 Edmund

---In Gothic-L at yahoogroups.com, <marja-e at ...> wrote :

 A few issues.

 First, I thought the differences between traditional Slavic calendars corresponded with the differences between the regional climates, planting times, harvest times, etc. rather than with more accidents of who did or didn’t apply an extra month. So harvest months in Gothic should line up either with Bulgarian or Ukrainian, not Old English.

 Second, Wulfila avoids writing hailags.

 Third, Diceneus the astronomer comes to the Getae rather than to the Goths. Jordanes merges Getic history into Gothic history.

 On Jan 3, 2015, at 7:04 PM, Dicentis a roellingua at ... mailto:roellingua at ... [gothic-l] <gothic-l at yahoogroups.com mailto:gothic-l at yahoogroups.com> wrote:

 > Andy, I know the Gothic dictionary of this guy and although I have read some things at his website, I 'm not sure if I can trust his website in regard to a calendar. 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/gothic-l/attachments/20150103/39fb87a9/attachment.htm>