LL-L "Etymology" 2003.10.13 (18) [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 13.OCT.2003 (18) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian B=Brabantish D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian
L=Limburgish LS=Lowlands Saxon (Low German) N=Northumbrian
S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic V=(West)Flemish Z=Zeelandic (Zeêuws)
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From: Andy (Scots-Online) <andy at scots-online.org>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2003.10.11 [E]

Tom wrote:

> I wonder if the Scots Lallans word "knowe" which means 'knoll,
> hillock, hillside' is related to the "knok-name" structure for
> toponyms signifying that they lie on higher ground.
>
> For example there is hillock dominating one Scots village which
> the locals call "the cockie(?) knowe" which translates - badly -
> as the fine-looking knoll.

Scots „knowe“ [(k)nʌu] is cognate with English knoll. The Scots
pronunciation is a result of the vocalisation of the historical  /l/ and
subsequent vowel diphthongisation.

Anglo-Saxon cnoll would seem to correspond to Low Saxon Knolle though Old
Norse also has knollr – a mountain summit – Norwegian Knold. C.f. Old High
German hnol and Dutch nol. Perhaps the Old Norse and Anglo-Saxon influences
reinforced each other and resulted in modern knowe.

Andy Eagle

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From: Antero Helasvuo <antero.helasvuo at welho.com>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2003.10.11 [E]

>Hai everyone
>Ron replied to Antero: Secondly, the _hana > kana_ transformation might be
>due to
>the Russian influence,
>
>But, if I remember correctly from a book I read as a child, wasn't
>Karelie/Finland
>at one time under Russian rule?  Could that have been sufficient to
>influence some
>words and alter their pronunciation?
>
>Groeten ,
>Jannie Lawn-Zijlstra
>
Hello Jannie et al.

The current area of Finland has been a battleground between the kingdom
of Sweden and Russian forces from the Middle Ages until 1809 when
Finland was annexed by the Russian Empire as a Grand Duchy with her own
legistlation and eventually own currency, the Finnish Mark. Up to that
moment the frontier changed many times while the population on both
sides of the border remained Finnish both ethnically and linguistically.
The Russian influence in the Finnish (or Carelian) language naturally
gets more marked the more Eastward you go. Correspondingly the Swedish
influence is grater in the Western parts of Finland. Due to the
fundamental differences between the Finno-Ugric Finnish and the
Indo-European Swedish and Russian those influences always remained
rather superficial being mostly loan words. Another important source of
loan words was the Low Saxon spoken by the rulers of the Baltic
countries and the Hansaetc League. The Finnish town of Wyborg (Viipuri)
(lost in the WW2 to the Soviet Union 1945) used to be a lively
commercial centre where in the Middle ages the bourgeois class was
mainly Low Saxon speaking Germans trading with Nowgorod and Reval
(Tallin) a long time before the establishing of St Petersburg and even
after that. While the common people mostly spoke Finnish, also Russian,
Swedish and even French could be heard in that little cosmopolitan centre.
I don't know when the poultry was introduced to Finland, in any case it
was a rare phenomenon till the end of the 16. century. The name "kana"
obviously is of Germanic origin: Swedish "höna" and as Ron pointed out
the Low Saxon "hana". As for my speculation that the transformation from
h to k might be due to Russian influence, well Ron said: "Russian would
have had to borrow the word first (> *_ган(а)_ [*gan(a)]) and then pass
it on to Finnish (> _kana_)", which is very good argument. However all
kinds of changes can take place in circumstances where many languages
meet, so purely speculatively I think a place like Wyborg could have
been a breeding ground for transformations like hana>kana and
hansa>kansa. It's also only a short while ago when the colloquial
Finnish was strongly divided in dialects actively used by the "common
people" Those dialects have phonems, often antiquated ones, the
relatively young standard literary language does not know.

--
Antero Helasvuo
Luutnantinpolku 9 C 20
00410 HELSINKI
FINLAND

TEL (fax on demand) +358 9 5872345
antero.helasvuo at welho.com

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