LL-L "What does it mean?" 2008.06.07 (02) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L  - 07 June 2008 - Volume 02
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From: Luc Hellinckx <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "What does it mean?"

Beste Ron,

You wrote:

Body:
First and foremost (I offer) my eager, humble service now, always and
everywhere.
     Dear, honourable gentlemen, I herewith have you kindly know that the
King of Denmark hath caused me great damage and hath ruined me ("to the
ground" =) thoroughly. And for this I desire to retaliate against him if I
can etc. Furthermore I have you know that this summer (?) I shall set out to
sea. For this reason (please) warn your merchants that they not ship (any) (
*gut *=  goods =) merchandise upon (*vynde boddeme* =) (the) enemy('s)
waters or likewise no skipper taketh merchandise upon his waters that are
owned by the realm, for (*vynde boddeme maket vynde gut vnde vynde gut maket
vynde boddeme* =) enemy's waters make enemy's merchandise and enemy's
merchandise maketh enemy's waters(?).

I thought somebody on the list earlier on had already pointed out that
"boddeme" refers to a special kind of ship.
The riddle would then mean that you can't separate the ship from the goods
it is carrying, if either one belongs to your enemy, the whole lot can be
confiscated.
For a while however, I was thinking that "boddeme" could also mean "Boden"
(G), "territory"/"waters", like in Nazi-terminology "Blut und Boden", which
ties the rights of inhabitants to the land on which they're living (don't
get me started on this...it's the main source of trouble here in
Brussels/Belgium because Dutch and French communities are
fundamentally...grundsätzlich  :-D ...different in this respect).
In this view, the riddle would become awkward, because "enemy's merchandise
maketh enemy's waters" would mean that the presence of foreign goods on home
territory would automatically change the status of the territory. This
reminds me more of a Latin, or even a nomadic culture, than of a Germanic
one.

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx
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