Re: [tied] sabrina river

From: Piotr Gasiorowski
Message: 46313
Date: 2006-10-09

On 2006-10-08 18:08, Cuadrado wrote:

> Hello
> does any opportunity to connect
> the river Name Sabrina (Severn)
> with
> tribe celtic name : Abr-incate from Cotentin (France)
> Sabr- = Abr- is aquatic name ?
>

I don't think they can be connected. The river-name contains the Celtic
element *sab- (*sab-ro-). The initial *s- has become /h/ in Brittonic,
but was still a sibilant at the time the Anglo-Saxons arrived in Britain
(Mod.Wel. Hafren but OE Sæfern); the old pronunciation has also been
preserved in the Latinised form. There are quite a few Gaulish
river-names and toponyms in <Sab-> on the continent, and there's OIr.
Sabrann (the old name of the River Lee/An Laoi in County Cork), but the
meaning and further etymology of this element are uncertain (Pokorny's
guess that *sab- is a variant of *sap- 'taste, peerceive' is not very
convincing). In Gaulish, the /s/ would not have been lost.

Piotr