Fw: Re: [tied] Re: Frankish origins

From: Torsten
Message: 65341
Date: 2009-11-01

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> At 5:09:33 PM on Friday, October 30, 2009, Torsten wrote:
>
>
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> > <BMScott@> wrote:
>
> >> At 7:46:46 PM on Wednesday, October 28, 2009, Torsten
> >> wrote:
>
> >>> -- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> >>> <BMScott@> wrote:
>
> >>>> At 4:10:01 PM on Sunday, October 25, 2009, Torsten wrote:
>
> >>>>> http://tinyurl.com/yjcsxkk
> >>>>> Danish original
> >>>>> http://www.verasir.dk/show.php?file=chap22-1-1.html
>
> >>>> He writes:
>
> >>>> I Kalevala har Ukko heitet "ylijumala", der i dag
> >>>> oversættes til "God of Mercy/Lykkens Gud", men
> >>>> oprindeligt må have haft betydningen "Julens Herre",
> >>>> jvf. julemandens navn "Ýlir" i Norge/Island i 900
> >>>> tallet e.Kr.
>
> >>>> But <ylijumala> is 'high god' (<yli> 'over, above; more
> >>>> than', <jumala> 'god'). In fact, Václav Blaz^ek thinks
> >>>> that the name <Ukko> itself is an adaptation of Baltic
> >>>> *uka- > Prussian <ucka-> 'prefix expressing the
> >>>> superlative' (as in <ucka-kuslaisin> 'weakest'): the
> >>>> first god of the Prussian pantheon is in record as
> >>>> <Occopirmus> 'Saturnus' 1530, <Ockopirmus> 'der erste
> >>>> Gott Himmels vnd Gestirnes' (16th cent.), and
> >>>> <Occopirnum> 'deum coeli et terrae' 1563. He concludes:
> >>>> 'It is generally accepted that the compound *Uka-pirmas
> >>>> meant "most first"'.
>
> >>> But where does that leave Öku-Þor then?
>
> >> It says nothing about it at all.
>
> > What it?
>
> Blaz^ek's hypothesis says nothing about the Scandinavian
> name <Öku-Þórr>.

No, I can see that, but where does that leave Öku-Þor?

>
> >> If you believe Snorri, Ukko is totally irrelevant;
>
> > ?? How so?
>
> Because Snorri takes <Öku-> to be a derivative of <aka> 'to
> drive (a vehicle)', referring to Thor's goat-drawn cart,
> thereby making it a purely Norse development.

I was asking *you*.

> >> if you think that <Ukko> is the source of <Öku->, the
> >> source of <Ukko> is still irrelevant.
>
> > Erh, why?
>
> Why ask such a stupid question?

Maybe you should cut back on the booze? It does things to your brain.

> If the Norse byname is
> borrowed from the Finnish theonym, the source of the theonym
> is prima facie irrelevant to that act of borrowing. Middle
> English borrowers of Old North French <cherise> 'cherry'
> didn't know that it was from Greek <kerasos> by way of Latin
> <cerasus> and Late Latin <ceresia>.


Well, I was thinking more along the lines of a common substrate, not surprisingly.

> >> The real point is that this is a very basic error, as is
> >> the error about <Ýlir>. If he can't even get this stuff
> >> right, I'm not inclined to trust him about much of
> >> anything, or to take him very seriously as a scholar.
>
> > I can understand that these matters of prestige are very
> > important to you so I won't press the point.
>
> Don't be an ass. I'm talking about his evident lack of
> *competence*.

Blind høne kan også finde et korn.
Regardless of whether he knows what yli- means in Finnish.

> I couldn't care less about his formal credentials.
>
> Are you unable to distinguish 'doesn't know what he's
> talking about' from 'doesn't have a high reputation in the
> field' or from 'doesn't have the usual formal credentials'?

I thought that was you did that.

> [...]
>
> >>> True, bungled, but...
> >>> I don't think we can escape 'jól' on this one.
>
> >> It's certainly a possibility. But then Yule itself is the
> >> underlying idea, referring to a time and a festival.
>
> > And still one of Odin's names is Jólnir
>
> So what?
>
Oh, you're in that mood.

> >> [...]
>
> >>>> De tidligst kendte stednavne i Britannien, hvori indgår
> >>>> "Jól", er "Youlton" (Jól's tun) i North Yorkshire, og
> >>>> "Youlthorpe" (Jól's thorp) i East Riding, Yorkshire.
>
> >>>> Here's what Watts has to say about the place-names:
>
> >>>> S.n. <Youlton>: 'Joli's estate'. <Loletun(e)> (for
> >>>> <Iole-> 1086, <Yolton'> 1295-1508.
>
> >>>> S.n. <Youlthorpe>: 'Eyjulfr's outlying farm', later
> >>>> 'Yole's outlying farm', with spellings <Aiul(f)torp> 1086,
> >>>> <Hiel-, Hioltorp> 12th c., <Yolt(h)orpe(e)> 12th-1359.
> >>>> From the 12th cent. this name contains a different
> >>>> pers.n., ME <Yole> from ON <Jól>, <Jóli>.
>
> >>>> So this one apparently never did contain the Scandinavian
> >>>> name as such and didn't acquire its ME borrowing until the
> >>>> 12th century.
>
> >>> Apparently Watts' Eyulfr hangs on the 1086 form alone.
> >>> Are you sure that is not a folk normalization of an
> >>> unusual name?
>
> >> As sure as one can be in such cases. If it were a folk
> >> normalization, it would most likely have persisted.
>
> > It can go either way, as you very well know.
>
> I know how to play the odds.

Whatever.

> >> Besides, the manner in which DB was constructed means
> >> that odd forms are generally the result of Anglo-Norman
> >> misunderstanding of native input. Here we have a
> >> perfectly expectable AN rendering of a late OE form of
> >> <Eyjulfsþorp>.
>
> > Can't say it couldn't happen. [...]
>
> I *can* say, however, that it's very unlikely, and that
> there's no evidence for it. I also cannot absolutely
> exclude the possibility that it's the result of telepathic
> control of the scribes by invisible pink unicorns.

You definitely need to cut back.


Torsten