From: Sergejus Tarasovas
Message: 2242
Date: 2000-04-28
Piotr wrote:
No, it's a real counterexample. What I said refers to a clear majority of cases, but there's no denying that cases like "the Holy River" can occasionally be encountered. Anyway, this is still an epithet, even if a sacral one, rather than a theonym. A river name derived from a known Slavic god or goddess would be a different thing altogether.
Here's if not counterexample then at least a new pearl for your semantics collection: Šlovė^ 'glory' in Central Lithuania, also Слуя in Smolensk district and Словутичь '(sun of) a famous one', an Old Russian epithet of Dnepr.
By the way: there's a (now?) small village on that Šlovė called Šlovė/nai. Looks like a Lithuanian counterpart of Slavic *Slovĕnĕ:*Slov'anĕ? I've been to this village: the river is extremely small (rather a brook), and I feeled nothing Urheimatish :)
Sergei