I assumed it was *dan-i- on the basis of OE
Dene (also Denisc, Dene-mearc, etc.), which, however, is a collective
noun. I'll need to take another look at the various Germanic variants of the
name to see in what form the original stem can be recovered.
The "a" of "Danube" is shortened in
English, but the Latin name (borrowed from Celtic) was Da:nuvius. The IIr
reflexes point to *da:nu- as well. Iranian *a: would have given late
Scytho-Sarmatian *a, which seems to be reflected as Slavic *o in stressed
syllables but reduced *U in pretonic syllables, hence *don- alternating
with *dUn- > modern dn-.
The full name Tuatha Dé [sic! =
"Goddess's"] Danann is, as Chris Gwinn pointed out some time ago, a rather
late literary invention. Anyway, if some Proto-Celts had named _themselves_
after a river (be it the Danube, Donwy, or anything with *da:nu- or *da:neujo-
in it), I wouldn't be surprised at all. Many Slavic tribes, for example, derived
their names from hydronyms. But you seem to claim that somebody else named the
Danes in that manner (*dan- can't be a Germanic reflex of *da:nu-), and that
they accepted the foreigner-given name, which people are reluctant to do, on the
whole.
Piotr
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Wednesday, January 10, 2001 11:52 AM
Subject: [tied] Re: etruscan
I looked up Danes in my little NuDansk Ordbog. It says O.Ic.
pl.
"danir", Old Danish "dan". So where does the *-i of your *dani-
"Dane" come
from? Old Icelandic has dönsk "Danish" where ö is an u-
umlauted a (if that's
not part of the inflection). North Germanic
forms of "danish" or "Denmark"
(Danmark) do not show umlaut.
If the wovel of *da:nu- is long, whence the Dn-
of Dniepr and Dniestr?
What shortened that wovel in Don and Danube? If it is
silly for a
people to call themselves a "river people", does "sea people"
make
sense? If "river people" a designation for a people that has settled
on a river, does a "sea people" live by the the sea to enjoy the
view?
If naming yourself by *da(:?)nu- makes no sense, how about the
Tuatha te
Danan? If you can't lump Celtic and Germanic etnonyms
together, how about
Cimmerians, Cimbri and Cymru?
I need another cup of
coffee.
Torsten