Re[2]: [tied] Gmc. Place-names & the Pas-de-Calais [was: Transhuman

At 7:02:28 AM on Friday, January 9, 2004, tgpedersen wrote:

> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> <BMScott@...> wrote:

>> At 5:28:34 AM on Thursday, January 8, 2004, tgpedersen
>> wrote:

[...]

> Are there any *Beorminga- names in the vicinity [of
> Birmingham]?

Not to my knowledge.

[...]

> No, but the idea of having a 'reception center' for young
> 'have- spatha, will-travel's on the continental side would
> make a lot of sense logistically for someone in the
> process of landnám, with a high attrition rate in his
> retinue, don't you think?

The question is based on preconceptions that I don't share.

> Another fact: Udolph's gives "plot of arable land raised
> above swampy territory" as the sense of <horst>/<hurst>.

Attested senses of OE <hyrst> are 'a hillock, a bank', 'a
copse, a wood', and, linking the two, 'a wooded eminence';
in ME also 'a sandbank'. I have seen OHG <hurst> glossed 'a
heap, a thicket, a sandbank', and LGer and EFris <horst> as
'a wooded eminence'.

> But although this is found almost all over the place, also
> in Flanders, it is not found in the Pas-de-Calais. In oter
> words, the Germanic speakers in that area had use for a
> word meaning "small fenced-in settelement" but not for a
> word for arable land. How did they make a living then, and
> for how long?

This is ridiculous: even on Udolph's interpretation
<horst>/<hurst> isn't a general term for arable land, but
rather a term for a specific type of arable land.

Brian