Re: [tied] Slavic placenames

19-01-04 14:10, andelkod wrote:

> Oldest attested name for Ljubljana is Luwigana (slavic form) and
> Laibach (german form). Landscape around Ljubljana is dominated by an
> exposed round hill, so, I tend to connect Ljubljana with *lUbI 'head,
> skull', rather then love. Why not? What love can have with one
> medieval burg located on top of hill?

Names of cities do not necessarily derive from their topographic
features. I don't think Leibach/Labacum is related to the Slavic name
(let alone *lUbI 'skull'). Mediaeval Luvigana may be just a crude
orthographic rendering of Slavic *ljubjana (I've seen far stranger
corruptions). The root *ljub- yields many personal, tribal and
geographical names in Slavic. As for *lUbI, it doesn't produce any
derivatives with *ljub-.

Piotr