Re: Wuz

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

> At 4:07:43 AM on Wednesday, July 14, 2004, tgpedersen wrote:
>
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> > <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> >> At 7:37:40 AM on Tuesday, July 13, 2004, tgpedersen
> >> wrote:
>
> >>> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"
> >>> <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> >>>> Künzel, Blok, & Verhoeff, Lexicon van nederlandse
> >>>> toponiemen tot 1200, have the citation <Philippus de
> >>>> Wasnare> 1200 [1305] and say: wrsch. onl. _hare_
> >>>> 'hoogte, heuvelrug' met bijv. nw. _wasn_ (< dativus
> >>>> singularis *_hwassan_) 'scherp' (vgl. oe. _hwass_).
>
> >>> Given Swedish vass 'reed(s)' (I think most Lexicon etc
> >>> writers wouldn't be aware that it existed),
>
> >> Seems a strange assumption; the word's in every
> >> Swedish-English bilingual that I own, in both directions,
> >> and is described as 'common'. (I'm not sure what you mean
> >> by 'Lexicon etc writers'; all three authors are serious
> >> toponymists.)
>
> > That may be so. It seems an obvious choice, so I just
> > puzzled it wasn't discussed or even mentioned. Do you have
> > a better explanation of why that is so?
>
> To the best of my knowledge the word is completely isolated
> even within N.Gmc., unless one assumes that it belongs with
> <vada> 'to wade', which is already pretty conjectural and
> also requires a semantic development that could not
> reasonably be assumed elsewhere.

Ordbog over det danske Sprog has a 'vasse' "wade", fig. "move
clumsily, as if wading through water", dialectal and loaned from
Norwegian. There goes your 'conjectural'.


Second, if we assume the root is Nordwestblock, we should expect
a/o-'ablaut' and variable vowel length; ex Engl. 'hook',
Dutch 'hoek', German 'Haken', and (related to the root under
discussion Engl. 'waste', Dutch 'woest', German 'wüst'. This means
all that may be derived from (loan in) pGmc *was-, *wa:s-, *wos-,
*wo:s- should be considered as descenced from that single
Nordwestblock root.

>This all makes it a very
> weak candidate to appear in a Dutch place-name.

This all makes it a very
strong candidate to appear in a Dutch place-name.

>If the
> etymologies were the main point of the book, perhaps even
> something so unlikely might be discussed, but in fact the
> main point is the documentary evidence.

Whatever that is supposed to mean. Did you have trouble finding the
scherpe hoogte near Wassenaar on a map?


Torsten