From: tgpedersen
Message: 50212
Date: 2007-10-03
>http://www.meertens.knaw.nl/taalentongval/abstracts/Vaan2.pdf
> --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...>
> wrote:
> > At 8:06:33 AM on Thursday, July 15, 2004, tgpedersen wrote:
> >
> > >>>> 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'.
> >
> > >> No. 'Conjectural' here referred to the proposed
> > >> relationship, not to the existence of the word. I already
> > >> knew about Norwegian <vasse> 'to wade'; its existence is
> > >> the only reason even to consider the possibility of a
> > >> relationship in the first place.
> >
> > > Tsk-tsk.
> > > And presumably the reason you didn't mention it in the
> > > first place.
> >
> > Why bother? As far as I'm concerned, it has little bearing
> > on the point that was actually at issue, namely, why one
> > wouldn't spend much time on <vass> 'reed' in etymologizing a
> > Dutch place-name. I gave you the one outside possibility of
> > a relative of which I'm aware and pointed out why, even if
> > it were legitimate, it wouldn't be particularly helpful to
> > you; that seemed quite adequate for a brief answer to a
> > question that it hardly seemed necessary to ask.
> >
>
> Yes, yes. Let's humor you a bit and assume there is no Nordwestblock
> root *wa(:)s-/*wo(:)s-.
>
> How would etymologize 'Land van Waas' (the land between Gent and
> Antwerpen, pretty flat, close to the Westerschelde)?