Re: Fw: Re: [tied] Re: Frankish origins

From: Brian M. Scott
Message: 65335
Date: 2009-10-30

At 7:46:46 PM on Wednesday, October 28, 2009, Torsten wrote:

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

>> At 4:10:01 PM on Sunday, October 25, 2009, Torsten wrote:

>>> http://tinyurl.com/yjcsxkk
>>> Danish original
>>> http://www.verasir.dk/show.php?file=chap22-1-1.html

>> He writes:

>> I Kalevala har Ukko heitet "ylijumala", der i dag
>> oversættes til "God of Mercy/Lykkens Gud", men oprindeligt
>> må have haft betydningen "Julens Herre", jvf. julemandens
>> navn "Ýlir" i Norge/Island i 900 tallet e.Kr.

>> But <ylijumala> is 'high god' (<yli> 'over, above; more
>> than', <jumala> 'god'). In fact, Václav Blaz^ek thinks
>> that the name <Ukko> itself is an adaptation of Baltic
>> *uka- > Prussian <ucka-> 'prefix expressing the
>> superlative' (as in <ucka-kuslaisin> 'weakest'): the
>> first god of the Prussian pantheon is in record as
>> <Occopirmus> 'Saturnus' 1530, <Ockopirmus> 'der erste
>> Gott Himmels vnd Gestirnes' (16th cent.), and
>> <Occopirnum> 'deum coeli et terrae' 1563. He concludes:
>> 'It is generally accepted that the compound *Uka-pirmas
>> meant "most first"'.

> But where does that leave Öku-Þor then?

It says nothing about it at all. If you believe Snorri,
Ukko is totally irrelevant; if you think that <Ukko> is the
source of <Öku->, the source of <Ukko> is still irrelevant.

The real point is that this is a very basic error, as is the
error about <Ýlir>. If he can't even get this stuff right,
I'm not inclined to trust him about much of anything, or to
take him very seriously as a scholar.

[...]

>> The interpretation of Þórsdrápa 12:5-8 is certainly a bit
>> idiosyncratic.

>> þá er funhristis fasta
>> flóðrifs Danir stóðu
>> knáttu Jólnis ættir
>> útvés fyrir lúta

>> Different editors have distributed the genitives
>> differently, but one reasonable prose rendering is indeed
>> the one that he used:

>> Danir flóðrifs útvés knáttu lúta fyrir [þeim], þá er ættir
>> funhristis Jólnis stóðu fasta.

>> Danes of the flood-rib of the outlying sanctuary could bow
>> down before (them), when (the) kinsmen of Jólnir's
>> flame-shaker stood fast.

>> <Flóð> is also 'high tide', and <flóðrif> 'flood-rib, rib of
>> the high tide' looks like a term for a skerry. <Útvé>
>> 'outlying sanctuary' looks like a parallel to <Útgarða-> in
>> <Útgarða-Loki>, referring to Jötunheimr; the 'Danes' of its
>> skerry would be giants.

>> <Jólnir> is one of Óðin's names, and <funi Jólnis> 'Óðin's
>> flame' is a kenning for 'sword', so <funhristir Jólnis>
>> 'Óðin's flame-shaker' = <hristir Jólnis funa> 'shaker of
>> Óðin's flame' = 'sword-shaker' = 'warrior'. Presumably
>> their kinsmen are also warriors. Thus:

>> Giants bowed down before them when (the) warriors stood
>> fast.

> Probably true, but doesn't affect his point.

Yes, it does. It reduces the Odin reference merely to part
of a kenning.

>> He has a grammatical problem with the verse from
>> Skáldskaparmál:

>> Jólna sumbl
>> enn vér gátum,
>> stillis lof,
>> sem steina brú.

>> Here <jólna> is clearly a genitive plural, not the gen.
>> sing. that he wants it to be.

>> (The) gods' banquet/drink [= poetry];
>> we yet fashioned,
>> (the) king's praise,
>> like a stone's bridge.

>> (It's possible that <enn> should be read as <en>
>> 'but/and', if the first line continues the preceding
>> strophe.)

> True, bungled, but...
> I don't think we can escape 'jól' on this one.

It's certainly a possibility. But then Yule itself is the
underlying idea, referring to a time and a festival.

[...]

>> De tidligst kendte stednavne i Britannien, hvori indgår
>> "Jól", er "Youlton" (Jól's tun) i North Yorkshire, og
>> "Youlthorpe" (Jól's thorp) i East Riding, Yorkshire.

>> Here's what Watts has to say about the place-names:

>> S.n. <Youlton>: 'Joli's estate'. <Loletun(e)> (for
>> <Iole-> 1086, <Yolton'> 1295-1508.

>> S.n. <Youlthorpe>: 'Eyjulfr's outlying farm', later
>> 'Yole's outlying farm', with spellings <Aiul(f)torp> 1086,
>> <Hiel-, Hioltorp> 12th c., <Yolt(h)orpe(e)> 12th-1359.
>> From the 12th cent. this name contains a different
>> pers.n., ME <Yole> from ON <Jól>, <Jóli>.

>> So this one apparently never did contain the Scandinavian
>> name as such and didn't acquire its ME borrowing until the
>> 12th century.

> Apparently Watts' Eyulfr hangs on the 1086 form alone.
> Are you sure that is not a folk normalization of an
> unusual name?

As sure as one can be in such cases. If it were a folk
normalization, it would most likely have persisted.
Besides, the manner in which DB was constructed means that
odd forms are generally the result of Anglo-Norman
misunderstanding of native input. Here we have a perfectly
expectable AN rendering of a late OE form of <Eyjulfsþorp>.

Brian