Re: Nordwestblock, Germani, and Grimm's law

--- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, george knysh <gknysh@...> wrote:

>
> --- On Sun, 1/17/10, Torsten <tgpedersen@...> wrote:
>
> --- In cybalist@... s.com, george knysh <gknysh@> wrote:
> >
> > In the Wikipedia article on the NWB one reads the following:
> >
> > "Kuhn noted that since [PIE] /b/ was very rare, and since this
> > PIE /b/, via Grimm's law, is the only source of regularly
> > inherited /p/'s in words in Germanic languages, the many words
> > with /p/'s which do occur must have some other language as
> > source."
>
> Actually, I wrote that.
>
> ****GK: That's perfectly OK.****
>

Well, thank you.

> > In cybalist message 65652, one reads: "the Grimm sound shift ...
> > took place, judging from placenames in W Germany and the
> > Netherlands, no earlier than the 1st cent. BCE."
> >
> > It seems to me that the Germanization of the NWB took place after
> > the Grimm sound shift. otherwise the /p/ words and toponyms would
> > also have been subject to it. Which means that the incoming
> > Germani already spoke a language with the familiar "Germanic"
> > consonants. If this shift occured "no earlier than the 1rst c.
> > BCE" then the invasion and Germanization of the area took place
> > still later.
>
> Actually, that's how I date the sound shift.
> http://tech. groups.yahoo. com/group/ cybalist/ message/29016
>
> ****GK: But if the doublets are from the NWB area why could this
> not simply suggest that Grimm/Verner arrived there with the
> colonists (and the earlier forms survived) but actually emerged
> earlier in the colonists' homeland?*****

Many years ago I worked on a temporary job in the ministry of housing on a project which involved people applying for compensation for the loss on their property incurred by a zoning law, which means I got to see a lot of place names. Among them Skjern
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skjern,_Denmark
and Gjern
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gjern
which show the characteristic Jutland palatalization before front vowel (or breaking e > je, depending on your view). The 30-40 year old list I worked from had them depalatalized as Skern and Gern. Today they are officially Skjern and Gjern, but on Sjælland what was once spelled Kjøge and Kjøbenhavn are now spelled Køge
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%B8ge
and København
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K%C3%B8benhavn
although the palatalization in those names a few hundred years back was just as real as the Jutland one (which in the meanwhile has disappeared at least in the cities).
My point is that in order for two different forms to appear, seemingly affected and non-affected by some soundlaw, there must be a connection in the mind of the speaker between those two forms, ie. the soundlaw is alive and still functioning in his mind as a mark of a *sociolect*. And this is what I imagine happened in case of the incoming Gemani in NW Germay and Holland: they spoke a sociolect of a common language in which Grimm's law had already applied.

>
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/27873
>
> > There are problems with this. Many linguists believe that Grimm
> > much antedates 100 BCE
>
> Without giving any reason.
>
> ****GK: What about Piotr's points in
> http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/cybalist/message/1957 ****

He makes this point:
'In fact, we have no good evidence for the absolute dating of Grimm's Law.' BTW, AFAIK Caesar doesn't mention any Chariwaldus.

...

> > Wikipedia also notes that nothing has yet been finally decided,
> > that discussion is still possible.
> >
>
> Yeah, right
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Nordwestblock
>
> 'NEW SOURCES?
>
> Wanted some English sources. I can't read or evaluate the main
> German references given. In addition there may be something
> translatable in the following references BUT I can't read them:
> Goldenrowley 03:31, 3 October 2007 (UTC)
>
> * Hans Kuhn , Vor- und frühgermanisch Ortsnamen in Nord-Deutschland
> und die Niederlanden, Westfälische Forschungen, 12, pp. 5 - 44,
> 1959. (German)
> * Hans Kuhn, Rolf Hachmann et Georg Kossack, Völker zwischen
> Germanen und Kelten. Schriftquellen, Bodenfunde und Namengute zur
> Geschichte des nördlischen Westdeutschlands um Christi Geburt,
> Neumünster, Karl Wachholz, 1962. (German)
> * Wolfgang Meid, Hans Kuhn "Nordwestblock" Hypothese: zur
> Problematik der Völker zwischen Germanen und Kelten", in
> Germanenproblem in heutiger Sicht, Berlin, De Gruyter, 1986.
> (German)'

In particulr I enjoyed the phrase 'there may be something translatable in the following references'. Apparently there exist German texts which are in principle untranslatable.


Torsten