>This also means that the two senses are not immobile and mutually
>exclusive, they are stages in the development af a function as
>changed by outer circumstances. In other words, in an established
>sedentary state, a Heeres-führer
Heeresführer (without hyphenation) is 100% OK.
>under a duke/Herzog might be 'mere' but in the nomadic
>people/army (where the people *is* the army) the Herzog and the
>Heeres-führer is the same person (Attila, Djengis Khan etc).
A "bit" above the "mere" rank of a "general". Esp. such leaders as
Attila, Temüdjin-Djingis, who were kagans of the khans (some
kind of "shah-in-shah"). Moreover, many of them were perceived
by their underlings as members of (even "ancient") "royal" clans
(often of Scythian extraction) or at least of "white" (noble) tribes.
They weren't always simple "meritocrats". (AFAIK even Arminius wasn't
"hoi-polloi". And some Sarmatians who disappeared in Germanic
masses also had their own clan symbols = tamgas, didn't they?)
Even in today's governments: often the Heeresführer is the
minister or secretary of Defense, but his senior colleague, the
president of the cabinet or the president of the state, is often
the "supreme chief of the armed forces." (Much the more in
medieval times the monarch as compared with his carrier of
the "spatha".)
So, in Asian terms, Odin, if not a deity, but a "prophet", might
have been a kakhan (kagan) "king of kings" and at the same
time tarkhan "chief over metallurgy (weapons) and shamanic or
religious matters" (usually, a tarkhan was a "viceroy" or kind of a
duke or a Herzog in Western terms). (Unfortunately, I am not
quite acquainted with the corresponding Scythian-Sarmatian-Alan
& Persian termini. I vaguely remember only "ban", seemingly
introduced by Avar's Bayan, and bäg/beg/bey.)
George
PS: Anyway, the assumptions "water + hunting" seem quite an
den Haaren herbeigezogen. Warriors "castes" usually used other
metaphors in order to illustrate their prowess. Esp. those mounted
ones in the East, whose beloved symbols were eagles and other
accipiter-like birds (mythical symbols for many "royal" clans of
the steppes, esp. the Tögrül bird), the lion, the leopard (cf.
Turkic names Baybars), the Cervidae (the founding mythical
symbol for the Hungarians, along with the kartal eagle, the symbol
of the founding dynasty) and, of course, the horse. Even Goths,
Gepids et al. borrowed these accipiter symbols & customs (see
their ornaments and jewelry). The famous Vandals were actually an
Alan-Vandal symbiosis, as was the Goth-Alan one that founded
Catalonia. (They were ahead of their times as far as chivalry, the
long joust lance techniques (against which the Roman legionnaire was
a consummate victim), the long sword, the curved sabre, esp. the
Scythian bow and the "arkan" lasso on a pole. Compared to that,
what could have been a swamp and marsh hopping "Recke" that hid
in forests? Perhaps a... hit-and-run guerrilla fighter. :-))