From: gknysh
Message: 67814
Date: 2011-06-20
>****GK: Only one of the three Ventas is connected to the Belgae. The others are Venta Icenorum and Venta Silurum. Looks like the poor Veneti got it from everybody (:=)). But seriously, I think the link to the discussion mentioned by Brian Scott is useful, and the notion that "venta" was a borrowing into Celtic worthy of further study. On the Venet/Vened problem cf. also ch. 3 here: http://books.google.com/books?id=5aoId7nA4bsC&pg=PA87&dq#v=onepage&q&f=false
> DGK wrote: I see no basis for Wikipedia's claim that <Venta> meant 'market', and Kitson's theory of extraction from suffixed names is implausible. But if the Belgae conquered the three towns named Venta from the Veneti, perhaps the original name was *Wenetja:, and this became in Belgic *Wentt(j)a with regular syncope and /j/-gemination (a feature later occurring in NWB-influenced West Germanic).