Friday, November 11, 2011

New toponyms for Europe, Atlantic, Eurasia and Australia

The ritmálssafn orðabókar háskólans makes mention of two genuine Icelandic names for Europe:
1) Kvöldlönd (based upon the German 'Abendland', which, in the Old World's view, before the Columbian period of discoveries, was antonymous to 'the lands of the rising sun, the morning lands' (Asia)) and
2) Norðurálfa (Northern continent). Derivations like 'kvöldlendingur' or 'kvöldlenskur' are possible, but there happens to be a better option.

The SnorraEdda mentions a second name for the European mainland: Enea, derived from the name Aeneas, the Troyan hero, who fled to Carthago and later to Italy, where he was thought to be an ancester of Romulus, founder of the city of Rome. Unfortunately, this name is troublesome to construct derivations with: Enneskur??, Ennverji, Enjungur. Not possible.

It's regrettable that I or anybody else have apparently never tried an adjectival derivation of 'aftann' with the suffixes -anskur or -neskur, often observed in toponymic derivations like rússneskur, lettneskur, tyrkneskur. Aftneskur or aftanskur (Dat. of aftann is 'aftni') is just a derivation of "aftann" while at the same time it LUCKILY sounds as being derived from a place-name, which is interesting. It miraculously leans itself to an appropriate Icelandic equivalent for 'European'. It is the ideal word to refer to Europeans, less akward as 'kvöldlenskur'. This is very interesting and opens up new possibilities.

Let's observe the following construction:

Aftanálfa (evening continent): Europe (Some argue that 'evening land' should be interpreted in a narrower sense, applying only to 'Western Europe'. This problem is solved by making use of 'álfa' instead of 'land'.)
aftneskur, aftanskur: European
Eftningur, aftneskur (aftanskur probably resembles 'afganskur' too much) maður, Aftani (maybe too much like Afgani): European (inhabitant)
Eftningahreyfingin: European movement (Evrópuhreyfingin)
Aftneska húsið í Strætisborg (í Stransborg, Steinvegarborg): Palais de l' Europe. (The original name of Strassbourg is the old texts is Stransborg, which was later replaced by Strætisborg (Old Latin name Stratisburgum, fortress at the (stone or Roman) road. Still, it is possible to form an even more genuine Icelandic name for the city: 'stræti' refers to a "Roman road", which were the first roads in Europe made of 'stone'. The original meaning of the word is explained in the Íslensk orðsifjabók as 'Steinlagður vegur'. Let's use 'steinvegur' as the pure equivalent of the latinism 'stræti'. The name for Strassbourg then becomes the ultra-pure Steinvegarborg)
aftneska þingið: European parliament
Aftneska bandalagið: European communion
Aftnesk-Indversk tungumál: Indo-European languages
Aftneska Efnahagsbandalagið
: European Economic community
afti
: Euro (currency unit, yes, the 'n', a part of the stem is lost, but so is the last syllable of the name Europa in 'Euro'., So why not using Afta- as the equivalent of constructions with Euro-)
aftneskur eyrir: Eurocent
aftneskur dalur: Eurodollar
að aftneska: to europeanize
aftneskun
: europeanization
Aftasýn, Eftningasýn
: Eurovision
Aftnesk söngvakeppni: Eurovision song contest

Aftanshafið: Atlantic Ocean (From Old German 'Abendmeer' (Evening sea, Google "abendmeer atlantische". I should have conceived this long before. Indeed, in the traditional, Old world view, the far east of asia is regarded as the "Land of Dawn", hence the Pacific could be described as the 'Sea of dawn' and the Atlantic ocean is the 'sea of the evening land', the atlantic ocean. Although there's no real term for the atlantic ocean in the Old Icelandic writs, the denotation 'aftanshaf' is so obvious (and more so because the German 'Abendmeer' existed in this meaning) that no reference to an old Icelandic word is needed.)
Aftanshafssambandið: NATO
Aftanshafsfylki: Atlantic states (USA)
Aftanshafshryggur (Jörmungandshryggur)
: Mid-Atlantic Ridge

Reginland: Eurasia (The prefix 'Regin-' denotes something 'huge' and is used here to designate a huge 'Meginland'. The Eurasian continent is the largest landmass on the planet.
Reginlenskur: Eurasian
Aftnesk-Austurlenskur: Eurasian

NB: But kvelskur (kveld-skur, 'd' is lost like in 'land - lenskur'), kvelskur maður is also possible

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