This paper is a response to an article in the journal Acta Linguistica Lithuanica 62–63 (2011), whose author argues partially quite unscientifically. This paper will show the deficiencies of knowledge the other article’s author betrays as far as historical-comparative linguistics in general and Indo-European linguistics especially are concerned. As a conclusion it must be stated that all the results the other author has achieved in the field of ‘Old European Hydronymy’ by using research methods outdated for decades will have to be reevaluated applying to them modern Indo-European linguistics. Only after this task will have been accomplished, one will be able to tell which of that author‘s works and results will be safe for further use.

This paper is a response to an article in the journal Acta Linguistica Lithuanica 62–63 (2011), whose author argues partially quite unscientifically. This paper will show the deficiencies of knowledge the other article’s author betrays as far as historical-comparative linguistics in general and Indo-European linguistics especially are concerned. As a conclusion it must be stated that all the results the other author has achieved in the field of ‘Old European Hydronymy’ by using research methods outdated for decades will have to be reevaluated applying to them modern Indo-European linguistics. Only after this task will have been accomplished, one will be able to tell which of that author‘s works and results will be safe for further use.

The article analyses three place names, which have been explained up to now in the following way: one of them was supposed to be of German, one of Old European and one of Slavic origin. As we show in our paper, all of them are Slavic names, two of them are hydronyms.

During the last decade Prof. Udolph has published a series of at least five articles, in which he argued that the until then unanimously accepted etymology of the place-name Magdeburg ‘City of (the) Virgin(s)’ must be wrong. In these articles he also refuted the less widely known etymology that argues for Magdeburg to be the ‘City of camomilla’. Comparing this and other place-names containing the element Magde‑, Magade‑ vel sim. to others containing the first member Mikil‑, Michel‑ etc. ‘big, great’ he reached the conclusion that Magde‑, Magade‑ etc. should be an adjective meaning something like ‘great, mighty ’ as well. His morphological and phonological arguments for doing so are here refuted by showing that neither is the prototype for his proposed adjective Germ. *magaþ‑, Germ. *nakuađ‑ ‘naked’, etymologically sufficiently clear, nor is there any other way to produce the required word-structure either by Germanic or by Indo-European means of word-formation. Though the author of this article is also not very glad about the older explanations, they have the advantage of simply being morphologically and phonologically flawless.

The oldest forms of the place-name Leipzig, i.e. Libzi, Libiz vel sim., are now generally assumed to be Slavic, i.e. Old Sorabian derivatives of an older river-name, probably of Germanic origin. At the basis of this river-name is thought to be an enlarged root PIE *lei̯‑bh‑ ‘to flow, drip’. As the concept of root enlargement is somewhat problematic and should thus better be abandoned, it is claimed here – based on a recently published idea for the etymologization of the name of the river Elbe – that this assumed Germanic river-name is a derivative of an unenlarged root with the suffix PIE *‑bho‑. This suffix was used to form colour adjectives on the one hand and action nouns vel sim. on the other. Theoretical proto-forms of the river-name are PIE *h2lei̯H‑bho‑ or *h2liH‑bho‑ ‘making/being dirty/filthy’, PIE *lei̯H‑bho‑ or *liH‑bho‑ ‘nestling up against, winding itself’, PIE *lei̯H‑bho‑ or *liH‑bho‑ ‘pouring out’ (→ ‘flowing’?), PIE *lei̯h2‑bho‑ or *lih2‑bho‑ ‘dwindling, disappearing’, PIE *(s)lei̯H‑bho‑ or *(s)liH‑bho‑ ‘blue(ish)’, and PIE *(s)lei̯‑bho‑ ‘slippery, slimy’. A further theoretical possibility is the reconstruction as PIE *lei̯p-o‑ ‘sticky’ vel sim. (> ‘muddy’?). And finally, a reconstruction seems possible regarding the whole name not as a derivative, but as a compound with PIE *‑h2p-o‑ (the zero-grade of PIE *h2ep- ‘water’) as the second member. In this case, the same roots which form the bases of the derivatives are used as the first members of these compounds. All proposals show semantics acceptable for the formation of river-names. Thus no final decision between these proposals is possible.

In den Namenkundlichen Informationen 99/100 stellen Harald Bichlmeier und Andreas Opfermann – nach harscher Kritik an den Deutungen des Flussnamens Unstrut von Jürgen Udolph und Albrecht Greule – einen eigenen Vorschlag zur Etymologie des Namens vor. Sie greifen auf die traditionelle Segmentierung Un-strut zurück, fassen auch -strut im traditionellen Sinne auf (bieten allerdings auch zwei abweichende Erklärungsmöglichkeiten an). Der Unterschied zur klassischen Deutung des Flussnamens besteht vor allem in der Erklärung des Vorderglieds un-. Sie schlagen vor, un- als „das schwundstufige Allomorph von uridg. *(h1)en ‘in’“ aufzufassen. So bestehe „nun die Möglichkeit, urgerm. *un-strōdV- als sog. entheos-Kompositum zu interpretieren.“ Als die wahrscheinlichste Deutung für Unstrut schlagen sie vor: ‘Sumpfgebiet an sich habend’ bzw. ‘[der Fluss,] in/an dem [= an dessen Ufer] Sumpfgebiet/Gebüsch ist’ (Bichlmeier / Opfermann 2011: 179). Die von Bichlmeier / Opfermann angenommene Bildungsweise mag, vom Indogermanischen her gesehen, formal möglich sein. Ob allerdings das Germanische, dem sie den Flussnamen zuordnen, die Möglichkeit zur Bildung sogenannter entheos-Komposita überhaupt (noch) hatte, scheint doch sehr fraglich zu sein. Die Verfasser führen mit ae. umbor ‘Kind’ ein singuläres Beispiel an, um eine solche grammatische Erscheinung im Germanischen nachzuweisen. Eindeutig ist das Beispiel meines Erachtens keineswegs.

Dieser Artikel beschreibt einen neuen angewandten epistemologischen Aspekt der sogenannten Konvergenztheorie, die eine Homogenisierung der unterschiedlichen Ansätze auf dem Gebiet der indoeuropäischen Linguistik anstrebt. Es wird versucht, anhand von Ortsnamen in Verbindung mit der Wurzel *alb- und den semantischen Bedeutungsverschiebungen über Jahrhunderte ein europäisches und italienisches "Makro-Gebiet" (bzw. "Mikro- Gebiet") zu rekonstruieren. Es scheint, dass Paleo-Ligurische Ortsnamen wie Alba, alteuropäische Flussnamen wie Albis und ihre ablautenden Formen Olb- (> Orb- im Romanisch-Ligurischen) nicht direkt auf das Proto-Indoeuropäische Adjektiv *albho-, ‘weiß’ zurückgehen, sondern auf die weitere Prä-proto-Indoeuropäische Wurzel *Hal-bh-, ‘Wasser’, verwandt mit dem Sumerischen ḫalbia (> Akkadisch ḫalpium, ‘Quelle’, ‘Brunnen’, ‘Wassermassen’, ‘Wasserloch’). Eine weitere Analyse von *Hal-bh- führt zum Vergleich mit der Proto-Indoeuropäischen Wurzel *Hal-, ‘ernähren’. Das Proto-Indoeuropäische Suffix *HwaH-r-, ‘Wasser’, weist eine ähnliche Verbreitung auf.

During the last decades a big gap has opened between onomastics on the one side and Indo-European linguistics on the other, because the progresses made in Indo-European linguistics have not been integrated into the study of onomastics any longer in a sufficient way. The article tries to close this gap by giving an outline of some of the main features of modern Indo-European linguistics. Those features are then used to reexamine the etymologies of several presumably rather old river-names and of one of the Indo-European words for "water". This sometimes leads to a reevaluation of existing etymologies. The author hopes that this article might be seen as an incentive for researchers in onomastics to care more about the findings of Indo-European linguistics again.

The present paper deals with a number of aspects, that are connected with the complex topic “names and translation”. Thereby the focus does not lie on the general question of translatability of names, but shows several cases in which names are translated: Geographical names, personal names, names of products and finally names in literature.

Three and a half centuries Don Quixote in German: the proper names. – The first German partial translation of Cervantes’ novel El Ingenioso Hidalgo Don Quijote de la Mancha (Part I 1605, Part II 1615) dates from 1648, the most recent one from 2008. As proper names play an important part in Don Quixote, this paper analyzes their rendering in four different translations, namely by Joachim Caesar (1648), Ludwig Tieck (1799-1801), Ludwig Braunfels (1883), and Susanne Lange (2008). Proper names are rooted deeply in the respective cultures of their users. Therefore the translator’s task is a difficult one: Shall he try to translate the names and thus activate for his readers as many as possible of the cultural connotations they possessed in the original language or shall he transmit them unchanged and thus contribute to the strengthening of local colour? It is shown that different times preferred different solutions, earlier times trying to translate the names of the novel. But even the most recent translation of Don Quixote does not, as might be supposed, abstain from translating part of the novel’s proper names.