Deutsches Gewässernamenbuch – a resource for Swedish onomasticians. – The publication of Albrecht Greule’s magnificent work Deutsches Gewässernamenbuch (DGNB) in 2014 was an event of European significance. Consulting this extensive dictionary makes it much easier than before to obtain information about the wide-ranging and important German research undertaken in the field of hydronymy. The material dealt with in DGNB is of great interest from a lexicographic, morphological and semantic point of view. The present author has found many hydronyms in DGNB that merit consideration in the study of Swedish place-names.

Low German is widely associated with such terms as humour, congeniality, and honesty. They are a result of the tension in the national language’s variational spectrum. This is reflected in the choice of names für North German clubs and associations, clubs devoted to the maintenance of local and regional traditions in the broadest sense: a history club is called Tru un fast, a theater club Snackfatt, and a choir Plattdeutsche Schreihälse, for example. Such names are gaining momentary importance in the description of linguistic landscapes attesting to the multilingualism and charm of a region. In tourism and its search for authenticity, this is in fact economic capital. The science of onomastics should pay more attention to the names and naming of clubs.

The focus is on the name(s) of the Merovingian pretender Ballomeris–Gundovald (†585). Notwithstanding the prejudice of many historians Ballomeris is not an invective but a given name. The component -meris was characteristically for traditional names of princely Francs (4th to 6th century), the component gunthi- appears more ‘modern’. (Furthermore the stems balþa > ballo ‘brave’ and vald ‘to rule’ were often confused.) So the change of name reflects the changing role from illegitimate son of a king to a claimant for dynastical participation and at least for kingship. Unfortunately the perspective of the prejudice mentioned above hampered for a long time the consideration of Ballomeris as a name (not as a word) and blocked the use of onomastics in this case.

The onomatology traditionally assumes that -ingen (and -heim) ending toponyms are the oldest Germanic place names and date back to the Migration Period. Because these earliest place names always start with a personal name, it is believed that linguistic research could be able to reconstruct the names of the town founders out of them. However, the earliest place names are mentioned for the first time in the written records of the 8th to 12th centuries. The study shows that the personal names in the toponyms are still changing in the earliest documents of the 8th/9th century. Therefore, it seems not possible to reconstruct the personal names – and the persons – contained in the toponyms and to assign them to the town founders of the alemannic settlement period.

The article reviews vol. 6 of the significant Deutscher Familiennamenatlas (Atlas of German Surnames) by Kathrin Dräger. The book is considered to be an essential work on today’s patronymic surnames. By disclosing their structure and geographic distribution the author simultaneously takes an innovative approach to the occurence of the underlying first names in the (late) Middle Ages. Furthermore, the article emphasizes that the complete atlas as it now stands is not only a milestone in anthroponomastics but also a prime example of scientific organization and the sustainable promotion of junior scientists.

This paper provides an overview of the discussion on so called onymic phrasemes. In onomastics they are usually described as fixed combinations of words functioning as proper names (proper noun phrases). The focus hereby is on those names that are not only polylexical and semantically transparent (cf. the White House, the “new Länder“) but also have an apparent literal meaning (cf. appellative/ descriptive meaning) and a non-literal meaning (‘specific/ assigned meaning’). Phraseology integrates those names as a special class of phrasemes or more precisely as nominative phrasemes with the feature [+ onymic]. Like all phrasemes, they are polylexical and rigid and develop a “new meaning” which should be modeled along theoretical conceptions. Upon closer inspection one can also find correlations along the lines of questions of meaning, phraseologization, proprialization, as well as idiomatization and dissociation. Problems in lexicography and orthography result from the status of onymic phrasemes of the type the Far East. Whether or not onomastics and phraseology should work together more closely on this topic or distance themselves from one another can only be determined once the discipline of onomastics is more engaged with phraseolexemes of the type [+ onymic/ monoreferential]. The aim of this paper is to call attention to similarities and differences between these two fields.

Where there is the beginning of the mountainous range of the Scharten in the northern part of the Hausruckviertel in Upper Austria there are situated one opposite each other Vitta with originally three little farms and Fürling with only one big farm. There will be discussed the possible etymologies of there indoeuropean or celtic origin and their further romanic and german development.

German vineyard names often consist of terms like Berg, Buck/Buckel, Hang, Höhe, Kopf and Kupp to describe hills, slopes or mountains. This essay is concerned with names like Höllenpfad or Geiershöll. The element Höll(e) has nothing to do with Hölle in the sense of ‘underworld’. It derives from the Old High German haldi ‘slope, hill’. In accordance with phonetic laws, haldi develops from heldi > helde > helle into Höll(e). The names of vineyards with Hölle emerge particularly in West Middle German. Terms with Halde trace back to Old High German halda. Such forms occur primarily in the area of Upper German.

The term sustainability is an essential part of the languages of business (commercialese). A lot of enterprises consider it as an inherent part of their busines strategy and not as a marketing approach. How do enterprises cope with this term and which role does sustainability play in their names?

In onomastic and linguistic research literature, there are only a few works dealing explicitly with modern unofficial place names. The terminological delimitation of this name class alone presents some difficulties. For what an unofficial place name is is first of all explained by what it is not, namely officially fixed. Unofficial toponyms are essentially distinguished by the fact that they do not have an officially standardized status. They have mostly been developed in oral communication and are used by various groups of speakers at different times, above all to mark social affiliations. But it is precisely in their lack of official fixation that they allow an illuminating look at mechanisms of name genesis, name establishment and the social role of place names.