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.

As Thietmar of Merseburg reports in his well-known chronicle, King Henry II set up a camp iuxta Sprewam flivium in the provincia Nice during his campaign against Bolesław Chrobry of Poland in the year 1005. Up to now, historians and onomasticians have not agreed on where to locate Nice. Some see it as a Slavic settlement area around the town of Forst on the Neisse river; others, however, equate the provincia Nice with the pagus Selpoli, a Slavic tribal area on the Lubst river (Polish Lubsza) a right tributary of the lower Neisse river. A thorough analysis of the historical, onomastical und archaeological facts leads to the conclusion that in the region around Forst, especially in the south, a small Slavic settlement area extended along the left bank of the Neisse river. This is also indicated by the fact that there is a concentration not only of older Slavic place name types, but also of surnames typical only for this region. Although they developed in later times, they are a sign of an older settlement community. Moreover, archaeological finds from the middle and late Slavic periods point to a settlement region which is clearly confined by areas lacking any finds at all. / Wie Thietmar von Merseburg in seiner bekannten Chronik berichtet, schlug Heinrich II. auf seinem Feldzug gegen Bolesław Chrobry von Polen im Jahre 1005 iuxta Sprewam fluvium in der provincia Nice ein Lager auf. Bis heute sind sich Historiker und Namenforscher nicht einig, wo Nice zu lokalisieren ist. Manche sehen darin ein slawisches Siedlungsgebiet um Forst an der Neiße, andere wiederum setzen Nice mit dem pagus Selpoli, einem slawischen Wohngau an der Lubst, poln. Lubsza, einem rechten Zufluß der unteren Neiße, gleich. Eine genaue Analyse der historischen, namenkundlichen und archäologischen Zusammenhänge führte zu dem Schluss, dass sich in der Gegend um Forst, besonders südlich davon, einst ein slawischer Kleingau am linken Ufer der Neiße erstreckte, denn dort konzentrieren sich nicht nur ältere slawische Ortsnamentypen, sondern es finden sich aus späterer Zeit auch nur für diesen Raum typische Zunamen, die auf eine ältere Siedlergemeinschaft hindeuten. Darüber hinaus lassen Bodenfunde aus mitt el- und spätslawischer Zeit auf eine Siedlungskammer schließen, die sich durch fundleere Räume deutlich gegen den Gau Luzici und den Gau Selpoli abgrenzt.

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 motif of the doppelgänger has been present in literature and the visual arts, but also, more or less concealed, in music, from classical antiquity until today and may manifest itself in the most various forms, dependent on genre, epoch, and culture. This has led criticism to consider the motif of the doppelgänger as a genre in its own right and to propose, especially during the last years, numerous classifications of the ways in which this psychological and anthropological phenomenon is treated in the arts. In the present study I have concentrated my attention on creations in which the doppelgänger represents the disturbing aspects of the hero’s ego. This motif was especially prominent in German late romanticism and has considerably spread during the last decades in cinematography and in fantastic literature. Though there exists a large amount of criticism on the motif of the doppelgänger, what has hardly been analyzed up to now is the role of the characters’ and their doppelgängers’ names. Therefore the aim of my study was to exemplify by means of numerous examples from antiquity until present times the role the proper name has played in literature and other arts dedicated to the theme of the doppelgänger.

Aus dem gedrängten Überblick geht hervor, dass der Benennung von Siedlungen oft georgische Baumbezeichnungen zugrunde liegen, die unterschiedlicher Herkunft sind. Diejenigen Bezeichnungen, die offenbar kartwelischen Ursprungs sind, bilden drei Gruppen: 1. solche, die sich für die kartwelische Grundsprache rekonstruieren lassen (d. h. wo auch swanische Entsprechungen vorliegen), 2. solche, die bis auf die jüngere georgisch-sanische Grundsprache zurückgehen, und 3. nur in der georgischen Sprache belegbare Bezeichnungen, für die sich kein regelmäßig entsprechendes Material der anderen Kartwelsprachen beibringen lässt. Hinzu kommen jene georgischen Baumbezeichnungen, die aus anderen Sprachen entlehnt worden sind. Der Vergleich der georgischen Baumnamen mit der betreffenden Lexik der anderen Kartwelsprachen und mit den rekonstruierten Grundformen zeigt, dass bei der Entstehung der georgischen Oikonyme die Aufspaltung der kartwelischen Grundsprache in die heutigen Einzelsprachen bereits abgeschlossen war. Zu der gleichen Folgerung führt die Einbeziehung jener Oikonyme, die auf Lehnwörtern fußen, die nur im Georgischen (aber nicht im Mingrelischen, Lasischen und Swanischen) vertreten sind.

The article is a review of the newly published Atlas of German Family Names. Vol. 1. The authors determine the place of this publication in the history of anthroponymic research as a completely new type of map book. Its results are achieved with the aid of a special software, that turns out to be a mighty means of creating distributional maps of present-day German family names on the basis of digitally stored phone connections (CD-ROM). – Within the scope of grammatical and lexical issues number 1 in a series of volumes to be published deals with the vocalism of family names. After summarising the structure of the book and the new impetus it gives not only to anthroponymy but, beyond that, to further linguistic and historical disciplines, the authors also point to some shortcomings that should be avoided in the following volumes. On the whole, the atlas is appreciated as an important step to a deeper insight into the growth and linguistic structure of both widespread and, as to the respective problem, typical German family names.

The article gives a review about the development of onomastics in Leipzig, beginning with first publications about Lithuanian personal names in 1909 by a famous representative of Slavonic linguistics. Further the survey shows the merits of Slavonic linguists for onomastics in scientific discourse with other philologists. Three different stages of its development since the Second World War are characterised specifically: the time of orientation in the new scientific area, the formation of an interdisciplinary group of researchers in 1953 and their regular national and international publications since 1956. This developmental period of Onomastic research was based on international co-operation and various projects, one of which is reflected by the increasing popularity of this journal as an internationally distributed and acclaimed paper. The main directions, questions, intentions, projects, and aims as well as the results in onomastics are described and illustrated in this article. A new period in Onomastic research began in 1990, which includes new perspectives and the creation of the academic subject "Onomastics" which is increasingly popular with students. And since then a new quality of public relation of onomastics on TV and other media can be noted.

Since the 1960s Germany has seen the arrival of a considerable number of immigrants, mainly from Turkey. The Turkish language, the religion of the Turkish people and other Turkish groups manifest themselves in their naming traditions. The Turkish history, culture and language (also of other groups who speak a Turkish language) is unknown in Germany. The present paper is the beginning of a project of a Turkish dictionary with Turkish names.

Since the 1960s Germany has the arrival of a considerable number of immigrants, mainly from Turkey. This paper is a statistic investigation of Turkish names in Germany.

This paper examines company names from a pragmatic point of view and focuses on their functions in different local and socio-cultural contexts. A company name has to fulfil many functions, among them identification, distinction, protection and promotion. The latter function is of special relevance, since the world of today is a consumer culture, where many activities in business and even in personal contexts have to some extent been influenced by promotional concerns. The promotional function of company names can be realised by different naming strategies, including linguistic form and graphic design. In recent years, however, studies of cultural, social or emotional values of names have gained in importance. The name is seen as reflecting sets of common values that are connected with the environment in people’s minds, thus maintaining a certain ‘we-feeling’. This can, for example be achieved by the inclusion of locations as elements of company names. The name is linked to a particular region and thus connotes the company’s origin, traditions and scope of business or personal attachment to a certain place. Based on the 2007 lists of the top 100 companies, ranked by revenues, in Central Germany (Mitteldeutschland) and Lower Saxony (Niedersachsen), the present study aims at a more systematic description of regional connotations of company names, which are especially frequent in the eastern part of Germany. Possible explanations for this situation will be offered and discussed with respect to factors such as economic motivation, historical background, local culture and global competition.