Thing. The effects of the circulation of ideas in the semantics of a term in the early Germanic languages
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5433/1984-3356.2020v13n25p339Keywords:
Res, Things, Semantics, Latinitas, Germanic languagesAbstract
The aim of this article is to assess, by contrast with the evolution traceable in the Latin languages, the semantics of the Germanic words for things, in particular the lexical root that lead to this word and similar terms in the other languages of the same family. We survey the evidence from the earliest Germanic through the medieval languages. Our hypothesis is that the progressive effect of Latinisation affected the meaning and made it closer to those derived from Latin res and causa. This is already partially visible in early Frankish and Langobardic sources, but becomes clear from Carolingian times onwards. The main exception, found in Old Norse and particularly prominent in Icelandic (which preserves the original sense of “assembly”) reinforces this view, as it represents a society relatively outside the institutional and cultural core derived from a Roman framework.Downloads
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References
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WIENER, Leo. Commentary to the germanic laws and mediaeval documents. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1915.
ALVARADO PLANAS, Javier. El problema del germanismo en el derecho español. Madrid: Marcial Pons, 1997.
BAGGE, Sverre. Nordic uniqueness in the middle ages?: political and literary aspects. Gripla, [S. l.], v. 20, p. 56-61, 2009.
BERNÁRDEZ, Enrique. Los mitos germánicos, Madrid: Alianza, 2008.
BLÖNDAL MAGNÚSSON, Ásgeir. Íslensk orðsifjabók. Reykjavík: Orðabók Háskólans, 1989.
BOSWORTH, Joseph; TOLLER, Thomas Northcote. An anglo-saxon dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1898.
BROWN, Bill. Thing theory. Critical Inquiry, Chicago, v. 28, n.1, p. 1-22, 2001.
CLEASBY, Richard; VIGFÚSSON, Guðbrandur. An icelandic-english dictonary. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1874
COLLINGWOOD, Robin; WRIGHT, Richard. The roman inscriptions of britain (RIB), I, Inscriptions on Stone. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1965.
CORTESE, Ennio. Thinx, gairethinx, thingatio, thingare in gaida et gisil. Rivista di Storia del Diritto Italiano,Itália, n. 56, p. 33-64, 1988.
DE VRIES, Jan. Altnordisches etymologisches wörterbuch. Leiden: Brill, 2000.
DESCOLA, Phillipe. Par-delà la nature et culture. París: Gallimard, 2005. ECKHARDT, Karl August (ed.). Lex salica. Hannover: Hahn, 1969. (Leges Natinum Germanicarum, t. 4, parte 2).
GADE, Kari Ellen; WHALEY, Diana (ed.). Anonymous lausavísur - lausavísur from Haralds saga Sigurðarsonar 1. In: GADE, Kari Ellen. Poetry from the kings’ sagas 2: from c. 1035 to c. 1300. Turnhout: Brepols, 2009. (Skaldic poetry of the scandinavian middle ages, v. 2). p. 815-16.
GREEN, Alexander. Commentary to the germanic laws and medieval documents by Leo Wiener. JEGP, Champaign, v. 15, n. 2, p. 293-304, 1916.
GREEN, Dennis. Language and history in the early germanic world. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
HEIDEGGER, Martin. Das ding. In: HEIDEGGER, Martin. Gesamtausgabe. Fráncfort del Meno: Vittorio Klostermann, 2000. v. 7, p. 167-187.
HILL, Eugene. A case study in grammaticalized inflectional morphology: origin and development of the Germanic weak preterite. Diachronica, Amsterdam, v. 27, n. 3, p. 411-458, 2010.
IVERSEN, Frode. Concilium and pagus: revisiting the early germanic thing system of northern europe. Journal of the North Atlantic, [S. l.], v. 5, p. 5-17, 2013. Number special.
KARLSSON, Gunnar. Was Iceland the Galápagos of germanic political culture? Gripla, [S. l.], v. 20, p. 77-91, 2009.
KASPERS, Wilhelm. Wort- und Namenstudien zur Lex Salica. Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum und deutsche Literatur, [Zurique], v. 82, n. 4, p. 291- 335, 1950.
KROONEN, Guus. Etymological dictionary of proto-germanic. Leiden: Brill, 2003.
LANGER, Johnni. Religião e magia entre os vikings: uma sistematização historiográfica. Brathair, São Luís, v. 5, n. 2, p. 55-82, 2005.
LASSEN, Annette. Indigenous and latin literature. In: JAKOBSSON, Ármann; JAKOBSSON, Sverrir. The routledge research companion to the medieval icelandic sagas. Nueva York: Routledge, 2017. p. 74-87.
LATOUR, Bruno. Scientific objects and legal objectivity. In: POTTAGE, Alain; MUNDY, Martha (ed.). Law, anthropology, and the constitution of the social: making persons and things. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. p. 73-114.
LINCOLN, Bruce. Rewriting the German war god: Georges Dumezil, politics and scholarship in the late 1930. History of Religions, Chicago, v. 37, n. 3, p. 187-208, 1998.
LØKKA, Nanna. Þing goða- the mythological assembly site. Journal of the North Atlantic, [S. l.], v. 5, p. 18-27, 2013. Number special.
OREL, Vladimir. A handbook of germanic etymology. Leiden: Brill, 2001.
POOLE, Russell. Óttarr svarti. In: PULSIANO, Phillip et al. (ed.). Medieval scandinavia: an encycplopedia. Nueva York: Taylor and Francis, 1993. p. 459-460.
POTTAGE, Alain. Introduction: the fabrication of persons and things. In: POTTAGE, Alain; MUNDY, Martha (ed.). Law, anthropology, and the constitution of the social: making persons and things. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004. p.1-39.
RIISØY, Anne-Irene. Sacred legal places in eddic poetry: reflected in real life?, Journal of the North Atlantic, [S. l.], v. 5, p. 28-41, 2013. Number special.
SKALDIC PROJECT. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages. 2019. Disponible en: https://skaldic.abdn.ac.uk/ db.php?id=83386&if=default&table=lemma&val=%C3%BEing. Acceso el 22 ago. 2019
THOMAS, Yan. Res, chose et patrimoine: note sur le rapport sujet-objet en droit romain. Archives de Philosophie du Droit, Paris, v. 25, p. 413-426, 1980.
ÞÓRÓLFSSON, Björn; JÓNSSON, Guðni (ed.). Gísla saga. In: ÞÓRÓLFSSON, Björn; JÓNSSON, Guðni (ed.). Vestfirðinga sögur: Íslenzk fornrit. Reykjavík: Hið íslenzka fornritafélag, 1943. v. 6.
TIEFENBACH, Heinrich. Mars Thincsus. In: BECK, Heinrich ; GEUENICH, Dieter; STEUER, Heilo (ed.). Reallexikon der Germanischen altertumskunde. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2001. p. 343-345.
UPPSALA UNIVERSITY. Institutionen för nordiska språk. Samnordisk runtextdatabas. Uppsala: Uppsala University, 2019. Disponible en: http://www. nordiska.uu.se/forskn/samnord.htm. Acceso el: 22 ago. 2019.
VYKYPĚL, Bohumil. Studie k šlechtickým titulum v germánských, slovanských a baltských jazycích : etymologie jako pomocná věda historická. Brno:Masarykova universita, 2004.
WIENER, Leo. Commentary to the germanic laws and mediaeval documents. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1915.
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Published
2020-08-21
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BARREIRO, Santiago Francisco. Thing. The effects of the circulation of ideas in the semantics of a term in the early Germanic languages. Antíteses, [S. l.], v. 13, n. 25, p. 339–361, 2020. DOI: 10.5433/1984-3356.2020v13n25p339. Disponível em: https://ojs.uel.br/revistas/uel/index.php/antiteses/article/view/37363. Acesso em: 16 feb. 2025.
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