Die skandinavischen Personennamen in den Birkenrindeninschriften

Abstract

Until now there have been found about one thousand birch bark documents in Northern Russia, containing approximately one thousand different personal names (including patronymics, nicknames, possessive adjectives etc.), most of them of Christian-Greek or native Slavic origin. Besides a number of Finno-Ugrian names, there is also a small number of Scandinavian personal names. The article shows that more than half of these names are already documented in the Primary Chronicle (Glebъ [with hypocoristic forms in -ьcь and -ko], Jakunъ [possibly also the hypocoristic form Jaksa], Ljutъ, Rjurę [as a hypocoristic form of Rjurikъ] and Svenь), two names (Azъgutъ and Vigarь) are likely to be of Scandinavian origin, another two (Stenь and Velьjutъ) may be Scandinavian, while two names, proposed by Mel'nikova (Gugmorъ and Vozemutъ) cannot be interpreted as Scandinavian. This seems to suggest that the Scandinavian cultural influence in medieval Novgorod was much lesser than the political influence.