Etymological Analysis of Toponyms from Ptolemy's Description of Central Europe

Abstract

Ptolemy was not the first classical author to describe Central Europe, and the territory of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia in particular. The importance of his work is rather concerned with a list of toponyms he recorded, around thirty items altogether, attested from the middle of the second century AD or earlier, which can all more or less be related to this territory. This contribution presents an analysis of the toponyms mentioned in Ptolemy’s list on the diachronic basis. For our purposes, the so-called Old European linguistic stratum is presented as the most archaic, from which we then move on to the Celtic one and then on to Germanic. The present etymological analysis is yet very tentative and reflects the attempts of the so-called first approximation. But even regarding the preliminary character of the etymologies discussed in the sections 3 and 4, it is obvious that for most of them (21 out of 28, i.e. ¾) the Celtic etymological derivation seems most probable. In four cases the Germanic etymological derivation seems more preferable, in three other cases the Germanic adaptation of the originally Celtic toponyms is indicated by Lautverschiebung (Grimm’s Law). Summing up, the sources of Ptolemy’s information reflect a relatively strong Celtic tradition in the area, which was still able to compete with the arising Germanic tradition.