Zum Zeugniswert der Ortsnamen für die Erforschung der Siedlungsgeschichte des deutschen Südwestens

Abstract

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.