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Negau harigasti

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 April 2026

Eric P. Hamp
Eric P. Hamp*
Affiliation:
University of Chicago
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Extract

In a recent article, Lg. 29.308 (1953), Reichardt discusses the chronology of syncopation of the connecting stem-vowel in harigasti, a name contained in the inscription on helmet B of Negau. Reichardt's argument raises an interesting combined point of method and of fact. From attested old (and dialectally unspecified) Germanic names, of which Reichardt adduces a few examples, a seeming anachronism presents itself in the occurrence of compounds with -io-as late as the 4th or 5th century, while in harigasti and in Harimellae we seem to find *-ja- reduced to -i- at a date considerably earlier than the 4th century a.d. It is, of course, possible to allege that in each case we have forms from a different dialect, and that the change occurred separately at different times in different places; but it is unsatisfying to argue from our ignorance of prehistoric Germanic dialect distributions, and Reichardt wisely refrains from introducing this answer of despair.

Information

Type
Research Article
Information
Language , Volume 31 , Issue 1-Part1: January-March , March 1955 , pp. 1 - 3
Copyright
Copyright © 1955 by the Linguistic Society of America

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References

1 When this note was originally submitted, I was using */x/ in the reconstruction of such Germanic forms; I have not troubled to change the writings even though I now accept Moulton's formulation with */h/ in initial position, Lg. 30.39 (1954). While I can only admire Moulton's elegant and inclusive article and applaud his conclusions, I must take issue on one point—the point which is here relevant. Moulton appears to determine the status of */x/ and */h/ on the basis of phonetic (dis)similarity. But we cannot reconstruct phonetics; we reconstruct only oppositions—allophonic patterns and phonemes. Hence the identification as */x/ would be perfectly acceptable even if the phonetics had been *[x]: *[ḥ] (or even a voiceless vocoid).

But within the data which he displays, Moulton actually has the material to substantiate his conclusion. The array of initial allophones for the set of voiced phonemes in Germanic is impressive, with its aberrant velar member. This pattern makes it look as though there was something asymmetrical in the velar series. Now we know there were ‘laryngeals’ (postvocalic and elsewhere), which give us the makings for at least one phoneme that can be called */h/. If *[ḥ] (or a voiceless vocoid, whichever it was) had become phonetically divergent from *[x] and thus could be complemented with a ‘laryngeal’ phone as */h/, there would be plenty of room for free variation of /g/ to spirant articulation. That is just what we find.

Because of the reconstructed allophonic configuration for the velars, therefore, Moulton's */h/ seems likely.

2 Contrast arbinumja, winþiskauro, aglaitiwaurdei (beside aglaitgastalds), and perhaps þiuþiqiss. Hrainjahairts, apart from being a loan translation, may well contain a different stem formation, and the influence of the verb hrainjan is not to be ruled out.

3 It is difficult to specify the primary form or stem-type, if any, in manamaurþrja, manaseþs: manleika.