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Enn Ernits. Once More On -vere-Final Place Names |
2007, nr. 11 |
In Finno-Ugric languages the -vere component
has no secondary meanings of 'kin', 'lineage' or 'offspring'.
Therefore it does not sound convincing when -vere is compared
to the noun veri 'blood' or associated with the latter
via red iron ore. For phonetic and some other reasons the -vere-component
is not likely to be associated with the Old Russian word вервь
'community' either. An association between the toponym Värati
and the Russian noun веретье
(< *vertьje, *vertja) 'ridge in a swamp, river
meadow or water-side lowland' would look incredible, yet not quite
impossible, but only in case the latter is a Finnic loan (*vēre-tti).
The Mari wer/wär 'place' and the Old Russian
вервь cannot be associated due to the inequivalence of
r ~ rv. In old times there may have existed a Finnic
equivalent of the Mari words meaning 'place', but our nescience
of its original end vowel leaves us in the dark about its possible
connection with the -vere component of place names. If
the latter be true, the lexeme may be manifested in the Latvian
word vēris '(deciduous) forest', which is homonymous
with the Estonian veer 'edge, brink, brim', but extinct
in that language, while a homonym meaning 'assart' has been conjectured
but not proved. Consequently the most likely explanation remains
to be sought in the word veer in the sense of 'slope, bank',
following the suggestion of M. Veske from the late 19th century.
Keywords: Estonian, place names,
topoformant -vere, etymology, language contacts.
Enn Ernits (b. 1945), DMV, Estonian University
of Life Sciences, Department of Morphology, associate professor
ennernits[at]hot.ee
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