Suerto Rico

Wikipedia has its uses but sometimes it’s just a joy to quote from what people put up there.  Take a look at this explanation of Suevi:

“Etymologists trace the name :

•  from Proto-Germanic *swēbaz, either:
  • based on the Proto-Germanic root *swē- meaning “one’s own” people, or
  • on the third-person reflexive pronoun; or
• from an earlier Indo-European root *swe- (cf. Latin suus/sua/suum and Polish “słabi,”  Sanskrit “swa”, each meaning “one’s own”).”

Putting aside that słaby (not słabi) means “weak” and not “one’s own”, a few observations are in order.

First, no one has ever seen *swēbaz.  As the asterisk indicates, it is a “reconstructed” word.  That is it is “made up”.  It’s made up in accordance with an also made-up linguistic formula but it is nevertheless made up.  The asterisk is fessing up that, well, “it seems ok but we just don’t know.”

No one has seen a *swēbaz written anywhere at any time other than in linguistic texts.  It is, to put it charitably, a guess. 

Given that, there is really no point to discussing where *swēbaz itself comes from.

But, to each their own rabbit hole.

Second, there is no established Germanic cognate here.

What?

BUT, you say, what about the Swedes!?  

What do we have here svear, svíar / suer.  And we have Tacitus’ Suiones and Adam of Bremen’s (didn’t he say the Wends were the Vinnulli though? can we trust this guy) Sweon(as) or the Norwegian Svíþjóð.  Or Svíariki.  What is the origin of this?

Wikipedia can be delightfully helpful again:

“probably from the PIE reflexive pronominal root *s(w)e, “one’s own [tribesmen/kinsmen]”;

ok, so same as above for the Suevi…

What else?

“Most scholars agree that Suiones and the attested Germanic forms of the name derive from the same Proto-Indo-European reflexive pronominal root, *s(w)e, as the Latin suus. The word must have meant “one’s own (tribesmen)”.

Ok, so same as above… What else?

“The same root and original meaning is found in the ethnonym of the Germanic tribe Suebi, preserved to this day in the name Schwaben (Swabia).”

So to sum this up:

• we don’t know what Suevi means
• we don’t know what Swede means
• but to explain Suevi we use Swede
• and to explain Swede we use Suevi
• and, after all there is that Latin suus so that kind of makes it all work.

The conclusion of this in the Swede discussion is delightfully honest:

“The details of the phonetic development vary between different proposals.”

No doubt

Look, the fact that we have Svens in Sweden is not questionable.  The fact that these words all appear in relation to Sweden is not questionable.

BUT, none of them specifically mean “one’s own”.  You could just as easily say that Sven was a Ven (Finn? Venet?) or came “from” (“z”) there and established his own “rik”.

Or maybe like, for example, Amalasuenta – suen means strong (Slavic Swiety that is Saint).  Strong Land!

Or maybe you can derive it from svit meaning dawn (in Slavic).  The Land of the Dawn!

You can do all of this and all of these sound like impressive enough “land” names for a Rik of the Swedes.  You just have to learn enough linguistics to know the jargon and then come up with a cogent enough argument.

None of these, save the Latin suus, refer to own’s own.

The sue can just as easily refer to “swaing”, “swearing” or whatever else you want.

Third, there is a word in Germanic languages for that but it seems to have an “L” in it:

• self
• selb
• zelb
• själv
• selv
• sjálf
• silba (Gothic)

So where did the “l” come from and why do the Suevi not have it.

(Of course you could add an “L” to the word Suevi but then you’ll just  get something resembling “Slav”)

Can you name a language (outside of Latin-based languages and present in the same locality as the Suevic presumably was) in which SUO or SVO really does have an attested and, indeed, current meaning of “own’s own”?

Here is a hint:

Sami Swoi (= solely our peeps)

Swo-boda (= freedom or “one’s own body/life”) (see here)

Swa-wola (= free-will)

These are from Polish but other Slavic languages have the same or similar forms.

For more on this exciting topic see here (or really anywhere on the site).

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