Hag
A hag is an area that is usually enclosed or fenced in by a hedge . The word element -ha (a) g (s) has a common corridor or place name that earlier form of settlement down.
etymology
Hag is derived from germ. * Haga / * hagaz / * hagjô / * hagjôn " fence , enclosure " and also includes the term "protection" as in chegen and comfortable . Even today, the term “Hag” is used in Swiss German and Southwest German to denote the fencing of property or pasture.
The word comes from the Germanic root * hag : "hit, push, stab" and includes two fields of meaning:
- The enclosure of a site by Busch capped timber, a hedge : these were thorny shrubs such as hawthorn ( Hawthorn ), Hagerose ( Dog-Rose ) and rose hip , or strongly verwachsende plants like the hornbeam ( hornbeam ), pastures or hazel . In the Grimm dictionary there are also hagapfel ( western strawberry tree ), hageiche (for horse chestnut ), hagtanne for a small type of fir .
- The enclosure of a terrain by rod wood or rods as a fence : In the late Middle Ages was around a farm as a low earth wall with piles applied, often by wicker connected or hazel braid to protect the property from intruders and to prevent the advance of the cattle ( hedgerows in Friesland).
The two fields of meaning meet in the Schneitelwirtschaft (tree hay) as an early feed industry. About the Niederwald economic divides in the Middle High German language layer the word Hain as a "small forest" from.
On the enclosed area there is usually a courtyard (yard) , a homestead or a hamlet . The root of the word has therefore been preserved in numerous topographical names . In later phases of the Middle Ages, however, this type of settlement was already considered poor, and hagestalt referred to a small property, hagestut referred to a small farmer who could not afford his own family, also known as Hagesatz , Hagestolz . The adjective lean is still used in this sense today .
The Landhag ( Landwehr , Landheege ) is the name given to hedges as barriers or border fortifications .
The Hag also offered cemeteries protection from evil spirits, especially if it was made of yew or boxwood . Are both in Central Europe and in the Nordic and English legends circular surprising passages in hedges as a transition into a fairy rich or the underworld to find. So also conducts witch (ahd. Hecse , Eng. Hag , also mnl. Hagetisse ) from the same root word from. An alternative name is Zaunreiter / in .
Places with a hag
Few small towns are known in history and literature that had a hag in earlier times. A very small community at the time was Großrinderfeld in Franconia, now in Baden-Württemberg. The course of this hag is described in great detail in the local history of Behringer. It consisted of a trench with a wooden fence, or an earth wall with a wooden fence, and completely enclosed the village. There were two openings. The Upper Gate and the Lower Gate. A night watchman opened the two gates at 6 a.m. and closed them at 10 a.m.
One of the few places in Germany with a largely preserved Hagen is the district of Dörna in the municipality of Anrode in Thuringia . Street names such as: B. Bridge gate and field gate. Both the courtyards and the adjacent house gardens are protected by the Hagen. In the past, the courtyards were additionally protected by the row house-like barns between the courtyard and the garden. Today the Hagen is dominated by a mixed population of deciduous trees with different degrees of hedges.
Place names
The root word hag indicates a fenced off area of different sizes:
- Especially in Low German as -hagen , especially in areas that were created by clearing forests
- in Bairischen is it multiplies in the form Hague , -hag, -haag ago
- Swedish and Norwegian -hage, Danish have , from Old Norse hagi for enclosed land or pasture
The suffix -hag or -hagen has been added to many place names , such as in Eckenhagen , Stadthagen , Den Haag (officially 's-Gravenhage:' Grafenhagen ') , Fürstenhagen , Isernhagen , Stavenhagen , Altenhagen , Neuenhagen , Steinhagen . In some places there are also several places with first names + -hagen , probably after a first settler: Diedrichshagen , Gerdshagen , Hanshagen , Hinrichshagen , Karlshagen , Leopoldshagen , Meinerzhagen , Petershagen .
Other place names begin with Hag- such as Hagen , Hagenow , Hagenbrunn .
Other place names that refer to a former Hagen contain the root word -dörn- or -dorn- see Dörna or Dornum .
Art, literature, fairy tales and fantasy
- The thorn hedge in the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty also indicates a hagen.
- In JRR Tolkien's works The Lord of the Rings or The Adventures of Tom Bombadil there is a hedge that is referred to in the German translation as "Hoher Hag" ( English High Hay ). At the southern end of the 20 mile long hedge was the Hagsend area at the mouth of the willow winds.
- The heavenly hag . Title of a collection of sacred folk songs by Franz Peter Kürten.
See also
- Hagenhufendorf
- Spank
- Landwehr , Landheege
literature
- Hag. In: Jacob Grimm , Wilhelm Grimm (Hrsg.): German dictionary . tape 10 : H, I, J - (IV, 2nd division). S. Hirzel, Leipzig 1877 ( woerterbuchnetz.de ).
- Hagen, Hag . In: German Academy of Sciences in Berlin (Ed.): German legal dictionary . tape 4 , booklet 9 (edited by Hans Blesken and others). Hermann Böhlaus successor, Weimar, Sp. 1419–1420 ( adw.uni-heidelberg.de - publication date between 1944 and 1951).
- Hag. In: Friedrich Kluge: Etymological dictionary of the German language. 22nd edition, Walter de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 1989, ISBN 3-11-006800-1 , p. 286 (first edition 1881, reprint, reading sample, books.google.de )
- Hag. In: Wolfgang Pfeifer: Etymological Dictionary of German. Central Institute for Linguistics, dtv, 1995, ( dwds.de ).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Dietrich Rahn: The place and field names of the city and district of Greifswald. Their origins and their significance for Pomeranian local history. (also dissertation, University of Greifswald 1923). P. 18.
- ↑ Robert Foster: The Great Middle Earth Lexicon. Bastei Lübbe, Cologne 2012, ISBN 978-3-404-20453-3 , pp. 321 and 357.
- ↑ JRR Tolkien: The Lord of the Rings - The Companions . New revision and update of the translation by Wolfgang Krege. Klett-Cotta, 2014, ISBN 978-3-608-10713-5 ( books.google.de - reading sample).
- ^ Franz Peter Kürten: The Heavenly Hag. Sacred folk songs sung according to old rhymes. Book and Art Print AG, Regensburg 1929.