Moselle Romance language

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As mosel Romance language is called the language to a Romance languages at the end of the Roman Empire , the province Belgica I (the entire area around Mosel and Saar has) is formed. It was inhabited by Celtic tribes . At the same time, many Laeten ( Germanic mercenaries in Roman service) had settled here. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Franks migrated to this area. Despite this language overlap, some Romance language islands survived until the 11th century .

Historical background

initial situation

The Moselle area.

The Gallo Romania included before the outbreak of the Great Migration almost all France , the Walloon Belgium , the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and the former administrative districts of Trier and Koblenz . The Roman province of Germania inferior , extending on the left bank of the Rhine , encompassing the present-day Netherlands and the Rhineland southwards to the Ahr , and significantly weaker the Germania superior from Koblenz southwards to Basel , was already heavily Germanic in ancient times .

Formation of the Romance language island

First, the Angles and Saxons moved from what is now northern Germany ( Schleswig-Holstein , Lower Saxony , Westphalia ) and what is now the western Netherlands on the North Sea coast via Flanders to the Channel coast between Calais and Boulogne , where they crossed over to Britain . As a result of this passage , the Franks residing in Holland , Brabant and Flanders must for their part have been pushed south from their traditional homeland. They pulled the Ourthe and Sauer downwards towards the southeast and up the Upper Moselle to around Metz . In doing so, they split the old Gallo-Roman area between Trier and Arlon over a width of about 60 kilometers. Most of the Galloromania remained in the west ( France ) and in the east (between Trier and Koblenz ) a small Gallo-Roman language island , within which the Moselle -Roman language developed from Vulgar Latin .

Studies have shown that the Franconian farmers, whose economy was based on cattle breeding and grain cultivation, preferred the Bitburger Land, the Luxembourg Gutland and the land on the central Saar to the less suitable lower Saar valley and the Moselle valley .

In the relatively late Germanised Moselle-Roman language island, the Gallo-Roman place names were preserved in a particularly striking form, for example at Maring-Noviand , Osann-Monzel , Longuich , Riol , Hatzenport , Longkamp , Karden , Kröv or Alf . The place name Welschbillig indicates the former presence of the Welschen (Romanized Celts) in the entire region.

Romanesque relict word areas in the Rhineland

In addition to the Gallo-Roman place and field names, the vocabulary of the Moselle dialects also shows an abundance of Romance influences, which are to be regarded as reflections of the Moselle-Roman language island. A quantifying cartographic representation of Romanesque relict word areas shows a clear massing of Romanisms in the area of ​​the middle Moselle up to the Trier area and the lower reaches of the Saar and Sauer. Examples of such words are: Bäschoff 'back carrying vessel ' < bascauda , Even 'oat' < avena , Fräge 'strawberry' < fraga , Gimme 'bud' < gemma , glinnen 'read grapes' < glennare , More ' blackberry '< morum , pauern ' Filter must '< purare , Präter ' Flurschütz '< pratarius , Pülpes ' Hahnenfuß' (plant) < pulli pes etc.

Going out

Despite the Frankish conquest, the Moselle Romansh language persisted until at least the year 1000, within scattered language islands even until the 11th and 12th. Century.

Text example (inscription from the 6th century)

This text example on a tombstone from the 6th century represents a very early form of development at the transition from Vulgar Latin to Moselle Romanic:

  • Hoc tetolo fecet Montana, coniux sua, Mauricio, qui visit con elo annus dodece; et portavit annus qarranta; trasit the VIII K (a) l (endas) Iunias.
    • This tombstone was made by Montana, his wife, Mauricius, who lived with him for twelve years; and he was forty years old; he died on May 25th .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Rudolf Post: Romanic borrowings in West Central German dialects . Steiner, Wiesbaden 1982, ISBN 3-515-03863-9 , pp. 303 .
  2. ↑ Rudolf Post: Romanic borrowings in West Central German dialects . Steiner, Wiesbaden 1982, ISBN 3-515-03863-9 , pp. 303 .
  3. ↑ Rudolf Post: Romanic borrowings in West Central German dialects . Steiner, Wiesbaden 1982, p. 49-261 .
  4. ↑ Stefan Barme: Latin - Vulgar Latin - Moselle Romansch - on the language of early Christian grave inscriptions in the Trier area, Journal for Romance Philology (ZrP) Volume 124 issue 1 2008, p. 16
  5. ↑ Johannes Kramer : Between Latin and Moselle Romansh. The Gondorf epitaph for Mauricius . In: Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik , Vol. 118 (1997) pp. 281–286, ISSN  0084-5388 (PDF; 292 kB)