Prydein
Prydein ( Welsh [ 'prədein ]), younger Prydain , is the Celtic name for Britain . As a personification, Britto , Brutus , Prydein , Britus , Britain Mael or Cruithne are alternately referred to as the deity and ancestor of the Britons and Picts in island Celtic literature .
etymology
The word Prydein is derived from the Cymrian Prydyn , which, like the Irish Cruithin among the Celts of Britain, originally only referred to the Pict people. Both words are derived from the older form * Qrtenī , which could mean something like "cut" or "scratch". This suggests an original meaning of Prydyn and Cruithin as "the tattooed" (compare the Latin Picti , "the painted" [?]).
However, a derivation of Old Irish cruth , Kymrian pryd is also assumed, both from the original * Kʷritenoi , meaning "beauty, beautiful figure", which the Picts would call "the well-formed". From * Kʷritenoi the British * Pritenī (also * Pritanī ) arose and from it the Cymric name of the island ynys Pridein . The Greeks used the form τα βρετανικά νησιά ( hai Prettanikaì nêsoi , "the British Isles"), while the Romans used the Britannia version , which was then also accepted by the inhabitants. The Kymrian brython is only used in the language of scholars.
According to Birkhan , versions and short forms are Brittania , Ρρεττανία , Prydyn , Prydain , Cruithen , Britton , Brittia , Breiz m ( Breton ). The first entry was allegedly made in a demotic papyrus from the early 1st millennium BC. BC, the word pretan is used here for tin , which came to Egypt from Cornwall .
Different names for elves and goblins, such as puck , pixie , etc., are also derived from these shapes. The earlier residents who migrated underground are apparently intended to be appeased with cover words . Here also the Picts might Folk etymology demonized.
Personifications
Britain (nicknamed Mael "the bald") is a figure in Irish / Celtic mythology . In Lebor Gabala Eirenn ("The Book of the Lands of Ireland") he is considered the ancestor of the Britons. In Wales there is a related figure, Britus , son of Aed Mawr .
Britus , also Britovius , is the name of a Gallic deity. The Romans equated it with Mars . Dedicatory inscriptions have been found in Nîmes ( Nemausis , Gallia Narbonensis ) and Dijon ( Divio , Gallia Belgica / Germania Superior ).
Geoffrey von Monmouth also mentions in his Historia Regum Britanniae ("The History of the Kings of Britain") a Britto or Brutus as the first ruler of Britain. All of these figures probably have their roots in ancient accounts of a Celtic king named Bretannos , who is said to have been the father of the Keltines, the ancestral mother of the Gauls. A god named Mars Britus or Mars Britovius from Britain has come down to us from late antiquity, but the genius of the island of Britannia was mostly thought of as female.
See also
literature
- Helmut Birkhan : Celts. Attempt at a complete representation of their culture. Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 1997, ISBN 3-7001-2609-3 .
- Bernhard Maier : Small lexicon of names and words of Celtic origin. CH Beck OHG, Munich 2003, ISBN 3-406-49470-6 .
- Bernhard Maier: Lexicon of Celtic Religion and Culture (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 466). Kröner, Stuttgart 1994, ISBN 3-520-46601-5 .
- Wolfgang Meid : The Celts. Reclams Universal Library , Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-15-017053-3 .
Individual evidence
- ↑ Helmut Birkhan: Celts. Attempt at a complete representation of their culture. P. 388, 1068.
- ^ Bernhard Maier: Lexicon of the Celtic religion and culture. P. 270.
- ↑ Bernhard Maier: Small lexicon of names and words of Celtic origin. , P. 40.
- ↑ Wolfgang Meid: The Celts. P. 70 f.
- ↑ Helmut Birkhan: Celts. Attempt at a complete representation of their culture. P. 50.
- ↑ Helmut Birkhan: Celts. Attempt at a complete representation of their culture. P. 508.
- ↑ * CIL 12, 03082 Aug (usto) Marti Brito / vio [3] Salvius / Secundini fil (ius) / ex voto