Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.1979, Page 268

248
Svavar Sigmundsson
SUMMARY
This paper deals with the meaning of the word staðir (pl. of staður) which occurs
as the second part of the names of many Icelandic farms. The author maintains
that the word staðir meant part of property, land and livestock which rich farmers
gave to their associates, possibly for rent, when Iceland was being settled. Staður
then means the same as Latin pars, which is actually an attested meaning in Old
Icelandic. The pl. staðir is connected with the words leigustaðir and skuldarstaðir
(pl. only), meaning land and livestock for which rent is paid.
In the beginning, then, the staðir may not have been farms at all although they
later developed into farms, and in fact into independent farms instead of lease-
hold farms. The staðir were named after those who owned or rented them, which
explains the fact that great many of them have a person’s name as the first part
of their names. The common name Hofstaðir is explained according to this theory
as property of a hof (i.e. temple), not as a place where a hof was built. But when
churches became the owners of whole farms, as frequently was the case later on,
such a farm could not be called staðir in pl. and was called staður (sg.) instead,
since the property was now undivided.
More recently, the part -staðir has been used quite freely in the creation of new
names for farms, i.e. as a sort of suffix the original meaning of which has been
forgotten. In such cases the first part of the name can be something referring to
the landscape, or it can be a person’s name as before.