Rit (Vísindafélag Íslendinga) - 01.06.1970, Page 369

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one hand, and chivalric influence, on the other. If the Chri-
stian influence is, in this case, older, the lending language is
Old Saxon; if the chivalric sense of the word in Icelandic is
older, the words must be borrowed from Middle Low German.
By using historical facts only, we cannot solve this problem.
Of course, the Christian influence is in most cases older, a fact
which makes it probable that the words are borrowed from
Old Saxon. This, however, is not a decisive argument. In this
case we are lucky enough to get support from linguistíc
criteria, especially for frú. The structure of frú is nearer to
Old Saxon than to Middle Low German: OSax.frúa, MLG
vrouwe. The nom. frú is an analogical form from the casus
obliqui: frú<frúu. The forms frúva, fróva used by Snorri
(SnE 1.96, ÍF 26.25, where it is indicated that this is a new
word: allar konur tígnar, svá sem nú heita frúvur) are certainly
borrowed from Middle Low German.
I stress that historical facts ought never to be neglected in
an investigation of borrowed innovations in a language. From
our knowledge of connections with certain foreign countries
during a given period, and of slight or nonexistent connections
with other countries, we may be able, using at the same time
other criteria, to prefer some possibilities and to exclude
others.
The second important historical criterion in this respect
which I want to discuss is the age of the words, or rather our
knowledge of it as derived, for instance, from their first
occurrences. The first occurrence of a word is in most cases a
terminus ante quem. In some rare instances it might be the exact
date of the borrowing, but in Old Icelandic I think we may
almost always exclude this possibility.
In assessing the age of loanwords most scholars writing on
Old Icelandic borrowed innovations have made serious
mistakes. Some of these mistakes are to a certain degree
understandable. The period called Old Icelandic goes down
to 1350. We have more or less reliable sources of Old West
Scandinavian (Old Norwegian, Old Icelandic) from the