Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1978, Side 17

Faroese Bird-Name Origins
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Turning now to the orthographical consequences, it is clear
that Resen’s implied jaðra- is historically correct, matching as
it does the earliest Icelandic and, of course, the Old Norse
prototype. On the other hand, the present Faroese sense arose
from an apparent meaning ‘earth-woman’, orthographically
jarða(r)-. We thus have the unusual paradox that both spellings
are etymologically justifiable. The following solution may sug-
gest itself. The spelling jarða(r)kona could be kept as the word
in the living language technically designates the water rail,
but where the term applies to the godwit, as in the traditiona!
Fuglakvæði or the two idioms quoted above, then jaðrakona
is appropriate.
We are now in a position to consider the origin of this name.
Two etymologies have been proposed so far, as explained in
FBN, loc. cit., and with further details in Guðmundsson, op.
cit., and we take these as the basis for our further discussion.
The first interpretation which would derive ON jaðrakárn
from Gael. adharcán ‘lapwing’ has already been touched upon
above. A certain similarity between the words is obviously
present and the Norse could, on formal linguistic grounds,
quite conceivably be envisaged as an admittedly rather free,
but nonetheless entirely plausible, naturalisation of the Gaelic.
There is no doubt that, if this were the case, the latter would
be the donor, and not vice versa. A native Celtic word, adhar-
cán is traditional and generally dominant throughout Gaeldom,
and will owe its stability to its being semantically transparent,
literally ‘little horn’ in allusion to the bird’s striking crest, i. e.
adharc ‘horn’ with diminutive suffix -án in use since Old
Irish times. An apparently important non-linguistic aspect
could be held to point in the same direction. The name jaðra-
kárn, as we now know, is not attested in Norway; indeed, the
godwit is not properly a Norwegian bird at all. It is there-
fore arguable that the Scandinavian settlers in the West had
no native name for this bird, hence the borrowing from Gaelic.
Now the lapwing is rare in Iceland, so that it is further argu-
able that the Gaelic name could then easily be transferred
3 — Fróðskaparrit