Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1982, Side 95

Faroese Bird-Name Origins
(VIII)
W. B. Lockwood
Lerkur ’lark’
Far. lerkur is, to all appearances, a borrowing from Danish,
see Faroese Bird Names, 74. The name is indubitably part of
the Common Germanic heritage, and it is this aspect we discuss
below.
The relevant forms will be (North Germanic) OWN lævirki
m., OSwed. Lerikia f. whence Swed. larka, Dan. lærke, (West
Germanic) OEng. lawrice, MLGer. lewerike, OHGer. lerihha,
older 'Heurihha (cf. sela, older seula beside OEng. sawol, Goth.
saiwala ’soul’), then N. Fris. lask. Falk-Torp, Norw.-dan. etym.
Wórterbuch, thought it probable that all these forms ultimately
went back to Pr.Gmc. 'Haiwazakón, consisting of :'Haiwaz- with
the suffix -ak-, as in Goth. ahaks ’dove’.
It will be convenient to start our commentary from these
conclusions. In the first place, one recognises the presence of a
&-suffix, not infrequent with bird names, but the form -ak-
can hardly be in order; it must be -ik-, as the examples them-
selves testify, and cf. Kluge, Stammbildungslehre3, 24, 33. Falk-
Torp do not explain the postulate :ilaiwaz- further, but this
element has always been considered to be onomatopoeic, a view
going back at least as far as Jakob Grimm, Kleine Schriften, ii,
124. One has little doubt that this is substantially correct, see-
ing that the lark’s song is a most striking feature and as such
likely to lead to the creation of a name. An echoic base :'Haiw-