Fróðskaparrit - 01.01.1991, Síða 114

118
ETYMOLOGICAL NOTES
are all too susceptible to unpredictable out-
side influences which can play havoc with
neogrammarian principles - as like as not
some such influence is responsible for the
unexplained form of Icel. smári (above) at
odds with Common Scand. smæra.
There is yet another aspect of this matter
which supports our general position. Follow-
ing Grimm, Kleine Schriften ii, 121, Bugge
draws attention to a Gualish term for clover:
trifolium ... gallice dicitur uisumarus’,
comparing it with Ir. seamar. The sourse is a
medical handbook composed c. 400 by Mar-
cellus of Bordeaux. Whereas the termination
-us is, of course, due to Latin (rendering -os
if the Proto-Celtic ending survived), any
analysis of the rest of the word can, in our
view, only be tentative. But should the word
be a compound, dividing as ui-sumarus, as
Grimm and Bugge supposed, then affinity
with Ir. seamar will not be disputed, which
would mean that the term once existed in P-
Centic as well. However that may be, the
mere mention of clover in this source speaks
for its esteem in popular medicine. This can-
not fail to remind one that shamrock, too,
has a special place in Irish folklore; not for
nothing will it have become a symbol of
Ireland. Such testimony to the significant
role of the plant in the practices of the Celtic
peoples reinforces what has already been
said about its economic importance and the
conclusion drawn therefrom.
Ælabogi m. ’rainbow’
There is, of course, no doubt about the for-
mal structure of this word, but the literal
meaning ’shower bow’ is unique among
Scandinavian languages which generally
speak of a ’rainbow’, as ON regnbogi and its
descendants; this is the usual concept in
other Germanic languages, too. How is the
exceptional Faroese formation to be ac-
counted for?
It is well known that, in the Viking age,
there were connections between the Faroes
and the then Gaelic-speaking world in Ire-
land and especially Scotland. These connec-
tions led to the introduction into Faroese of
a number of gaelic words: for a general
review see Chr. Matras, »írsk orð í
føroyskum«, Álmanakki 1966, 22-32. In the
present case we also find a comparaable con-
nection. The Gaelic languages have various
terms for ’rainbow’, but the literal meaning
is commonly ’shower bow’, thus Irish ogha
ceatha, Scottish bogha frois (or froise). A
further Irish term is tuar ceatha lit. ’shower
portent’, while bogha báistí lit. ’rainbow’
may be due to English influence. But certain
it is that the concept ’shower’ is predominant
and indigenous. It is not possible to state ex-
actly how old these terms are, but bogha it-
selff is a loan from ON bogi (Marstrander,
Bidrag til det norske Sprogs Historie i Irland
(1915), 59, 127).
The expression ’shower bow’ occurs,
however, in the British Isles at a much earlier
date, namely in a single attestation of OE
scurboga from the poetical paraphrase
known as Genesis A (text scurbogan acc.,
line 1540). The ms. is dated to 1000 or a little
later, but the poem itself is older. It is similar
in style to the famous Beowulf epic, which
has drawn on it (A.N. Doane, Genesis A
(1978), passim). Thanks to recent archaeo-
logical evidence Beowulf, previously thought
to have been composed c. 725, can now be
dated to the second half of the seventh cen-
tury (M. Lehnert, Beowulf (1986), 5), with
obvious consequences for the dating of Gen-
esis A. It has for long been held that the