Well as a newbie to the records of the 1800's, it was easy to think that the whole document would be in Latin. Even though the town name did not look like it was Latin and on the three maps I have of Prussia I could not find a Nogath. However it is great to have the input from those who have already done research. It makes it easier for those of us who are learning. With out your input I would taken other paths to find the answer. That is why it is well worth spending the time here and asking questions. Again thanks to all who have helped with this little stumbling block of mine. Sam **************Get fantasy football with free live scoring. Sign up for FanHouse Fantasy Football today. (http://www.fanhouse.com/fantasyaffair?ncid=aolspr00050000000020)

Hi, Regarding "Nogath," Sam <SamE797@aol.com> wrote: > Well as a newbie to the records of the 1800's, > it was easy to think that the > whole document would be in Latin. I know what you're saying. But the thing is, in recent centuries, priests writing records in Latin did not usually bother trying to "Latinize" place names. I mean, there really is no way to Latinize Nogath. You could put a Latin ending on it, but that's kind of like putting a ribbon on a pig -- it doesn't really fool anyone. In most cases they just wrote the name of the place down as it was. If you went up to the priest and said "Can't you put that name in Latin?" he would probably have shrugged and said "How? Nogathus? Ugh!" The official language in the Grudziadz/Graudenz area at that time was German, and "Nogath" was how the Germans spelled the name, so "Nogath" was what they wrote. Now in older records, back in the days when Latin was the universal language of education and administration, as well as the Church, writers did make an effort to Latinize names, as best they could. Sometimes they just modified the native name a little, so that in older records we see "Varsovia" for Warsaw, "Cracovia" for Krakow, "Calissia" for Kalisz, and so forth. Sometimes, if the meaning of a place name was obvious, they'd just translate it. For instance, any Pole immediately recognizes that "Nowy Targ" means "New Market(place)." So in Latin records, they often called it "Novum Forum," because that's how you say "new marketplace" in Latin. Similarly, Lwow means "[city] of Lew," and Lew is the Slavic version of the first name Leo or Leon (from the word for "lion"), so Lwow was called "Leopolis," which is the Latin way of saying the same thing. That was standard back in the days when Latin was THE language for all writing. But by, oh, the 1600s and especially the 1700s, that was changing, as Europeans were becoming more and more likely to write in the official or predominant language in their particular country. In this time frame, priests were less likely to Latinize place names in records -- unless the place in question was old and its Latin name was well-established and well-known. Then the old name might hang on, because it was traditional. You see "Leopolis" for Lwow all the time, even in documents from the early 20th century, because it was such a prominent place and most educated people knew that was its Latin name. But if a place wasn't so old, or if its Latin name never really got to be recognized by everyone, priests were more likely to just write down the name they knew the place by. Since there was nothing Latin about "Nogath," they probaby wouldn't bother trying to Latinize it. They'd just spell it the way they knew it. And that's how "Nogath" ends up in a Latin-language document. There's actually a great source for old Latin names of places here: http://www.columbia.edu/acis/ets/Graesse/contents.html It's a work entitled _Orbis Latinus_ [Latin World], by Johann Georg Theodor Grässe (Published by Richard Carl Schmidt & Co., Berlin 1909). If you ever run into a Latin name you can't place -- since some of them can be very hard to recognize -- it's worth a look. I was surprised to see that it does mention "Nogadi, Nogat" as an estuary of the Vistula river. But I doubt that name was ever applied to the village of Nogat. It would have to be a pretty serious, old-school priest who would even have heard of "Nogadi." So in the 1800s, usually place names appear in their official forms, whatever those were, with no attempt to Latinize them -- unless they were old, prominent places and their Latin names were so universally recognized that it made sense to use them. In earlier records, things were different; but we're talking 1700s or even 1600s. That's a generalization, of course, and as a wise man once said, "No generalization is worth a damn -- including this one." I hope this clarifies things a little. Fred Hoffman (Currently working on the Latin volume of _In Their Words_)

Hi Folks, Fred provides us with a very nice (as always) summary of the topic. He might, however, amplify a key aspect of usage in the various Latin documents we investigate, namely, the changes in the form of the word associated with usage in the sentence. For example, the city of Lwów, is known in Latin as either Leopol or Leopolis. Although I am neither a professional etymologist nor philologist, I would treat Leopolis as the Genitive Case of Leopol. On the other hand, the Greek root "polis" (meaning city) often becomes the ending "-polis" for named places. Furthermore, one often will see the usage Leopoliensis. And here the suffix -iensis simply means "pertaining to" or "originating from". I am sure that Fred will have further thought on this and include these aspects in his upcoming book. Roman Fred Hoffman wrote > Hi, <...> > Now in older records, back in the days when Latin > was the universal language of education and > administration, as well as the Church, writers did > make an effort to Latinize names, as best they > could. Sometimes they just modified the native > name a little, so that in older records we see > "Varsovia" for Warsaw, "Cracovia" for Krakow, > "Calissia" for Kalisz, and so forth. > > Sometimes, if the meaning of a place name was > obvious, they'd just translate it. For instance, > any Pole immediately recognizes that "Nowy Targ" > means "New Market(place)." So in Latin records, > they often called it "Novum Forum," because that's > how you say "new marketplace" in Latin. Similarly, > Lwow means "[city] of Lew," and Lew is the Slavic > version of the first name Leo or Leon (from the > word for "lion"), so Lwow was called "Leopolis," > which is the Latin way of saying the same thing. >

Hi, In response to my note on Latin place names, Roman wrote: > For example, the city of Lwów, is known in Latin > as either Leopol or > Leopolis. Although I am neither a professional > etymologist nor > philologist, I would treat Leopolis as the > Genitive Case of Leopol. On > the other hand, the Greek root "polis" (meaning > city) often becomes the > ending "-polis" for named places. >From the sources I checked, Leopolis is the standard nominative form, as well as the genitive form. As Roman noted, the form of the name is Greek, and -polis meant "city," so that "city of Leo/Lew" would most often take the form Leopolis. I don't doubt for a second you'll see it as Leopol sometimes, but Leopolis is the only form I've ever run into, and that's the primary form given in _Orbis Latinus_ (http://www.columbia.edu/acis/ets/Graesse/orblatl.html). That source also shows Leoberga and Lemberga, but those are clearly Latinized forms of the German name Lemberg, in which the Lem- is a shortened version of _Löwen_, the German word for "lion" = Latin _leo_ and Polish _lew_. The Slownik geograficzny entry (Volume 5, beginning on page 496), shows a whole variety of names for Lviv/Lwow I had not seen, including such Leontopolis. A 1389 document calls it simply "civitas Leona," the city of Leo. Fascinating stuff, for those of us who love names! Roman also wrote: > Furthermore, one often will see the usage > Leopoliensis. And here the > suffix -iensis simply means "pertaining to" or > "originating from". Yes, the standard way of making an adjective out of a place name was to take -(i)ensis onto the end. My diploma from the University of Dallas is in Latin and proudly proclaims that my degree came from "Universitas Dallasensis." So you can usually be confident a Latin word in the form X-ensis means "of, from X." What can be difficult is matching up the X part with the form of the name familiar to you. I've seen references to _neoforensis_ and thought "What on earth is that?" until I realized it was the adjective derived from Nowum Forum = Nowy Targ! Roman ended: > I am sure that Fred will have further thought on > this and include these > aspects in his upcoming book. Oh, count on it! The danger is we'll give way too much detail. But Jonathan and I, much as we love to lose ourselves in linguistic niceties, are always mindful of printing costs -- and that helps keep us under control. The first draft of our books is often 100 pages longer than the final draft we send to the printer. When we crunch the numbers, we come to our senses and cut out all the stuff that fascinates no one but us ;-) Fred Hoffman