The Unknown Old Polish Personal Names Ending in -mir and -sław Hidden in Contemporary Polish Names

Abstract

The paper is based on the material contained in the ten-volume Dictionary of Names Used in Contemporary Poland, ed. by K. Rymut and in the Dictionary of Old-Polish Personal Names, ed. by W. Taszycki. It consists of three parts.

In the first part consisting of such names as Rezmer (etc.) and Celmer (etc.), I reconstructs such old-Polish names as Redzimir (< Radzimir) and Żelimir; they are not confirmed in the SSNP. In the second part there are such names as Brommer, Kammer and Stammer, in the SSNO they are not confirmed; I interpret them as the effect of the respective reconstructed and abbreviated words, and thus confirmed directly or indirectly, the ancient two-element names like Bronimir, Kanimir and Stanimir.

Finally, in the third part I devote space to such names as Cyrklaff (etc.) and Niecław (etc.). The name Cyrklaff is a graphic and phonetic transformation of the German name of the place Zirzlaff (Western Pomoria) with the historical inscriptions of the type Sillezlaw of 1335; this name is derived from the old-Polish Sulisław, noted from the twelfth century onward. The name Niecław I propose to derive from the name Niecisław, which has not been confirmed in the SSNO. Its forms, respectively reduced, would be contemporary names of the type Necel or Niec. The series of contemporary names Niecław − Necel − Niec would be somewhat analogical to such series of the contemporary names as e.g. Węcław − Wencel − Wenc.