The Wendish Research Exchange - Hengst, Karlheinz: Further Observations on the Name Potsdam

Lětopis Abstract 2015 1: Hengst, Karlheinz: Further Observations on the Name Potsdam

The place name Potsdam was treated to a detailed investigation by the author in 2013. The changes in the name were analysed over a period of more than a thousand years of Slav–German linguistic contact. The history of the linguistic development of the toponym and the etymological clarification of the initial Old Polabian form are only briefly cited here as a final result. Further to this the article represents a critical view of an attempt published in Lĕtopis in 1999 to provide an etymological analysis of the name Potsdam. The views expressed at that time from the point of view of a Slavist, which attempted to provide a possible interpretation of the term Poztupimi, contained in a document from 993, are given a separate critical analysis. Here objections to the individual lines of argument are based on linguistic use over time citing examples from the Slavonic languages. The reader is made aware of the present state of research.