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The etymology of Yulemath
Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2016 6:09 pm
by caedmon
Possible Hobbit culture rather than Dunedain....
Where (in-universe) does the math in Yulemath come from?
Re: The etymology of Yulemath
Posted: Wed Dec 21, 2016 6:22 pm
by caedmon
ok, I think I answered this for myself....
The professor took it from the Anglo-Saxon:
mǽþ which means 'mowing/harvest' and took on the meaning 'time-off holidays'.
SO this would be like saying, "
We get time off after we bring the harvest in.", or, "
We take of two days of the six days of Yule. We call those days the YuleMath."
http://bosworth.ff.cuni.cz/022245
http://middleearthrangers.org/forum/vie ... ath#p16118
Re: The etymology of Yulemath
Posted: Thu Dec 22, 2016 5:08 am
by Manveruon
Makes sense to me! Good sleuthing!
Re: The etymology of Yulemath
Posted: Thu Dec 22, 2016 3:48 pm
by Udwin
Huh. I'd never come across that word in my previous Old English studies, so that's a good find. After-math makes a bit more sense now.
That's a decent explanation--since 'mǽþ' is already an existing word-- but I'd always assumed that '-math' was simply JRRT's 'wearing down' of the '-monaþ' ('month') found in the name of many months in the Germanic calendar, which Tolkien 'borrowed' for the names of the Mannish/Shire calendars. Solmath (February; 'mud-month'--late winter gets soggy), Wedmath (August; 'plant-month'), Blotmat (November; 'blood-month', owing to sacrifices), and the aforementioned Yulemath of course.