Re: Semantic typology?

On Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:17:26 +0200, Andreas Johansson wrote:
>I recently read an old (1928) article by L. Weibull which argued that in
>pre-Christian Scandinavia, the "north", "east", "south", "west" actually
>designated NE, SE, SW, and NW, respectively. I haven't heard of the idea in
>anything written in the eighty years since, so I guess it didn't win academical
>acceptance, but it does render more sensible some geographical informations in
>viking age texts.
Here's something interesting to go with that: I checked the etymologies of
the Finnish terms I just mentioned, and _luode_ is attested dialectally (and
in other Finnic languages) both for NW and W; _länsi_ for both W and SW; and
_lounas_ for both SW and S. There's no direct etymological connection with
the Scandinavian terms, but it's an interesting parallel.

John Vertical