garsecg

Old English

Etymology

Uncertain. Almost always analyzed as a compound of gār +‎ seċġ, but there is significant disagreement about how to interpret these components. gār is usually glossed as "spear," but the sense "tempest" has been suggested,^[1] and Holthausen dubiously connected it to Old English gānian (“to gape”), Sanskrit विहायस् (vihāyas, “atmosphere”).^[2] seċġ may be glossed several ways:

• "sword" appears least likely.
• "sedge" has been suggested (e.g. by Grimm^[3]), but the derivation is opaque.
• "man; warrior" is perhaps most popular; in this case the sense is "the ocean personified as a warrior," but attempts to find links to spear-wielding water deities (Bosworth-Toller suggests Neptune^[4]) have not yielded definitive results.
• Some Latin-Old English glossaries have possible variants of secg glossing "sea" (e.g. the Épinal-Erfurt glossary has segg).

William Redbond suggested a possible loan from Welsh mor-gaseg (“ocean”), related to modern caseg.^[5] Dahlman suggested analysis as gārs (“world's”) +‎ eċġ (“edge”), but this cannot be correct as ecg is a feminine jō-stem.^[6]

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡɑːrˌsejj/, [ˈɡɑːrˌsed͡ʒ]

Noun

gārseċġ m

1. ocean, sea
   • 10th century, "Exodus" in the Junius manuscript. Transcribed and translated in 1832, Thorpe, Benjamin (ed.), Cædmon's Metrical Praphrase of Parts of the Holy Scriptures, London: Society of Antiquaries of London; page 204–205, ll. 30–33, 1–4.

     his ƿuldres ƿord : ƿīddra ⁊ sīddra
     þonne befæðman mæᵹe : fōldan sceattas
     eorðan ȳmbhƿȳrft : ⁊ ūp-rodor
     ᵹārsecᵹes ᵹīn : ⁊ þeos ᵹeomre lȳft

     His glory's word : further and wiser spread
     than may embrace : earth's regions,
     the world's circumference, : and firmament above,
     ocean's expanse, : and this murmuring air.

Declension

Case	Singular	Plural
nominative	gārseċġ	gārseċġas
accusative	gārseċġ	gārseċġas
genitive	gārseċġes	gārseċġa
dative	gārseċġe	gārseċġum

Declension of gārseċġ (strong a-stem)

See also

• ēa (“river”)
• mere (“lake”)
• sǣ (“sea”)
• strēam (“stream”)

References

1. "gār-secg, n." in The Dictionary of Old English , accessed Febuary 13, 2024.
2. Ferdinand Holthausen (1909) “Etymologien II.87. Ae. Gār-seċg...”, in Indogermanische Forshungen, number XXV, pages 153–154
3. "Gârsecg" in Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum, I, 1841, p. 578.
4. • Joseph Bosworth and T. Northcote Toller (1898) “'gār-secg'”, in An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary‎, 2nd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
5. Wm. J. Redbond (1932 April) “Notes on the word "Gar-secg"”, in The Modern Language Review‎, volume 27, number 2, Modern Humanities Reaserch Association, pages 204–206
6. R. L. M. Derolez (1946 December 1) “"—And That Difficult Word, Garsecg" (Gummere)”, in Modern Language Quarterly, number 7, number 4, →DOI, pages 445–452