Noms de lieux / Anoioù lec'hioù

Noms de personnes / Anoioù tud

Loch Ness

Nessa

i

Extrait de Ordnance Survey : Map of Roman Britain.

* Rivet & Smith, p 422-423 : 

- Ravenna, 108₃₃ : CERTISNASSA. 

"As proposed under CERTIS, this entry looks like a conflation. 

Derivation : There are few analogues : the Nassogne river of Belgium, recorded in A.D 690 as Nassania fons (Carnoy in RIO, viii (1956), 102); two rivers Nestos ( = Nestos) in Dalmatia and Thrace (Pokorny in ZCP, xxi (1940), 121); possibly the second element is British *Raxtonessa. In Andamnan's Life of St Columba the present name is fluvium Nesam (II,19 et II,21) and its lake is mentioned too (ad lacum fluminis Nisae, II,22), clearly the modern Loch ness. Of the two roots proposed by R&C, that taken from Ekwall ERN 119 seems the better : *ned-as in Sanskrit nadi 'river', German nass 'wet', Greek notew 'am wet'; Pokorny analyses the name further as from *Nesta < Ned-ta, and thinks the root ultimately Illyrian; Carnoy argues for a root *nat-so, from Indo-European (s)nat- 'flowing'.

*****

* A.L.F RIVET & Colin SMITH : The Place-names of Roman Britain. Batsford Ltd. 1979. Édition 1982.

Liens électroniques des sites Internet traitant du Loch Ness : 

hast buan, ma mignonig vas vite, mon petit ami

go fast, my little friend