From the Methodology of Onomastic Research on Toponymy and Hydronymy Material

Abstract

The subject of the article are toponyms with different morphological structures, with the suffix -ów, such as Szczekarzów > Krasnystaw, Czumów, with the suffix -in, such as Szczebrzeszyn, names with the suffix -cz-, such as Mircze, Matcze, Łowicz, Lubicz > Lubycza or others, such as Bełz, Czerwien, Wołyń, Radecznica, Obrocz, Obsza, Tarzymiechy. These include renewed or derived water names. The main objective of the analysis is to reflect on the methodology of toponymic and hydronymic research. The author attempted to decrypt localised names, to verify their etymology, pointing to the sources of their ambiguity (source shortages, deficiencies in discerning the properties of natural named places, omitting the toponymic context and explaining local names, erroneous reading of the morphological structure of the onyms and its base without considering its historical, often metaphorical meaning, incorrect choice of the initial form of the name on the basis of incomplete source documentation, and erroneous reading of old name entries). In the case of naming homonyms (ambiguous names), the postulate of establishing the hierarchy of the degree of credibility of the proposed etymologies was pointed out, taking into account structural linguistic determinants, name records, its geography, seriality or uniqueness, closer and further naming contexts and preferences in nominations of elements of the perceived world – people and places – by man.