What is the first mention of the term dun in a place name?

I've no precise date to give you, sorry -
Dun appeared at least in a lot of towns from western "Keltia" to central Poland, supposed celtic all of them -
it's surely cognate with germanic terms town (ton, tun) modern english "town",dutch tuin = "garden", german zaun "enclosure" ...
the first meaning would have been "closed village" <> "fortified village" + according to size, time and place: "fortress", "closed city" or ordinary "willage " or "town" - not same but very close evolutionS for breton kaer welsh caer << cetic cagro "fortress", "villa" ("closed farm"), "farm", "village", "town", "home"... (see latin villa >> ville, cottage)
PN London was Lugdunum I believe, as Lyon and Loudun and a town in pre-iron Poland if I'm right...
 
MOESAN said:
PN London was Lugdunum I believe, as Lyon and Loudun and a town in pre-iron Poland if I'm right...
Click to expand...

Sorry, I'm confused

London was Londino (greek?) Londinium (latin) before further evolutions in form and its etymology is discussed yet
 
maybe dun is the west form of -dawa? -tuva? but at end of a place name
 
If your understanding of "place names" includes rivers, there is of course that Pontic-Baltic cluster of rivers like Danube, Dniester, Dnieper, Don, and Daugava (Dvina/Düna). Water is "don" in Ossetian, and "danu" in Old Persian. Sanskrit has permutated the D-N root into sindhu =large river. Celtic seems to also have used the root (e.g. River Tyne*), so it apparently is ancient IE. The likelihood is high that at some point in pre-historic times, people speaking a specific dialect included "dun" instead of dan/don in their designation of a place/fort/hill on the water. Potential candidates include Danapur, a suburb of Patna, India, Dhanbad (=wet land), Bihar, Thinadhoo, Maldives, and Dhundhar, the ancient name of the Kingdom of Jaipur.

To make things worse, the Jordan river seems to have the same etymology. Considering that the Aramaic alphabet didn't have vowels, and dan/dun/din/den were thus interchangeable, the most likely answer to your question is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_(ancient_city)

On a closer look, this place is surely even older, though it is not clear whether dan/den at any point in time was turned into "dun" However, the "script without vowels" argument should apply here as well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adana

Probably even more ancient:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidon

*) I love such pleonasms - River Tyne is as great as Rio Guadalquivir!
 
Hi guys. Thank you for your comments. I am trying to determine what was the first recorded town name, settlement name with dun in it. What i found so far points to the oldest ones being recorded in the Balkans.

Capedunum - http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0198:book=7:chapter=5
Singidunum - http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0062:entry=singidunum-harpers
Carrodunum - http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Periods/Roman/_Texts/Ptolemy/2/14*.html

Every other mention of a town with a dun in its name is later.

Do you know of any older records then these?

Thanks in advance for your help
 
[FONT=arial, sans-serif]In 496 AD the Irish Annals record the storming of [/FONT]Dún Lethglaise now called Downpatrick in County Down. Dunseverick in Antrim is named after the Dun of Sobarki, the legendary king of Ulster who lived, (if he lived at all), several centuries before the common era.
 
FrankN said:
If your understanding of "place names" includes rivers, there is of course that Pontic-Baltic cluster of rivers like Danube, Dniester, Dnieper, Don, and Daugava (Dvina/Düna). Water is "don" in Ossetian, and "danu" in Old Persian. Sanskrit has permutated the D-N root into sindhu =large river. Celtic seems to also have used the root (e.g. River Tyne*), so it apparently is ancient IE. The likelihood is high that at some point in pre-historic times, people speaking a specific dialect included "dun" instead of dan/don in their designation of a place/fort/hill on the water. Potential candidates include Danapur, a suburb of Patna, India, Dhanbad (=wet land), Bihar, Thinadhoo, Maldives, and Dhundhar, the ancient name of the Kingdom of Jaipur.

To make things worse, the Jordan river seems to have the same etymology. Considering that the Aramaic alphabet didn't have vowels, and dan/dun/din/den were thus interchangeable, the most likely answer to your question is
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dan_(ancient_city)

On a closer look, this place is surely even older, though it is not clear whether dan/den at any point in time was turned into "dun" However, the "script without vowels" argument should apply here as well:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adana

Probably even more ancient:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidon

*) I love such pleonasms - River Tyne is as great as Rio Guadalquivir!
Click to expand...

without exclude any possibility of common ancient meaning I have momentally some difficulty to link the meaning of "fortress" or "enclosed village" to the one of "river"...
in Pokornik list I found *Dâ- "fluid", "river", "flow" +other close root *Dhen- to flow, to run (a first loan by a macro-family of I-E languages to another macro-family, at an early enough stage ???) - big possibilities for a link with Danau, Donau... and others placenames -
I see NO proved link with 'dun' - what I find is the gaelic verb dùn-adh "to shut off", "to close" with some link with the meanings: "enclosure", "enclosed village" ...
 
MOESAN said:
without exclude any possibility of common ancient meaning I have momentally some difficulty to link the meaning of "fortress" or "enclosed village" to the one of "river"...
in Pokornik list I found *Dâ- "fluid", "river", "flow" +other close root *Dhen- to flow, to run (a first loan by a macro-family of I-E languages to another macro-family, at an early enough stage ???) - big possibilities for a link with Danau, Donau... and others placenames -
I see NO proved link with 'dun' - what I find is the gaelic verb dùn-adh "to shut off", "to close" with some link with the meanings: "enclosure", "enclosed village" ...
Click to expand...
I also have the feeling that we are speaking of two unrelated roots. One might, however, speculate that Celts (IEs) regarded major waterways as barriers, and later transferred the barrier meaning to artificial barriers, i.e. fortification. One should consider that walls were often accompanied by water-filled trenches, and some excavations suggest the latter being the more ancient type.
I furthermore have the impression that many of the -dunum towns are located on river islands or at least on peninsulas between the confluences of two rivers (which are easily convertible into an island by a bit of trench-digging). Singidunum (Belgrade), Campodunum (Kempten/ Allgäu), Lugdunum (Lyon) Lugdunum Batavia (Leyden) and Augustodunum (Autun) fit this criteria. The area around Camoludunum (Colchester) looks marshy enough to make it a possibility, and the Scotch-Irish versions (Dundalk, Dundee, Dun Laoghaire) are all shore settlements. The photo of Doon Lough below gives an idea of how the transfer of meaning may have come about.
doon_above.JPG

In short: "Dun" may originally not have been a fence, but a trench. In this case, even an at first sight unlikely candidate like Dunum in East Frisia (one of the richest bronze-age burials in North Germany, burial site of Frisian kings according to folk mythology, settlement evidence since the 1st century BC) deserves consideration.
https://www.google.de/maps/place/Du...2!3m1!1s0x47b6643490697449:0x5bba0bdd4f08de9a
 
oldeuropeanculture said:
Hi guys. Thank you for your comments. I am trying to determine what was the first recorded town name, settlement name with dun in it. What i found so far points to the oldest ones being recorded in the Balkans.

Capedunum - http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0198:book=7:chapter=5
Singidunum - http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0062:entry=singidunum-harpers
Carrodunum - http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Gazetteer/Periods/Roman/_Texts/Ptolemy/2/14*.html

Every other mention of a town with a dun in its name is later.

Do you know of any older records then these?

Thanks in advance for your help
Click to expand...
In Book 4 Strabo also records a Lugdunum in the Pyrenees (4.I.2), Lugdunum / Lyom (4.3.2) and Campodunum / Kempten (4.6.8).

If you consider Sidon a "dun" name, and I think there is good reason to do so, it has already been mentioned by Homer and in some Phoenician inscriptions.
https://archive.org/details/jstor-3287919
 
It is interesting you mention Sidon. Ever thought of Tyre:

Tyre originally consisted of two distinct urban centers, Tyre itself, which was on an island just off shore, and the associated settlement of Ushu on the adjacent mainland. Alexander the Great connected the island to the mainland by constructing acauseway during his siege of the city,[7] demolishing the old city to reuse its cut stone.
Click to expand...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyre,_Lebanon

Tyre was made on an Island off shore. Tir in Gaelic means land. Could it be reclaimed land in this case? And if so what would that tell us about Phoenicians?
 
oldeuropeanculture said:
Tyre was made on an Island off shore. Tir in Gaelic means land. Could it be reclaimed land in this case? And if so what would that tell us about Phoenicians?
Click to expand...
Well, first of all that they needed the Greeks to learn how to build causeways :innocent:. But, more seriously, it is known that the Phoenicians / Carthagians were involved in trading Cornish tin. What is unclear yet is how early in time these operations started, and if they went to Cornwall / Ireland directly or acquired the metal from some intermediate source. I have been arguing in the thread below for a possible Levantine origin of the Bell Beaker people, and linguistic similarity like the one you have pointed at would fit the pattern.
http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads/30316-Bell-Beaker-As-Intrusive-Population

I should add, however, that tir=island makes more sense, also if you think of the Tyrrhenian Sea. The islands there are quite large (Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Mallorca etc.), so why shouldn't (proto-)Phoenicians also have regarded Ireland as "tir". The "natives" could have understood the term a bit differently, though...
 
FrankN said:
Well, first of all that they needed the Greeks to learn how to build causeways :innocent:. But, more seriously, it is known that the Phoenicians / Carthagians were involved in trading Cornish tin. What is unclear yet is how early in time these operations started, and if they went to Cornwall / Ireland directly or acquired the metal from some intermediate source. I have been arguing in the thread below for a possible Levantine origin of the Bell Beaker people, and linguistic similarity like the one you have pointed at would fit the pattern.
http://www.eupedia.com/forum/threads/30316-Bell-Beaker-As-Intrusive-Population

I should add, however, that tir=island makes more sense, also if you think of the Tyrrhenian Sea. The islands there are quite large (Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Mallorca etc.), so why shouldn't (proto-)Phoenicians also have regarded Ireland as "tir". The "natives" could have understood the term a bit differently, though...
Click to expand...

http://phoenicia.org/canaancornwall.html

one site that states a Phoenician -irish link
 
In de Bello Gallico, J.Caesar mentions:
- Noviodunum Biturifum
- Noviodunum Haedurum,
- Noviodunum Suessionum
- Uxellodunum
- Vellaunodunum

These towns are not related to water, but to mounts.
old irish: dun = fortress
old irish: dunad = camp
welsh: Din = town
old Breton: din
...
The common Celtic "*dunon" is closely related to German "*tuna". The initial meaning is "enclosed area"
(from X.Delamarre - Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise)
 
Diviacus said:
In de Bello Gallico, J.Caesar mentions:
- Noviodunum Biturifum
- Noviodunum Haedurum,
- Noviodunum Suessionum
- Uxellodunum
- Vellaunodunum

These towns are not related to water, but to mounts.
old irish: dun = fortress
old irish: dunad = camp
welsh: Din = town
old Breton: din
...
The common Celtic "*dunon" is closely related to German "*tuna". The initial meaning is "enclosed area"
(from X.Delamarre - Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise)
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Are you sure we are talking of mounts here, not river embankments?
- Noviodunum Biturigum = Neuvy-sur-Barangeon
- Noviodunum Haedurum = Nevers
- Noviodunum Suessionum = Soissons
- Vellaunodunum = Beaune ?

Uxellodunum is believed to be a hill near Saint-Denis-les-Martel, but even that hill might once have been an island in the floodplain of the Dordogne.
 
Well, in all the books I have (quite a lot), the meaning of fortress or "on a hill" is always mentioned, with no mention of river or island.
 
Diviacus said:
..
The common Celtic "*dunon" is closely related to German "*tuna". The initial meaning is "enclosed area"
(from X.Delamarre - Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise)
Click to expand...
Actually, it isn't (at least not in German). The original German meaning is basket-work or wattle. The corresponding verb "zäunen" has historically been applied to making fences, but also baskets and (clay-covered) walls, from willow or hazel rods. It seems to be related to "Gezähe/ Gezau" = tool, "Tau"=rope, and "ziehen"=to draw, to pull.
Latin zona may have the same root. Original meaning "belt", it was in the medieval also used for geographical belts, e.g. climate zones, and then gradually expanded its meaning.

Moreover, the container meaning, as in ton, seems to have been a medieval German borrowing from Celtic, via either French or English. Grimm reports that no early forms of "Tonne" (ton) are found in Old German. The word disseminated inland from the ports, which of course knew and handled tons as container for liquids.

Well, in all the books I have (quite a lot), the meaning of fortress or "on a hill" is always mentioned, with no mention of river or island.
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That may well be. But most of the authors probably had neither access to Google Maps, nor visited all the places in question. We now have put together some 10 dunums. Check out their geography for yourself, count the mountains and the rivers...
 
As there are probably hundreds of sites named with -dunum, it would be burdensome to check all these.

I have checked some books where dunum was explained. I give a list of the 10 first appearances I have noted:

X.Delamarre – Dictionnaire de la langue gauloise (2003) page 154 :
dunon, « citadelle, enceinte fortifiée, mont » (fortress, fotified area, mount)
« One of the most common term in the European toponymy, which means the fort, the circular citadel, the fortified area, generally on a hill.”

V.Kruta – Les Celtes (2000) page 588:
Dunum, or dunon (gaelique dun « fortress »).

B.Sergent – Les Indo-Européens (1995) page 193 :
« The origin of *plH(ey)es is from the root *pleH[SUB]l[/SUB]- “to poor” because to build a wall, it was necessary to poor earth and stones. In occidental IE languages, a synonym of *plH(ey)es attested by words gl. dunum “oppidum”, germ. Zaun “enclosure”, old Engl. and isl. tun “town” is linked to words meaning “sand dune”, “hill”. This confirms the concept of pooring earth to build a fortification”.

Plutarch – Names of rivers and mountains…(~ 80 AD) VI,1-4
“beside Arar, is the mount Lugdunum, […]. … they called the city Lugdunum. Because in their language a raven is called lugos, and a high place is called dunum…”

M. Rat – La guerre des Gaules traduction française (1964) page 246 :
« Uxellodunum – Fortified site of the Cadurques…Its name means « high fortress. »”

S.Gendron – La toponymie des voies romaines et médiévales (2006) page 116:
« Dunum : The Gaulish word dunum « fortress, fortified enclosure »,… It refers generally to a fortress, a fortified enclosure, and is generally located on a hill, equivalent of the Latin oppidum.”

H.Walter – L’aventure des langues en Occident (1994) page 78:
« Dunum : high fortress, hill »

J.Markale – Les celtes et la civilisation celtique (1999) page 454 :
“« dunum, « hill », then « fortified hill »”

D.Garcia – Territoires celtiques (2002) page 318:
“ The toponymy can be discussed, particularly with names of sites including Dun or Dunum, generally translated by “fortress”. ”

E.Mantel – in La Revue archéologique de Picardie (2006) page 39 :
“Briga, meaning “mount”, “hill, “high spot”, […] often used among the Celtiberians, where it seems to be the equivalent of –dunum, prefered in Gaul.”

I could find dozens more, but none of these refer to water or island, and I'm sure I have never seen this explanation.

However, most cities are not far from a river!
 
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