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early.
This corrcfusion notwithstanding, we have in front of us a unique document of
the final llth Century, listing fourteen regional population groupings. Among
these, two cases mclude very old and possibly pre-Slavic collective names
(Lemuzi and Chorvati), whatever they may have meant in the llth Century. Two
other names may mention individual sites (Tuhost’ and Sedlec), two other have
the character of the -fei names (Ljutomerici and D&dosici) while the
remaining seven are characterized by the suffix -ane (Lu2ane, DScane,
Psovane, Slezane?, Trebovane, “Pobarane” and MilSane). These -ane names (on
which cf. Profous - Svoboda - Smilauer 1960, 631 — 632) usually consist of
non-personal substantives (apeliatives) or of toponyms compounded with the •ane
suffix. Personal names turn up among them only exceptionally and this makes
them clearly different from the -ici names. The historical development of
these -ane names is most clearly exemplified in the manuscripts of the
foundation charter of the LitomSrice chapter of canons the most ancient
version of which dates to c. 1057 (CDB1:55 pp. 53 — 60). The original text A
has no such names at all, only a later marginal note refers to a village
called “Dolany” by an archaic locative case “Dolas”. Text B, confirmed by
king Pfemysl Otakarl in 121P, has five such toponyms (CDB /: 55, 57 : 7; 57 ;
13; 57 : 15; 58 : 1; 58 : 10). Two names of this type are contained in the
foundation charter of the HradistS-u-Olomouce monastery of 1078 (CDB l : 79,
84 : 1, 84 : 3). Other texts likely to contain reliable infor-mation mention
-ane names in times of Spytihnev II (1055— 1061: CDB I: 56, 60 : 16) and
VratislavII (1061 to 1092: CDB 7: 91, 98:33, cf. also CDB 11: 359, 381 : 30,
381 : 33), Such names first occurred en masse in the large charter of bishop
Jindrich Zdik for the church of Olomouc of 1131 (21 cases: CDB /: 115 pp.
116— 123). In relation to the 1169 toponyms, documented by Charters of the
first CDB volume, their representation lies far below that of the -ici names,
amounting to 74 cases equal to 6.3% of the total of all toponyms. At the end
of the 12th Century, Population groups inhabiting such villages are referred
to as “vicinatus” (CDB 7:311, 284:21-22, year 1186, text quoted by Profous -
Svoboda - Smilauer 1960, 631). This may imply that unlike the -ici groups,
likely to have been cemented together by (quasi?-)kinship links, the main
unifying agent of the •and groups could have been represented by the factor
of common residence. Even the •ane groups did, howevcr, hardly represent a
unified phenomenon. Settlements established in Bohemia after 1039 by
re-settlement of some population groups from Poland taken away by duke
Bfetislav I and bearing -ane names (Hedgany, Krusicany: Släma 1985, 336) were
noted by Cosmas the chronicler as having retained the laws and customs of
their homeland. This made them un-doubtedly different from other -and groups
of the same age. The relation between the regional and local Settlement units
bearing -ane names may perhaps be described by the term of atomization. The
original -ane names of the llth Century referred to sizable segments of the
Bohemian landscape together with their population. After 1100, when these
natural units were replaced by the provinces instituted by the
Premysl-dynasty administration, the •ane names denoted localized Settlements,
possibly sheltering population groups United by the sole factor |
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of the
proximity of their past or present residences. The earlier and extensive •ane
Settlement units probably in-cluded a number of villages and hamlets bearing
-fei names. Their disintegration following the introduction of division of
Bohemia into provinces administered by ducal ofhcials after 1100 both “bared”
the basic settlement tissue of the land, consisting of -fei settled places,
and limited the further use of the -ane names to sites probably differing in
their structure from the -fei groups. |
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Having
at our disposal no means for distinguishing between the “well-born” and
commoner lineages and Population groups resident in the Bohemian countryside,
we must limit our observations to features likely to have been of general
significance. One of these features is quite definitely the role of kinship
ties within society which seems to have been not negligible. In addition to
the oft-quoted relations of individuals towards their ancestors, patemal and
maternal uncles, the role of cognatic ties is emphasized by the existence of
a personal name “NesvaJSil” (i.e. one without male marriage-related kin:
Hosäk - Srämek 1980, 139; Profoits 1951, 213—214; Svo-boda 1968, 385; on the
underlying substantive “svak” cf. Nemec etal. 1980, 78—79). Again, such relations
must have been so typical that their absence was conspicuous enough to mark
the individual in question in the manner of a personal name. Most instructive
examples of village lineages named after their ancestors by means of the -fei
suffix, patrilocal and patrilinear with inheritance exclusi-vely along the
male descent Ünes, are supplied by the Ksi<jga Henrykowska from the
borderland between Silesia and Bohemia (Grodecki 1949 Liber 1.2 p. 252, 31;
Liber 1.8 p. 278, 84; Liber 1.10 p. 299, 113; fbid. p. 300, 113; ibid. p.
307, 120). |
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A
number of inhabitants of the countryside of early medieval Bohemia are
referred to in our sources as “he-redes” (the inheritors: Sasse 1982,
249—250; Modzelewski 1987,110— 111). Against the background of all the
evidence presented above, this term, likely to be indigenous to the rural
strata of the Bohemian population, seems to denote individuals integrated
into the economic and social structure of their communities by means of their
blood rela-tionships to the earliest ancestors of these communities (in
Czech, the term “dSdic1*, the inheritor, is derived from the substantive
“ded”, meaning “ancestor” at that time, with the patronymic suffix -ic\ the
inheritor is thus the descendant of the ancestor). Some of the “heredes”
at-tained such social Status that they were invited to act as wittnesses on
Charters {CDB I: 308, 278:32, year 1185: CDB II: 378, 422 : 25 to 423 : 5, a
transaction of the inci-pient 13th Century recorded in the second half of the
same Century). The last-named instance even includes a “heres” with a
patronymic (Stepän Radostic), attesting thus to the homogeneity of
genealogical usances percolating through “well-born” and commoner strata of
Contemporary Bohemian society. In fact, the use of the term **here$” need not
have been confined strictly to lower social ranks and it could have denoted
groups of various social Standing (so in Poland: Modzelewski 1987, 110— 111,
on the term also Trawkowski 1980). Groups of inhabitants of freshly asserted
lands seem to have been referred to in the Charters as “hospites”. The
internal structure of these groups is entirely elusive save for the fact that
they |
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