The suffix -ow is Slavic though not always. In the East of Germany, it is assumed that -ow endings are all or virtually all Slavic. But what about somewhere else. Like on Lake Constance aka the Bodensee (for the Polish Goddess Boda see here) aka Lacus Podamicus aka Lacus Veneticus aka Lacus Moesius (Musiano? Musianus?).
Here is a map of the Bodensee from 1540 with the -ow place names circled. Other names that also sound (though, of course, not necessarily are) Slavic are underlined.
The trouble with some of these is that the suffix -gow also represents the earlier German spelling of a -gau. Putting aside whether -gau coming from -gow may also be Slavic, note that the above names also include other -ow suffixes such as:
- -now
- -chow
- -dow
- -sow
We have not include the various “true” (?) Gau names such as Lintzgow, Algow, Turgow or Hoegow. Other names in the area include (see Johann Georg Tibianus 1603 map):
- Raittnow (?)
- Dieow
- Justnow
- Sangnow
- Lestetten
- Weissow
- Lestiech
- Radara (Redarii?)
- Widow
- Didow (?)
- Gassow (?)
- Reichenow (note that on the above map, it was still called Rychow)
For other interesting names in the area such as:
- Belgrad
- Grod
- Lengatz
- Altwinden
- Edelitz
- Engelitz
- Reutin
- Kochlin
- Kremlen
- Warnow
see here.
We will not follow Ketrzynski (yet) in seeing Constance (Kostnitz) as Slavic.
If you wanted to know where (at least some) Slavs come from take a look at the above.
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