Kaszubian Suavi

One may ask the question of whether Slavs called themselves Suavi or Suevi.

(The first supposed difficulty is the question of pronunciation of the “ue” in old Slavic languages.  We have already devoted time to this before (finding no difficulty) so we won’t spend any time on it here.)

So are there any examples of this?  Well, such examples do exist albeit they are rare to say the least.  One is the following from Florian Ceynowa’s “The Treasure of the Kaszubian language” (Skôrb kaszébskosłovjnskjè mòvé, published in 1866, page 62) where, in discussing customs and attire of the Kaszubian Slovinians, he refers to them as “Slovinians, that is the Suavs” (genitive Sławów):Ceynowa was a bit of a character, nevertheless his testimony is interesting.

Note too that the Slovinian Kaszubs lived mostly around the town of Łeba which raises a question – was this Łeba also derived from some sort of a Germanic Elba (like Łaba allegedly from Alba, Albis or Elba) or is it rather the case that all these words are Slavic in origin (note the German form is Leba)?  According to Christian Friedrich Wutstrack, a German topographer, the name Łeba is Wendish, that is Slavic, and means as much a wood or forest:

From the 1793 Kurze historisch-geographisch-statistische Beschreibung des Königlich-Preußischen Herzogtums Vor- und Hinterpommern.

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