The meaning of the name of the Poles’ first historically-attested ruler – Mieszko (pronounced Mieshko) – has been a source of confusion, so to speak, for quite some time.
Jan Długosz concluded that this was a diminutive of Mieczysław as in “he who obtains fame by means of a sword” (miecz). Various academics mocked this because they claimed such a name was an invention of Długosz’s. However, this strictly speaking is not true. Długosz did not invent the name Mieczysław.
We have no idea what early Polish names sounded because the rules of spelling were nonexistent back then and the correct pronunciation today of such names is based on guessing. Some have hypothesized names such as Miecisław, Miecsław, Miesław, Miecław, Masław (the alleged Mazovian rebel against Casimir the Restorer), Mojsław or Miesław but those are mostly just guesses.
We do know that the Meczslaus, Meczzlaus or Meslaus are attested in the written source material. Here is an example (Meczslaus de Comeczsko dapifer Brestensis) from the court records relating to the lawsuits between Poland and the Teutonic Knights:
Note too that the Polish Brześć appears as was usual as Brest (much like the Brest in the “Venetic” Bretagne – take that for what you will).
In any event, Długosz did not invent the name Meczslaus. What Długosz did instead was twofold. First, he linked Mieszko to Meczslaus (claiming the former was a diminutive of the latter). Second, he provided an etymology of Mieczysław (claiming it was a name that had something to do with “swords”.
Mieszko may or may not have been diminutive. Certainly, names ending with an -o did exist in Poland, for example, Lesko, Jasco, Hanko. Now, maybe these were diminutives of Lech (?), Jan (?), Henry (?) but, if so, they were used in official records (which is how we know they existed) rather than the “full” names. Of course, further west, Germanic names also commonly ended with an -o: Bodo, Gero, Tassilo and so weiter. Were those too dimunitives? Who knows but likely not.
Let’s focus on the second claim made by Długosz, that Mieszko was connected to miecz – meaning “sword.” Is that likely? It’s possible.
On the other hand, Długosz’s predecessors Wincenty Kadłubek and the writer of the Greater Poland Chronicle seemed to connect the name to someone who miesza – meaning “mixes things up” or “stirs things up” in the sense of, in Mieszko’s case, introducing great changes such as the assertion of Polish claims against the Germans and others and introduction of Christianity. Interestingly, “mix” may be a cognate here of mieszać much as “mess” (though I will leave that to others).
Are there others etymologies? Sure. Some have connected the name to the diminutive name for a bear – miś or miśko. This is the same process as the Russian name Misha which refers to a bear but is a diminutive of Michael. This has served some to claim that Mieszko was a viking after all because Scandinavians have the name Björn which means the same thing – bear; the idea being that this was just a translation into Suavic.
Another suggestion was that the name has something to do with a mouse – mysz/mysza/mycha. So something like Myszko. This would have somehow connected Mieszko with the legendary King Popiel (Pompillius) who had the misfortune of being eaten by mice (how exactly though, the proponents of this theory do not tell us).
Ok, so now we have the following suggested etymologies:
- sword (miecz);
- mixing or stirring up (mieszać);
- bear (miś or miśko); as well as
- mouse (mysz/mysza/mycha);
Are there other possible etymologies?
How about a diminutive of the Polish word for “moon” – miesiąc (the Czech miesic or the OCS měsęc).
Of course, these etymologies are not entirely exclusive. Thus, for example, Saskia Pronk-Tiethoff, in discussing the etymology of the Suavic miecz – sword, muses (following Kiparsky) whether the word may have derived (in the case of both the Suavic and the Gothic meki/Crimean Gothic mycha (!)) from a Caucasian language. Kiparsky, it seems brought up Georgian, Lezgian and Udi words with a similar meaning to “sword”. The Georgian word – maχνα – refers to something “sharp” or a “sword.” The Lezgian word – maχ – is a word for “iron” Most interestingly, we have the Udi word – meχ – which stands for “sickle.”
So perhaps when the moon is out, the mice and bears and the roving bands of Suavic warriors with their crescent-shaped swords really mess/mix things up before order/harmony – ład -I s restored once again by the rising Sun (Łado?).
Whether the Germanic messer has some connection is another question. It seems to go back to a “food” (or “meat”?) knife. Somehow it all may have something to do with some IE tale of the body (Boda?) of Moon being cut up and eaten. If this sounds too a bit like the tale of Osiris, Isis and Set (sunset? 🙂 ), that is not surprising given Osiris’s lunar connections. Of course, the sword and scabbard have obvious sexual connotations as well (though the Polish po mieczu, though used in a genealogical context, refers rather to the fact that the sword was associated with men; what the story is with the English “rod” and the Suavic narod is another matter – suffice it to say that people have reconstructed a PIE *reudh- meaning “to clear land” and uncultivated land in Suavic is lada which, of course, is a term used for a female “beloved”. In any event there maybe be a rather good reason why “ploughing” may mean so many things).
Curiously, “knife” and gniew (“anger”) may well be cognates as well – whether these have something to do with Niya (Set?) is another question.
As a final interesting point, Udi speaking villages included such places as Vartashen in Georgia and Mihlikuvah in Azerbaijan. These – those not some of the other Udi placenames – appear IE in origin. Most interestingly, the primary remaining Udi village is nowadays Nij in Azerbaijan…
Getting back to the subject of this post. Perhaps those kinds of lunar, pagan overtones were why Mieszko had to quickly get himself a new Christian name. Whether Dagome was that name is another matter (Dzigoma is attested as a Polish name so a Scandinavian origin is not at all certain even if the scribe did get it right). Curiously, the Norse Dag – dagr – means “day”. (The moon-knife messer at night and the day-knife dagger for the day? Likely not, as the etymology of each suggests other origins but who really knows). Nevertheless, there is that tale of Mieszko having been born blind and then having miraculously recovered his sight – the mind (Mund, myśl, musli, Moon) runs wild with possibilities!
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