Talk:Hwicce

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Tolkein

J.R.R. Tolkien once refered to himself as a Hwiccan of Witchwood. Should this be mentioned in the article? Eluchil404 12:00, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Why not mention it under Tolkien and link to this article. --Genie 19:06, 29 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

pronunciation

How do you pronounce Hwicce? --128.176.233.18 21:27, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In IPA, I would guess something like ʍɪtʃə or maybe ʍitʃə But those are a guesses. Old English pronounciation is a far from simple subject. Angus McLellan (Talk) 22:06, 28 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

History

Small, but important point, Britannia did not secede from the Roman Empire it was abandoned by the Roman Empire ...The Fat Contractor 17:41, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've changed 'seceded from' to 'left' - more accurate and doen't change the sense of the sentence. The Fat Contractor 11:35, 15 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

For the hell of it I'll disagree: The Roman troops in Britania elected Constantine III as Emporer, who invaded Gaul in an unsuccesful attempt for the throne. While Constine was on the continent, there was a rebellion against his tax collectors. This conicided with a major barbarian invasion across the Rhine and the rampage of the Goths from the Balkins through Italy (sack of Rome), Gaul and Spain. After all that, the empire was not able to re-establish control over either Britian (or Spain). But technically Britannia was in rebelion. Jalipa (talk) 21:43, 5 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

tribal name

The Episcopus Hwicciorum was the "bishop of the Hwiccians", or "bishop of the people of Hwicce" in the late 7th century, but this does not mean that "the Hwicce" were ever an "Anglo-Saxon tribe". This is completely unsubstantiated. A "Hwiccian" is somebody from the kingdom of Hwicce, i.e. the toponym is primary, and the demonym at best secondary.

Whatever the origin of the name "Hwicce", it must be established on the basis of toponymy. The basis that hwicce "chest, box" could also mean witches'(!) cauldron seems to be pulled from thin air. The unspoken implication that the noun witch itself may also derive from this doesn't exactly lend credibility to the idea. I have no idea whether Stephen Yeates is to be considered a quotable source, but at least it should be made clear that he single-handedly pulled this suggestion from thin air in 2008. I must say that book titles that make "the Hwicce" a "tribe of the Witches" does not exactly suggest scholarly credibility to me. --dab (𒁳) 11:47, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

so, after looking up the relevant literature, it turns out that

the name's etymology is unknown, and "difficult". There are three main possibilities:
from a given name, but this is speculation, as no such name is attested
from a pejorative appellation "the quakers", i.e. cowards
from the shape of the valley, "the people living in the chest (-shaped valley)"

The Yeates suggestion appears to derive from this third suggestion, but turning this into an orgy of goddesses, cauldrons and witches is rather pie-in-the-sky to say the least. The suggestion that witch has anything to do with this is nonsense, as "witch" begins in w, not in hw. --dab (𒁳) 12:23, 8 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The problem is that Yeates has managed to get an academic publisher to publish his work. I also do not like his views, but I am not a Saxonist and not qualified to argue. Nevertheless I regard it as a lot of airy-fairy nonsense.

A H Smith is a good source. Duignan is now rather ancient and not well-regarded. I have looked at Watts, Cambridge Dictionary of English Place-names (2004). This is a recent work produced by members of the English Place Name Society to replace Ekwall. I have pruned the list of names derived from Hwicce:

Unfortunately, it does not deal with Wychnor, but that is too far from the boundary of the Hwicce for the people to be a likely derivation.
Wychbold, is given a different derivation by the Cambridge Dictionary.
Wychavon is an invented name for a new District Council operating from 1974 and covering the area from Droitwich to the Avon. My guess is that the Wych is Wychbold. Peterkingiron (talk) 15:48, 10 January 2012 (UTC)[reply]