GUNE'UNGA

Stuart wtote:

Very interesting, Myron!

I recognize one word, gune’unga.

Myron wrote.

It is interesting that similar words were used on both sides of the Atlantic over 600 years ago.  I believe that fact is supportive of the COPPER HAULERS hypothesis.

Let us keep a useful perspective.  We are going to discuss the meaning of three puffs of air used in different places, which were thousands of miles apart, over 600 years ago.

What I write that appears to be strong belief is only an  attempt to clarify a complicated hypothesis.

It (gune’unga) occurs in the third strophe of Voluspa, written down by Snorri Thurlson of Iceland in 1100 AD in his book Poetic Edda, taken from Norse bards when he was ambassador to Norway. 

It (gune’unga) is a Norse word Ginnunga that comes originally from a Finnish word Kinnunka, which means ‘sea of boats having a wooden keel with extensions in the stern and prow’, a distinctive longboat commonly depicted on rocks in Sweden. 

This sea is the Baltic Sea. Strophe 3 describes the earliest of times, when the Baltic Sea was a Baltic Lake, before an outlet cut through the rocks in Denmark. Here is my translation into English.

The third strophe of Völuspá is:

1. Ár var alda, þar er Ýmir bygði

2. var-a sandr né sær né svalar unnir;

3. jörð fannsk æva né upphiminn,

4. gap var Ginnunga en gras hvergi.

1 Twas the earliest of times when Ymir lived;

2 there was not sand nor sea nor cooling wave.

3 Earth had not been, nor Heaven on high,

4 trade lacked Kinnunka and nowhere was there grass.

Myron wrote:

The English translation of the stanza where  gune’unga appears on the west side of the Atlantic is in the sounds recorded by the Moravian Priests about AD 1832+.  In Chapter 3, Stanza 20, he sounds were given to the Moravian Priests by the man reciting the LENAPE History.    

There are many indications in other deciphered stanzas that the LENAPE reciter was the person doing the LENAPE to English translation.  So I accepted the English version without deciphering the sounds, because the English version fit the migration story.

Craig Judge deciphered the first stanza of Chapter 4.  His understanding that the LENAPE words meant "where there was an abundance of rivers," enabked me to add that phrase in [-] brackets to this verse.
But I did NOT do any tedious decipherment on this Stanza.

So now I went looking to see what gune’unga might have meant on this side of the Atlantic.  Here is what I found:

Viking and the RED Man, Reider T. Sherwin, Vol. 4, 1946, page 178. (Place Names).

GUNN-HANNE1 Coney Creek, Lancaster County, Pa. and
Long Run, Westmoreland County, Pa; meaning “Long Creek” (Johnson)
1  ginne vain,  long water or river
See KIN. (large); -AN (this section)

Page 73  (General Vocabulary)
KIN-1 large (an intensifying word used only in composition.) (Rand-Clarke)
…
GUNNEAU,1 long (Zweiberger)
1 ginn- (prefix), that gives to the word which it is attached, the meaning of being raised, elevated, high, superior, excellent, above the average, also means  remarkable, distinquished, of note, first rate, high-class, eminent.

Page 173  (Place Names)

-AN –AAN, -AHAN,1  sea.  There is considerable evidence that the terminations AN, etc, means “sea” or “out to sea” (from the land).  It is an abbreviation of the root evident in the Micmac word OKTAN2  the  sea (Rand).
. . .
1  vatn  (Norwegian vann)  noun neuter gender (1) water, (2) lake (sea), (3) voetn (plural, large sea.

2  greitt vatn, open sea or water.

So I think the word  gune’unga refers to a large body of water.  That would work with the phrase meaning a multiple of revers flowing into a large body of water. (James Bay).  Thus further deciphering of Chapter 3, stanza 20 increases the belief the stanza was self validating but the LENAPE rector was creating English translation phrases and "editing" on the fly.

STUART

Your poem may only refer to the water under the boats, and not the boats themselves.  I do not see much difference if the word is used either way.

The REAL IMPORTANT thing is that, once again, the VIKING and the RED MAN, helped me reach a
reasonable understanding of OLD NORSE words used over 600 years ago.

So, once again, MOST AMERICANS SPOKE NORSE, when the ENGLISH INVADED.