Die slavischen Orts- und Flurnamen im Lüneburgischen by Paul Kühnel; Ernst Eichler; Dieslavischen Siedlungen im Königreich Sachsen mit Erklärung ihrer Namen by Gustave HeyReview by: H. LeemingThe Slavonic and East European Review, Vol. 62, No. 3 (Jul., 1984), pp. 472-473Published by: the Modern Humanities Research Association and University College London, School ofSlavonic and East European StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4208945 .

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472 THE SLAVONIC REVIEW

in I956 Professor Betts went to Prague to participate in a conference celebrating Jeronimus of Prague. Professor Polisensky ought to know that during that same year Professor Betts expressed horror and disgust at the Soviet invasion of Hungary. What does Professor Polisensky think that Professor Betts would have said if he had lived to see Soviet tanks in Prague? Perhaps this is unfair: but it is not unfair to note the absence of any mention of a visit to Oxford and London of a group of Czechoslovak historians in September I 968. With one exception none of these historians is now able to pursue his calling. Selectivity of material goes on: Professor Polisensky does not much care for R. W. Seton-Watson - perhaps because he did not go to Prague in I 948? But he does not even mention the role of Bruce Lockhart in Anglo-Czech relations. Perhaps Professor Polisensky felt that a man so closely involved in the Russian counter-revolution could not be mentioned in a book published in Czechoslovakia under Soviet occupation? And what about Anglo-Czech relations concerning the Legions in Russia? There is absolute silence here. The role of Benes and his government in London during the Second World War is also not mentioned.

There are a number of inaccuracies in this book. There is no evidence to show that the National Front is 'financed by institutions which undoub- tedly have plenty of money. Monopolies, led by ICI, which pay dividends of 8 to i 5/% have money' (p. 249). The Czech reader will be pardoned for thinking that British capitalism, led by ICI, finances the National Front. In fact Professor Polisensky never actually says so. On p. 245, it is noted that the main tax burden falls on those least able to bear it. Indeed it is even denied that there is such a thing as progressive taxation in Britain. On p. 236 it is noted that during the Winter War Britain promised Finland a hundred thousand men. This is not so: nor do I know of any instant inJuly I940 when Rudolf Hess negotiated for a separate peace with the British ambassador in Madrid (p. 237).

I only hope that the readers of Dejiny Britanie will be able to extract from this short book that which is valuable and indeed excellent and disregard that which is false and untrue. London H. HANAK

SHORTER NOTICES

Kiihnel, Paul. Die slavischen Orts- und Flurnamen im Luneburgischen. Edited, with a foreword and index of Slavonic roots, by Ernst Eichler. Slavistische Forschungen, 34. B6hlau, Cologne, Vienna, I982. Xii +

523 + [2] pp. Indexes. DM I 34.00. Hey, Gustave. Die slavischen Siedlungen im Konigreich Sachsen mit Erklarung ilrer

Namen. Reprint of I893 Dresden edition. With postscript and sup- plementary place-name index by Ernst Eichler. Slavistische For- schungen, 35. Bohlau, Cologne, Vienna, 198I. [8] + 355 + [i6] pp. Index. DM88.oo.

THE reprinting of these two eighty-ninety year old monographs on Slavonic place-names of the Liineburg region and Saxony respectively is rather more

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REVIEWS 473

than an act of pietas celebrating earlier investigators in the field. It symptomizes a continuing healthy willingness to admit and treat scientifi- cally the relics of Slavonic ethnicity in German territory. The project is also a happy example of collaboration between West German series editor, Reinhold Olesch, and publisher on the one hand and East German editor and printer on the other.

Both works are well documented, drawing on sources from early medieval times. Kiihnel's lay-out is geographical; place-names are arranged in regional sections; each numbered article offers, apart from the name of town or village, a list of microtoponyms (Flurnamen or field-names). The editor has provided a valuable index of Slavonic roots which goes some way towards correcting what is an unsatisfactory arrangement for the philologist.

Hey's work follows etymological principles. The onomastic material is grouped in articles headed by the appropriate Slavonic root-word which appears in its Old Church Slavonic guise, together with variants in the West Slavonic languages. The dictionary comprises two alphabetical sections, the first of derivatives from personal names, the second from common nouns. Hey's etymologies, based largely on Miklosic's works, supplemented by his own knowledge of Lusatian, Czech, and West Slavonic generally, have in some respects been outdated by later research. Eichler provides a most useful index of such cases, referring the reader to German and Austrian post-war publications; this includes 41O words, or about 23 per cent of the 1,772 items in Hey's own index. One of the doubtful cases is Colditz, which Hey derives from a personal name, either Kolodej 'wheelwright', which would be in line with the earliest documentation (Colidici, Cholidistcha), or Koleda. It is a pity that the corrected etymologies could not be stated here; in this particular case one suspects a connection with CS *koldVzb 'spring'. London H. LEEMING

Bahdanovic, Maksim, Harun, Ales, and Biadula Zmitrok. The Images Swarm Free: A Bilingual Selection of Poetry. Translated by Vera Rich, edited with an introduction by Arnold McMillin. Anglo-Byelorussian Society, London, I982. I 35 pp. ?4.00.

BYELORUSSIAN poetry is almost unknown in the West. Original material is hard to obtain and very little has yet appeared in translation. There have been two previous anthologies of English translations (V. Rich, Like Water, Like Fire, London, 197I, and W. May, Fair Land of Byelorussia, Moscow I976), but in both the emphasis was on quantity rather than quality. Examples were taken from so many sources that no single poet's work was illustrated in any depth. Moreover, since the Byelorussian texts were not given, the reader was unable to form any opinion of the original.

This new selection remedies both those shortcomings. Each poem is given in the original, with its translation in verse on the opposite page. Only three poets are represented, but they are amongst the most impressive and distinctive talents in Byelorussian literature. Bahdanovic (I89I-I9I7) is

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