Cwén-land
- noun [ neuter ]
Grammar
Cwén-land lies between the White Sea [Cwén Sǽ] and Norway, north of the Gulf of Bothnia. The country east and west of the Gulf of Bothnia, from Norway to the Cwén or White Sea, including Finmark on the north. Malte-Brun says that the inhabitants of Cwén-land were a Finnish race. They were called Quaines, and by Latin writers Cayani. Gerchau maintains, in his history of Finland,
1810, that the Laplanders only were called Finns, and that they
were driven from the country by the Quaines.
'They settled in Lapland, and on the shores of the White Sea,
which derived from them the name of Quen Sea or Quen-vik.'. . .
Adamus Bremensis happened to be present at a conversation, in which king
Swenon spoke of Quen-land or Quena-land, the country of the Quaines,
but as the stranger's knowledge of Danish was very imperfect, he supposed
the king had said Quinna-land, the country of women or Amazons; hence
the absurd origin of his Terra Feminarum, mistaking the name of the country with quinna a woman
e
-
Sweón habbaþ be súþan him ðone sǽs earm Osti; and be eástan him Sermende; and be norþan him ofer ða wéstennu is Cwén-land
the Swedes have, to the south of them, the Esthonian arm of the sea; and to the east of them the Sermende; and to the north of them, over the wastes, is Cwën-land,
- Ors. 1, 1 ;
- Bos. 19, 21-23: 21, 10.
Entry information
Citation
Bosworth, Joseph. “Cwén-land.” In An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary Online, edited by Thomas Northcote Toller, Christ Sean, and Ondřej Tichy. Prague: Faculty of Arts, Charles University, 2014. https://bosworthtoller.com/6941.
Checked: 1