Talk:mece

Controversial Etymology

How do you know that the word mēċe was borrowed INTO Slavic and not FROM Slavic??
In fact, in all Slavic languages the word meč, меч is pronounced and means exactly the same. The differences appear only in the languages of Slavic neighbours: Old English mēċe, Old Saxon māki, Old Norse mækir, Finnish miekka.
It means that the word mece comes from the common root of Slavic languages and spreads out to the german-nordic neighbours, changing slightly (mainly due to the differences in the pronounciation). There is no stronger argument that would support the idea of spreading in the opposite way: from Germanic to Slavic languages .
Merewyn 23:03, 16 August 2006 (UTC)