Untitled - Centrostudirpinia.it

DUES, THUES. 521
Hickes (Gramm. AS. p. 207) : pyrs sceal on ferine gewuniau/
and elsewhere fiyrs, pi. ]?yrsas, renders the Lat. cyclops, orcus.
The passage already given from the Cod. exon. 425, 28 has pyrre
with the s assimilated, as in irre for irse. And we find an
Engl. tliurst surviving in hobthurst (woodsprite), conf. hobgoblin
p. 502 [hob o t hurst ?] The OHG. form ought to be durs, pi.
dursa, or duris, gen. durises, which last does occur in a gloss for
the Lat. Dis, Ditis (Schm. 1, 458), and another gloss more Low
Germ, gives thuris for orcus (Fr. ogre); yet Notker ps. 17, 32
spells it tars (daemonium), pi. tursa, and MHG. has turse, gen.
tursen (Aw. 3, 179), perhaps turse, tursen (as in Massm. denkm.
109 tursen rhymes kiirsen), and even turste, gen. tiirsten (MS. 2,
205a ) ; on the other hand, Albr. Tit. 24, 47 has spil von eineoi
diirsen (Hahn 3254 tursen) =play of a d., from which passage we
gather that tiirse-shows as well as wihtel-shows (p. 441n.) were
exhibited for pastime : Ls. 3, 564 says, alluding to a well-known
fable, des kunt der dursch, und sprichet schuo ! the d. knows
that, etc., where the notion of satyr and wild man (p. 482)
predominates. The Latin poem of Wilten monastery in Tyrol,
which relates the story of the giant Haimo, names another giant
Thy r sis, making a proper name of the word :
Forte habitabat in his alius truculentior oris
Cyclops, qui dictus nomine Thy rsis erat,
Thy rsis erat dictus, Seveldia rura colebat. 1
The name of a place Tursinriut, Tursenriut (Doc. of 1218-9 in
Lang s Reg. 2, 88. 94) 2 contains our word unmistakably, and so
to my thinking does the earlier Tuzzinwanc near Neugart, stand
ing for Tussinwanc, Tursinwanc (campus gigantis), the present
Dussnang. Nor does it seem much more hazardous to explain
Strabo s ov(rve\0a (7, 1. Tzsch. 2, 328) by Thurshilda, Thuss-
an ON. Thurshildr.
hilda, Thursinhilda, 3
though I cannot produce
In Switzerland to this day diirst is the Wild Hunter (St. 1, 329),
on the Salzburg Alp dusel is a night-spirit (Muchar s Gastein,
p. 145), and in Lower Germany dros or drost is devil, dolt, giant. 4
1 Mone s Untersuchnng, pp. 288-9.
2 Now Tirschenreit, Tirschengereith. Schmeller s birthplace in the Up. Pala
et. . SUPPL.
3 Conf. Pharaildis, Verelde, p. 284-5 Grimild ; for Grimhild.
4 Brem. wb. 1, 257. llichey sub v. druus, Schiitae sub v. drost, Strodtmann sub
tinate, Schm. 1, 458. So Tiirschenwald, Thyrsentritt, Tiiratwinkel,