THULE (ETYMOLOGY OF).
Reading edition
Perhaps the origin of “Thule” is ground more debatable and debated than even its geographical position.
“Some,” says Sibbald, “derive the name Thule from the Arabic word Tule (طول = Túl), which signifies ‘afar off,’ and, as it were with allusion to this, the poets usually call it ‘Ultima Thule;’ but I rather prefer the reason of the name given by the learned Bochartus,[49] who makes it to be Phœnician, and affirms that it signifies ‘darkness’ in that language. Thule (צל) in the Tyrian tongue was ‘a shadow,’ whence it is commonly used to signify ‘darkness,’ and the island Thule is as much as to say, an ‘island of darkness;’ which name how exactly it agrees to the island so called at the utmost point to the north is known to everybody.”
Others find Thule in the Carthaginian צל = “obscurity;” the Hebrew has צלל, and the Arabic ظل = obscuravit.”
After using or abusing the Semitic tongues, we come to Greek, which puts forth three principal claimants: θόλος = fuscus color, caligo; τέλος, a goal; and τηλὲ, procul. Meanwhile Isidorus (Orig. Seu Etym., lib. xiv., 6) derives Thyle, as has been shown, from the sun and its solstice. In the twelfth century, Suidas (Lex. sub voc.) makes Thulis (θούλις) a king who reigned over Egypt and the isles of the ocean, one of which was called after his name.
Etymologists presently applied themselves to the Gothic languages and their derivatives; and they did not reject geographical resemblances. Pontanus (loc. cit., i., p. 746) asserts that the islands about the Norwegian coast were generally called Thuyle. Ortelius (Thesaur. and Theatr. Orbis, p. 103), relying upon Ptolemy’s latitudes and longitudes, declares that “Thilir” was the term applied to the people of Norwegian “Tilemark;” the latter word is also written “Thulemarchia” (Johannes Gothus); “Thielemark,” “Thylemark” and “Tellemarck” (Pontanus).[50] Not a few writers refer “Thule,” as has been said, to “Thy” or “Thy-land,” the extreme point of Jutland. The commentator on Saxo Grammaticus, before referred to, records a derivation of “Thule:”
“Quod vel instar Tholi, cujusdam orbis terrarum sit imposita, vel quod eo navigantes ad ploratum (tothülen Belgæ dicunt) proficiscerentur.”
In p. 175 he becomes still more vague:
“Rectius itaque Velljus nostro, juxtà ac M. Christiernus Petri, primus Saxonis interpres, reddidere Blend aff Telløe vel Blend aff Tyløe. Quænam verò iste sint insulæ, juxtà scimus cum ignarissimis.”[51]
Prætorius (De Orbi Goth., iii. 4, § 3) deduces “Thule” from the Gothic “Tiel,” “Teule,” or “Tuole” (= τέλος, finis), meaning a long distance, and denoting the remotest land; he doubts the existence of the place, with D’Anville (Mem. de Paris, vol. xxxvii., p. 439). Reinerus Reineccius (Reinech, Historiæ tam Sacræ quam Profanæ Cognitio, Frankf. et Lipsiæ, 1685, and Methodus Legendi, etc., Historiam tam Sacram quam Profanam, Frankf. 1670) advocates the Saxon “Tell,” meaning a limit—limes septentrionis atque occidentis. Dr Charnock compares the Saxon “Deel,” a part or portion, and quotes Wachter (Gloss. Germ.), who gives amongst other meanings of “Teil” (hod. Theil), pars, portio, segmentum, and “teilen,” i.e., dividere in partes.
Torfæus (Hist. Norwegiæ, i. 5, p. 12) proposes a variety of derivations. Wilhelm Obermüller (Wörterbuch, etc., Williams and Norgate, Lond. 1872) would explain “Thule Procopiana,” by Dal (a dale), or “Tulla,” also written “Tolin” and “Tullin,” a meadow or pasturage; and he remarks that Norwegian “Tellemark” or “Thilemark,” is of the same descent. The Thracian Kelts had a kingdom of Tyle, which here probably signified “Dail,” a fortress. When Pliny makes men sail from Nerigos to “Thule,” the latter might have meant Du-ile, “the little island,” or perhaps “the dark (‘dubh,’ cloudy and wintry) isle.”
Even the orthography of “Thule” is disputed, and there are sundry variants—Thula, Thyle, Thile, Thila, Tyle, and Tila. The popular Greek form adopted by Strabo, Ptolemy, Agathemerus, Isidorus, Jornandes (De Reb. Get., cap. 1, 1), Procopius (De Bell. Goth., ii. 15) and Stephanus Byzantinus, is θούλη, which in Romaic would be pronounced “Thúle;” the ethnic being θουλαῖς (Thulæus), and θουλίτης (plur. θουλίται). The Latins (Mela, Pliny, Tacitus, Anonymus Ravennæ, Martianus, Solinus, etc.) seem to have preferred “Thule;” and Cluverius (Germ. Ant., iii. 39) rejects all others as barbarous. The learned and humorous Salmasius (in Solin., cap. xxii.) declares that “Thyle” ought never to be written, despite many good codices of Virgil, Pliny, Jornandes, Isidore, the Anon. Ravennæ, and others, which give Thyle and even Tyle, θύλη and θυλίτης; Æthicus (in Cosmog., p. 730), borrowing from Orosius, has “Tilæ;” Boethius (xx. 11), “Tile” and “Ðyle.”
We here conclude the subject of Thule, “celebrata omnium litteris insula.” To do it full justice, and especially to quote from the “cohort” of modern writers, would require a volume.