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Following Slavic immigration in the 7th century a Slavic tribal region developed on the lower Zwickauer Mulde river in the area of Rochlitz, the city mentioned as urbs and burgwardus Rochelinzi by Thietmar von Merseburg between 1014 and 1018. The region included 52 settlements, most of which were on land between 61 und 71 ground control points, a few above that. Thirteen of these villages had a name with the suffix -(ov)ici, three had a name of the type Kosobudy/Žornosěky. These represent the oldest class of names and the centre of the area. The later place names, with the suffixes -jь, -in and -ov based on personal names, appear in the centre as well as on the outskirts, where a greater number of place names based on appellatives are found. Some names such as Zschauitz and Kralapp, along with many other place names between the Elbe and Saale rivers, have exact equivalents in Bohemia and Moravia. They provide evidence of the immigrants’ origin.

The Slavonic district Quezici in the light of place names. ‒ The Slavonic district Quezici is mentioned for the first time in a document by Otto I, dated 961, as regio Quezici, in qua inest civitas Ilburg. Past linguistic research localized this district as a narrow strip of land beginning on the left bank of the Mulde river in the vicinity of Eilenburg which extended ca. 15 km to the north. The analysis and mapping of the Slavonic place names in the Eilenburg district revealed a clearly definable settlement area farther south. It extended from Taucha in the west to Müglenz, east of the Mulde. In the west it bordered on the pagus Chutici, in the north on the tribal area of the Siusili, in the south on the district Neletici. In the east a wide primeval forest belt separated the Quezici, Old Sorbian *Kvasici ‘Kvas people’, from the Slavonic tribes in the Elbe valley.

In an extensive article the well-known philologist Heinz Schuster-Šewc presented his views concerning our “Book of Place Names in Oberlausitz” (Upper Lusatia). He attempted to refute a substantial number of place name meanings and suggested new explanations. In some instances his interpretations were preferable to earlier explanations; however, in far more cases his arguments were not conclusive, so that the current explanations can still be considered valid.

In our 'Upper Lausitz Book of Place Names' the Slavic place names are given on eight colered maps with reference to soil value, in order to be able to determine the historical classification of the types of Slavic place names more precisely and to draw conclusions concerning the history of land-settlements. As a result it appears that the patronymic place names ending in -ici and -owici, as well as the habitative names ending in -jane and -y only occur where the soil was good, with values ranging between 50 and 70 points on a scale of 10 to 100. Other place names, including those ending in -jb, -ow, -in etc. also appear in rare instances here, but occur predominantly in areas of poor quality soil with values ranging between 20 und 50 points. They are therefore to be considered as later formations. Thus the oldest areas of land-settlement can be defined quite accurately and separated from later land-settlements. Our article presents a summary of the section in our book of place names dealing with the history of land-settlement and is illustrated with two new maps.

With the evaluation of numerous sources for personal and place names in the Niederlausitz (Lower Lusatia) new information also was gained to shed further light on three place names in the Leipzig area. The Niederlausitz place name Kolkwitz and the Leipzig place name Kulkwitz, wich have a very similar historical documentation, originally were traced back to *Kolkovici, from the personal name *Kolk, and also to *Kolkovica, from an appellative *kol, respectively, the diminutive *kolk 'pile, peg, stick, pole'. A more likely possibility is probably *Golkowici, from the personal name *Golk, which has been verified as a frequent family name in Lower Lusatia. Until now one presumed that the hybrid place name Meusdorf was derived from the Sorbian personal name *Mič< Nikolaus. The oldest historical forms- 1245 Mitisdorf, 1254 Mitisdorf, and only in 1339 Miczdorf - would seem to indicate a derivation from a personal name *Mět or *Mětiš. Both are common as family names in the Lausitz. One traced the name Schkölen, a place not far from Leipzig, on the basis of *skol < *sьkolь,, back to kol 'pile' and arrived at the meaning of a 'settlement near or with a palisade rampart', also because there is a circular rampart in the vicinity of the village. We have traced back the Niederlausitz place names Schollen and Schuhlen, which based on a chain of evidence closely correspond to Schkölen, to *Skolin, from the personal name *Skola, which was often used as a family name in the Niederlausitz. This interpretation is most probably also valid for Schkölen. This article once again demonstrates the close relationships between personal names and place names.

Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung, Bd. 46 Nr. 1 (1997)