Kylfings - Etymology

Etymology

The exact etymology of the word kylfing is disputed and many different theories have been put forward as to its ultimate origin. The general trend has been to trace kylfing to the Old Norse words kylfa and kolfr, but scholars disagree as to the meaning of these words as well. Cleasby notes that in Old Norse, kylfa can mean a club or cudgel. Thus the national Icelandic antiquarian Barði Guðmundsson translated Kylfing to mean "club-wielders". As Foote points out, it can also mean a smaller stick, such as a tally-stick or wooden token used by merchants, and, according to Jesch, it can also mean the "highest and narrowest part" of a ship's stem. Holm discussed the term kylfa in connection with the word hjúkolfr which means "meeting" or "guild"; according to Holm, the second element kolfr could refer to a symbolic arrow traditionally used as a device to summon people for a meeting.

These varied derivations have led to a number of interpretations. Holm offers two meanings: "archer" and "man armed with a cudgel". A number of historians have asserted that Kylfing referred to a member of a "club in the social or Anglo-American sense", a "brotherhood" or a member of a Norse félag. In a number of minor Icelandic manuscripts on mathematics and geography, Kylfingaland is identified as Garðaríki, i.e. Kievan Rus', but the sources are unclear as to whether Kylfingaland is named for the Kylfings or vice versa, or whether, indeed, there is any connection at all.

The Russian cognate of Kylfing is Kolbjag, following the pattern of development *kolƀing (*kulƀing) > *kolƀęg > kolbjag. The Kolbiagi were a group of foreign merchant-venturers and mercenaries mentioned in a number of Old Russian sources. They are often mentioned together with the Varangians, a term used in Eastern Europe to describe Scandinavian traders and pirates. In Byzantine Greek, they were named koulpingoi and they served as a unit of the Byzantine army listed alongside the Varangian Guard, which was of Scandinavian origin.

A very different derivation was put forward by the Russian scholar B. Briems. He hypothesised that Kylfingr was a direct Norse translation of the Votic self-designation Vatjalaiset and Vatja (or Vadjalaiset and Vadja) used by the Votes, a Finnic tribe residing in Ingria, Russia. A non-Norse origin was also proposed by Julius Brutzkus, who argued that both Varangian and Kylfing derived from the Turkic languages, particularly the Bulgar and Khazar languages. Brutzkus asserted that Varangian came from the Turkic root varmak ("to walk, travel") while Kylfing was a Norse pronunciation of the Slavic kolbiagi, itself deriving from the Turkic phrase köl-beg ("sea-king"); under this interpretation the word Kylfing would be more or less synonymous with "Viking".