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Help[Facts] Re: Meaning of Helsing
in reply to a message by Daniel
Hi Daniel,
Helsing is a newer spelling of Hälsing (same pronunciation) as in the place names Hälsingland (Swedish county), Helsingborg (Swedish town), Helsingør (Danish town) Helsingfors/Helsinki (Finnish capital) and some smaller places like Hälsingbacken, Hälsingen, Hälsingfors, Hälsinglund, Hälsingmarken, Hälsingtorp etc.
The place names derive from the word "hals" which means "neck, throat" nowadays but meant "narrow river, brook" and "tongue of land, hook" earlier.
Some of the places might be named Hälsing-... because people from Hälsingland were the first to settle there and not because of any "hals" around.
Nowadays the word "hälsing" alone means "man or woman from Hälsingland (Sweden)" in Swedish.
Regards, Satu
Helsing is a newer spelling of Hälsing (same pronunciation) as in the place names Hälsingland (Swedish county), Helsingborg (Swedish town), Helsingør (Danish town) Helsingfors/Helsinki (Finnish capital) and some smaller places like Hälsingbacken, Hälsingen, Hälsingfors, Hälsinglund, Hälsingmarken, Hälsingtorp etc.
The place names derive from the word "hals" which means "neck, throat" nowadays but meant "narrow river, brook" and "tongue of land, hook" earlier.
Some of the places might be named Hälsing-... because people from Hälsingland were the first to settle there and not because of any "hals" around.
Nowadays the word "hälsing" alone means "man or woman from Hälsingland (Sweden)" in Swedish.
Regards, Satu
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Replies
Hälsing indicates a person or people somehow related to Häls - i.e. the people or descendants of Häls (possibly a place, but more likely a person's name or epithet). Rather than "neck" I would assume it is derived from a word cognate with English háls/héals (health/salvation) Icelandic háls-/heilsa, a very rare name element I know of only from a single name Halsard (that there is no medial vowel hints that the /a/ is long, rather than short as it is in hals "neck", although more variants would be helpful to confirm this). That there is only one instance in English records may indicate that this is a peculiarly Danish/Swedish name. Either the name element was more common there than it would seem from name lists, or the Helsings were/are a prolific dynasty.
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