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MÜNZE, MINT,ANDMONEY AN ETYMOLOGY FOR LATIN MONETA

With appendices on Carthaginian Tanit and the Indo-European month word1

THEO VENNEMANN GEN. NIERFELD

Figure 15 Moneta2

1. Mint, Münze, money The etymology of E mint (both in the obsolete sense ‘a piece of money, a coin, money’ and in the current senses such as ‘a place where money is coined’, ‘a set of machines for coining’, and ‘a vast sum of money’) is seemingly straightforward. The OED writes s.v. mint n.1:

1 I am grateful to Philip Baldi (Pennsylvania State University, University Park, Pennsyl- vania), Peter Schrijver (University of Munich), Lutz Edzard (University of Oslo), and Ste- phen Laker (Leiden University) for reading drafts of this paper, and for encouragement and valuable suggestions. They must not be blamed for any errors, whether remaining or subsequently introduced. — As in previous publications I mark reconstructed forms by a raised cross (+) and incorrect forms by an asterisk (*). In cited material I respect the practice of the authors. 2 The picture shows a silver denar of the Carisia family (3.72 g., 46 B.C.) with the head of Moneta and her name on the obverse and the coining implements (anvil die with garlanded punch die — or cap of Vulcan? — above, between tongs and hammer, all within a partially visible laurel wreath) and the name T[itus] Carisius on the reverse (www.wildwinds.com/coins/sear5/s0447.html, 5-5-2005). My attention was drawn to the Carisius coins by Fig. 5107 in Lenormant and Babelon 1877-1919: 1963 and Fig. 2 in Babelon 1914: 266.  5)&0Û7&//&."//Û(&/Û/*&3'&-%

“OE. mynet neut., repr. (with change of gender) WGer. *munita fem., a[doption of] L[at]. moneta: see money. Cf. OFris. menote, munte fem., OS. munita fem. (MDu. munte,Du.munt fem.), OHG. munizza fem., muniz masc. and neut. (MHG. münze, mod.G. münze fem.). From LG. the word passed into the Scandinavian langs.: ON., Sw., Da. mynt.”

The etymology of G Münze is essentially the same, as can be learned from the above. Kluge/Seebold (2002: s.v.) write: “Wie ae. mynet n., anord. mynt entlehnt aus l[at]. monēta ‘Münze, Prägestät- te’. Die Bezeichnung stammt daher, daß die römische Münzprägestätte im Tempel der Iūnō Monēta war (die Herkunft des Namens ist umstritten).”

The etymology given for money leads to the same Latin etymon, cf. the OED: s.v.: “a[doption of] OF. moneie, mon(n)oie (mod.F. monnaie) = Pr., Sp. moneda, Pg. moeda,It.moneta [regular phonetic descendants of] L[at]. moneta ...”

2. Moneta: the problem The problems begin in Latin, as may be guessed by the Kluge/Seebold quotation above. The OED continues: “L[at]. moneta (? f[orm of] monere to warn, remind): orig. the name of a goddess (in classical times regarded as identical with Juno), in whose temple at Rome money was coined, hence, a mint, money. Cf. mint n.1”

The question mark prefixed to the derivation of Monēta, glossed as ‘Mutter der Musen’ and ‘Beiname der Juno’ in Walde/Hofmann 1982: s.v., from the verb monēre, advocated again and again from the time of Cicero down to our own days, is in my view fully justified. Walde/Hofmann (1982: s.v.) reject it for grammatical reasons, as did Assmann (1906: 478). They favor two hypotheses without making it clear which one is to be preferred: (1) “[Monēta ist] Sondergöttin einer etruskischen gēns Monēta ..., u[nd] zw[ar] eine Bildung vom Namensstamme, der in Monnius, Monnia¯nius usw. vor- liegt”, (2) “Monēta als ‘Musenmutter’ ist ... Übersetzung von Μνημοσύνη auf Grund nachträglicher Anlehnung an monēre”.3

3 The former etymology is in my view mere speculation. Reasons for rejecting the latter are given in Assmann 1906: 488.