Dava (Latinatepluraldavae) was a Geto-Dacian name for a city, town or fortress.[1] Generally, the name indicated a tribal center or an important settlement, usually fortified. Some of the Dacian settlements and the fortresses employed the Murus Dacicus traditional construction technique.
Most of these towns are attested by Ptolemy, and therefore date from at least the 1st century CE.
Many city names of the Dacians were composed of an initial lexical element (often the tribe name) affixed to -dava, -daua, -deva, -deba, -daba or -dova (<PIE *dʰeh₁-, "to set, place").[2][page needed] Therefore, dava 'town' derived from the reconstructed proto-Indo-European *dhewa 'settlement'.[3] A non-Indo European, Kartvelian solution has also been briefly mentioned, but dismissed as a random occurrence (Tomaschek 1893, p. 139) e.g., see comparison with *daba, 'town, village'.[4]
List of davae
Below is a list of Dacian towns which include various forms of dava in their name:
Onomastic range of the Dacian towns with the -dava ending, covering Dacia, Moesia, Thrace and Dalmatia
Acidava[5] (Acidaua), a fortress town close to the Danube.[6] Located in today's Enoșești, Olt County, Romania
Aedava[7] (Aedeva, Aedabe, Aedeba or Aedadeba), placed by Procopius on the Danubian road between Augustae and Variana,[2] in Moesia (the present Northern Bulgaria)
Pulpudeva, originally named Eumolpias by the Dacians. Philip II of Macedon conquered the area in 342–341 BC and renamed the city Philippoupolis (Greek: Φιλιππούπολις), of which the later Dacian name for the city, Pulpu-deva, is a reconstructed translation. Today's city of Plovdiv in Bulgaria.
Thermidava, placed by Ptolemy on the Lissus-Naissus route. The toponym is most probably a misreading of a settlement which most scholars in contemporary research locate near present-day Banat, Serbia.[14]
^"Bronze Age Tomb Finds Thrill Romanian Historians". Balkan Insight.
^ a b cOlteanu.
^Polome 1982, p. 886.
^Berzovan 2020, pp. 99.
^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n oGrumeza 2009, p. 13.
^"Considerations regarding the etymology of the Dacian word dava / deva / daba. A Historical and Linguistic Journey from the Lower Danube to Anatolia and Transcaucasia". ResearchGate.
^Velkov 1977, p. 92.
^*Procopii Caesariensis opera omnia. Edited by J. Haury; revised by G. Wirth. 3 vols. Leipzig: Teubner, 1976-64. Greek text.
^TSR9, Proc. 123. 26
^Grumeza 2009, p. 88.
^ a b cGrumeza 2009, p. 12.
^ a b cGrumeza 2009, p. 14.
^Ethnic continuity in the Carpatho-Danubian area by Elemér Illyés,1988,ISBN 0-88033-146-1,page 223
^Lepper, F. A. (1988). Trajan's Column: A New Edition of the Cichorius Plates. Alan Sutton. p. 138. ISBN 9780862994679. Stuart Jones noted the Dacian – sounding place – name ' Thermidava ' on the Lissus Naissus road : but see Miller col . 557 , for the evidence on this. The place was most probably called ' Theranda ' and there is no evidence for any settlement there of pro-Roman Dacians now, nor is it very likely. (..) Most scholars , however , have supposed , as did Cichorius , that we are now north of the Danube , somewhere in the Banat area where the local inhabitants are frightened that they may lose their recently acquired 'liberty'.
Bibliography
Berzovan, Alexandru (2020). "Considerations regarding the origin of Dacian Term dava / deva / daba. A Historical and Linguistic Journey from the Lower Danube to Anatolia and Transcaucasia". The Thracians and their neighbours in antiquity. Archaeology and history. Studies in honor of Valeriu Sîrbu at his 70th anniversary. Romania: Editura Istros , Brăila.
Grumeza, Ion (2009). Dacia: Land of Transylvania, Cornerstone of Ancient Eastern Europe. Hamilton Books. ISBN 978-0-7618-4465-5.
Olteanu, Sorin. "Linguae Thraco-Daco-Moesorum – Toponyms Section". Linguae Thraco-Daco-Moesorum (in Romanian and English). Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 8 December 2010.
Polome, E. C. (1982). "20e". In Boardman, John (ed.). The Cambridge Ancient History. London: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-22496-3.
Van den Gheyn, Joseph (1885). "Les populations Danubiennes". Revue des questions scientifiques. 17–18. Brussels: Société scientifique de Bruxelles.
Velkov, Velizar Iv (1977). The cities in Thrace and Dacia in late antiquity: (studies and materials). Hakkert. ISBN 90-256-0723-3.
Tomaschek, Wilhelm (1883). "Les Restes de la langue dace". Le Muséon. 2. Belgium: "Société des lettres et des sciences" Louvain, Belgium.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Dacian and Dacians.
Dacian Davae in Enciclopedia Dacica (Romanian)
Dacian materials and construction techniques in Enciclopedia Dacica (Romanian)