Dear roonyjwelch,
The expression "evening lands" predates its use by Oswald Spengler by
several centuries. The original German title of his book "Twilight of
the Evening Lands" is "Der Untergang des Abendlandes". With
"Abendland" (which literally means exactly 'evening land'), Spengler
used a very old term every native speaker of German knows and
understands immediately.
The direct origins of this word go back to ancient times, when the
Romans called the East "oriens" (rising = where the Sun rises in the
morning) and the West "occidens" (going down = where the Sun goes down
in the evening). Through direct translation of the Latin terms,
"Morgen" and "Abend" ('morning' and 'evening') became - with variants
- the terms for "East" and "West" in medieval German. The "Abend" was,
geographically, by definition the West.
The first documented appearance of the word "Abendland" dates from
1529. The reformer Caspar Hedio used the old plural form "Abendlender"
in a chronicle he wrote then. It is, of course, possible that Hedio
utilized a word that was already common in spoken German.
So the expression "evening lands" was, in its original German form
"Abendland", known long before Spengler used it.
Sources:
Wikipedia Germany: Abendland
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abendland
Wikipedia Germany: Okzident
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okzident
Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon: Kaspar Hedio
http://www.bautz.de/bbkl/h/hedio_k.shtml
Rotary Deutschland: Europa in der Geschichte des Abendlandes (PDF file)
http://www.rotary.de/dist1950-info/files/dokument16.pdf
Search terms used:
abendland okzident
://www.google.de/search?q=abendland+okzident&hl=de&lr=&ie=UTF-8&newwindow=1&start=0&sa=N
hedio
://www.google.de/search?hl=de&ie=UTF-8&newwindow=1&q=hedio&btnG=Suche&meta=
hedios
://www.google.de/search?hl=de&ie=UTF-8&newwindow=1&q=hedios&btnG=Suche&meta=
"Caspar Hedio" abendland
://www.google.de/search?hl=de&ie=UTF-8&newwindow=1&q=%22Caspar+Hedio%22+abendland&btnG=Suche&meta=
Hope this answers your question!
Regards,
Scriptor |
