''Aach'' (variants ''Ach'', ''Ache''; ''Aa'') is a widespread

Upper German Upper German ( ) is a family of High German dialects spoken primarily in the southern German-speaking area (). History In the Old High German time, only Alemannic and Bairisch are grouped as Upper German. In the Middle High German time, East F ...

hydronym A hydronym (from , , "water" and , , "name") is a type of toponym that designates a proper name of a body of water. Hydronyms include the proper names of rivers and streams, lakes and ponds, swamps and marshes, seas and oceans. As a subset of top ...

, from an

Old High German Old High German (OHG; ) is the earliest stage of the German language, conventionally identified as the period from around 500/750 to 1050. Rather than representing a single supra-regional form of German, Old High German encompasses the numerous ...

(Proto-Germanic ) (ultimately from

PIE A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts ( pecan pie), fruit preserves ( jam tart ...

). The word has also been reduced to a frequent suffix in Alemannic and

Austro-Bavarian Bavarian (; ), alternately Austro-Bavarian, is a group of Upper German varieties spoken in the south-east of the German language area, including the German state of Bavaria, most of Austria, and South Tyrol in Italy. Prior to 1945, Bavaria ...

toponymy. The word is cognate with

Old English Old English ( or , or ), or Anglo-Saxon, is the earliest recorded form of the English language, spoken in England and southern and eastern Scotland in the Early Middle Ages. It developed from the languages brought to Great Britain by Anglo-S ...

(reflected in English placenames as , also Yeo, Eau),

Old Frisian Old Frisian was a West Germanic language spoken between the late 13th century and the end of 16th century. It is the common ancestor of all the modern Frisian languages except for the North Frisian language#Insular North Frisian, Insular North ...

Old Saxon Old Saxon (), also known as Old Low German (), was a Germanic language and the earliest recorded form of Low German (spoken nowadays in Northern Germany, the northeastern Netherlands, southern Denmark, the Americas and parts of Eastern Eur ...

Low Franconian In historical linguistics, historical and comparative linguistics, Low Franconian is a linguistic category used to classify a number of historical and contemporary West Germanic languages, West Germanic Variety (linguistics), varieties closely r ...

'' Aa'',

Old Norse Old Norse, also referred to as Old Nordic or Old Scandinavian, was a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants ...

, Gothic , all meaning . The Old High German contraction from to , in compound hydronyms present from an early time (early 9th century). The simplex noun remained uncontracted, however, and Old High German (Modern German ) could be restituted in compounds at any time.''super fluuiolo Geazaha'' a. 782; ''inter Uuiseraa et Fuldaa'' a. 813; ''in pago Uuestracha'' a. 839. H. Menke, "Komposita auf ''-aha, -apa''" in: ''Das Namengut der frühen karolingischen Königsurkunden'' (1980), p. 346. Discussion of the early contraction of ''aha'' > ''â'': D. Schmidt, ''Die Namen der rechtsrheinischen Zuflüsse'', 1970, 123–154. Related is the German (variant ) with a meaning , i.e. a cultivated landscape in a

riparian zone A riparian zone or riparian area is the interface between land and a river or stream. In some regions, the terms riparian woodland, riparian forest, riparian buffer zone, riparian corridor, and riparian strip are used to characterize a ripari ...

. It is derived from the same root, but with a suffix (Proto-Germanic ). This word was also reduced to a suffix, as (as in '' Reichenau''). It is frequent as a river name, as in

Große Aue The Große Aue (in its upper reaches known as the ''Aue'' and then also the ''Neuer Mühlenbach'' or ''Mühlbach'') is an , southwestern, left tributary of the River Weser in northern North Rhine-Westphalia and central Lower Saxony in Germany. ...

, Aue (Elbe), Aue (Weser), etc., as well as the name of a settlement, as in Aue, Saxony; Au, St. Gallen; Au, Vorarlberg; Au am Rhein; Au am Leithaberge; etc. The river-name in Upper Germany is reserved for broad, but non-navigable, running streams with noticeable gradient sufficient to power

water mill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in the production ...

s; it contrasts with used for navigable rivers on one hand, and with for minor brooks or rivulets. An instructive example is

Salzach The Salzach (Austrian: �saltsax ) is a river in Austria and Germany. It is in length and is a right tributary of the Inn (river), Inn, which eventually joins the Danube. Its drainage basin of comprises large parts of the Northern Limeston ...

, now classed as a () but formerly as as it was only navigable by

raft A raft is any flat structure for support or transportation over water. It is usually of basic design, characterized by the absence of a hull. Rafts are usually kept afloat by using any combination of buoyant materials such as wood, sealed barre ...

, not by regular riverboats. Hydronymy in generally indicates a Germanic settlement in the early medieval or

migration period The Migration Period ( 300 to 600 AD), also known as the Barbarian Invasions, was a period in European history marked by large-scale migrations that saw the fall of the Western Roman Empire and subsequent settlement of its former territories ...

, while names in indicate names of the high medieval period. In French, the

Old Frankish Frankish ( reconstructed endonym: *), also known as Old Franconian or Old Frankish, was the West Germanic language spoken by the Franks from the 5th to 10th centuries. Franks under king Chlodio settled in Roman Gaul in the 5th century. O ...

form evolved into , as in

Aix-en-Provence Aix-en-Provence, or simply Aix, is a List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, city and Communes of France, commune in southern France, about north of Marseille. A former capital of Provence, it is the Subprefectures in France, s ...

Aix-les-Bains Aix-les-Bains (, ; ; ), known locally and simply as Aix, is a Communes of France, commune in the southeastern French Departments of France, department of Savoie.Aar, Ahr, and Acher reflect a cognate

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

word.

References

* *

References

See also