Talk:Hercynian Forest

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The introduction of the article says "The Hercynian Forest was an ancient and dense forest that stretched eastward from the Rhine River. The ancient sources are equivocal about how far east. All agree that the Black Forest formed the western side of the Hercynian." Isn't that somewhat contradictory? Stretching eastwards from the Rhine River means that the Rhine River forms the western border of the forest. How can then the Black Forest, which is around 20km away from the Rhine River, form the western side? Maybe 20km is not very much compared to the extend of the forest, but still it seems a bit inaccurate. But since I'm not an expert on the topic, I did not attempt to make any changes.--Dontaskme 02:35, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * The modern Black Forest is a very reduced relict tract of the once unbroken Hercynian Forest.-Wetman (talk) 20:39, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Erzgebirge
I'm a little curious at this. Is this a suggestion that Erz is derived from the old Germanic word "Miriquido" (listed at Erzgebirge) which would in turn be derived from Hercynia? The name "Erzgebirge" is traditionally derived from 12th century mining. Olessi 07:39, 18 August 2005 (UTC)

Julian Apostate
On might add that Julian Apostate is said to have seen this forest - and found it pretty troublesome:

"We hastened to the Hercynian forest and it was a strange and monstrous thing that I beheld. At any rate I do not hesitate to engage that nothing of the sort has ever been seen in the Roman Empire, at least as far as we know. But if anyone considers Thessalian Tempe or Thermopylae or the great and far-flung[3] Taurus to be impassable, let me tell him that for difficulty of approach they are trivial indeed compared with the Hercynian forest.[4]"

Found in the Fragments of his.

Regards, Andi — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.94.133.9 (talk) 14:21, 11 February 2015 (UTC)

Unfortunate wording for the relic traces...
While it is true, that the smaller mountain chains often carry "wald" (forest) in their name as with the Black Forest (Schwarzwald), Westerwald, Steigerwald, Kellerwald, Thüringer and Bayerwald (thuringian and bavarian forest resp.) They would still be called that if the whole are would be continuously forested and seen as the modern day Hercynian Forest. All those names are bona fide monikers for distinct hill and mountain ranges defined and/or distinguished by the river valleys and watersheds that separate their areas... yet the article does make it sound as if every little patch of remnant forest has gotten its own moniker just because the "undivided" whole isn't there anymore. I'm neither sure how to word it better nor do I trust my English enough to try my own hand at it, but this needs IMO proper overworking to distinguish between "those are forest areas that are left over from what was once called one whole forest" to something both including the nature as distinct geographic areas AND forests that would be leftover bits from the originally totally overgrown central german area.

Is there a proper definition for the border between Germania "magna" (the non occupied bit) and Sarmatia? Wouldn't that be the most likely eastern boundary for what still is seen as Hercynian Forest and what would start a new name? The romans definitely knew of the Elbe River and the Erzgebirge, Thüringer and Bavarian Forest would all lie west of that boundary (as would Böhmerwald, the bohemian Forest) while with the Black Forest the southern parts definitely would have been in roman territory and more properly defined. 178.203.29.150 (talk) 19:51, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

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wrong
It's not

Livy, v.24

It's

Livy, 5,34

Thanks for correcting this to whoever can do it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2.203.148.187 (talk) 15:33, 22 June 2019 (UTC)

Translation for a latin sentence
The texts says: Drusus invisum atque inaccessum in id tempus Hercynium saltum (Hercynia saltus, the "Hercynian ravine-land") [15] patefecit. Provision of a translation would be convenient for the reader.. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Rajanala83 (talk • contribs) 21:29, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Removing " The name of Pforzheim (Porta Hercyniae) in southwest Germany and the tiny village of Hercingen[10] are also derived from "Hercynian".
The source for Hercingen is a very outdated paper from 1918 that asserts this claim and gives no reasoning and no source (https://books.google.com/books?id=_bFJAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA232&lpg=PA232&dq=Hercingen&source=bl&ots=PONnKSegIH&sig=ACfU3U31JaOPhk1s9lIc_hq88gO9ZRwYDQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjOm4iBnObyAhVuJzQIHVgkBaIQ6AF6BAgaEAM#v=onepage&q=Hercingen&f=false). No village with that name seems to exist, and it would be a very unusual name for a German village. The given location "near the Waldsee in Württemberg" is pretty useless as there are lots of small lakes with this name.

Porta Hercyniae is *not* the Latin name of Pforzheim, see https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pforzheim.