A river is a beautiful thing. It runs along, its sings, it laughs, it
glints in the sunlight and becomes darker beneath the trees. Sometimes
one may see the bottom, where there are stones and grasses, while at
times it is a sombre abyss that fills one with shudders. The river
comes from afar and goes no one knows whither. True, people say that
it has a beginning and that its source lies yonder, in the mountains,
but that is not at all so certain. What is a source? When you see a
river, it is already a river and it never occurs to you that it may
ever have been only a tiny ribbon of water trickling down from a rock.
In olden days, when the world was happy, things were far different.
Rivers flowed from a marble pitcher which was held in the hands of
an eternally youthful, drooping maiden. But the wicked god of the
Christians, who is not fond of maidens? beauty, broke those marble
pitchers; the mothers of rivers died of grief and now the rivers are
born by accident, as best they may be. If we are not so well informed
about their birth, we know their life and their death. Their life is
to bound along or to flow nonchalantly on, to prattle over the pebbles
and dream amid the rushes. Often, when traversing the blooming meadows
they love to spread across the grass. If dikes or tree-trunks bar the
way they are provoked and even wax furious. But if it is a mill that
rises before them, they turn its wheels with docile promptness, and
continue on their way unperturbed. The river is the mother of men and
trees, of beasts and plants. Without the river there are no fish; there
are no birds. There are no crops, no flowers, no wine, no cattle, and
man flees, parched by the sun. After having given life, the river has
two ways of dying; either it expands into the bosom of a larger river
or flows directly to mingle with the sea; the sea is the vast cemetery
of all the rivers,--of the smallest as well as the greatest. But the
river that dies is nevertheless just as eternal as the ocean that
receives it into its depths. The clouds are born of the sea, and the
wind wafts them toward the forests, where they make rain and swell the
streams. There is in the world a circulation of water as in our bodies
there is a circulation of blood. All this is well regulated. The sea
loves the river. It comes to meet the stream and sends it as greeting
the salt tang of its waves. The river fears this infinitude. For a long
time it resists. At last, the sweet waters yield and melt under the
powerful kisses of the brine: the swell of the waves lulls the wedded
waters to rest.
The river is a person. It has a name. This name is very ancient,
because the river, although perpetually young, is very old. It existed
before men and before birds. Ever since men were born they loved the
rivers, and as soon as they learned how to speak they gave them names.
Even when we no longer understand them, the names of the rivers are
the most beautiful in the world. There is the Gironde and the Adour;
the Loire and the Vienne, the Rhône and the Ariège. But perhaps it is
possible to understand these names. Let us try, by having recourse
to the studies of a geographical scholar, M. Raoul de Félice. Our
rivers have received their names from the various races that anciently
occupied Gaul: The Iberians, an unknown people, the Ligurians, the
Celts. At the moment of the Roman conquest, almost all the streams of
France possess a name. So that modern names are very rare. The Iberians
were probably Basques, if not in race at least in language. Even if
this is contested, that would not prevent us from tracing the word
Adour back to the Basque word _iturria_, which means spring, source.
It is to the Iberians that we likewise owe names such as the Aude,
the Orbieu, the Urugne. Here probably came a people yet unknown, but
of Indo-European language, which was perhaps the godfather to many of
our rivers. To this people it may be we owe the names Somme, Sèvre,
Herault,--names that are derived from various roots signifying water,
liquid, source. According to the same theory, Durance, Drône, Drot,
Drac might be translated by "the running water," and the same idea
would be found in the name Rhône, while the Loire would be "the stream
that waters;" the Meurthe, "she who moistens." As to the Garonne, that
would be, "the rapid one"; but the matter is still under discussion:
the Garonne has not given up its secret, any more than the Gironde. We
may note, in passing, that there are in France three other Garonnes,
without taking into account a Garon, a Garonnette, and a Garonnelle;
there are seven or eight Girondes, of which two are in the environs
of Paris, tributaries of the Orge and the Marne. The Oise and the
Isdre stand for the same thing, namely, "the rapid one," which seems
rather hazardous to me in the case of the Oise. Certain rivers flow
in a deep-cut bed; thus they have received a name which would signify
something like case, vase or sheath: these are the Couse, the Cousin,
the Cusom, the Cousanne, the Couzeau, and the names Couzon.
We now come to the part played by the Ligurians. In their language
they called the alder-tree that grows along the banks of so many
rivers, _alisos, alsia_ or _alison_. They gave this name to a number of
streams; Alzon, Alzou, Alzau, Auzon, Auzonne, Auzonnet, Arzon, Auze,
Auzenne, Auzelle, Auzotte, Auzette, Auzigue, Auzolle, Auzone,--all of
which would signify the rivers of the alder-trees. There would also
be left to be explained the origin of names ending in _enque_, such
as Allarenque, Laurenque, Durenque, Virenque, but it is not known
what they mean. Finally, one could not deny to the Ligurians the name
Ligoure, which seems to be the name of the people itself. The Aude and
the Orb probably owe their designation to the Phoenician settlers;
the second of these is perhaps Greek. With the Celtic period the
etymologies become a trifle less uncertain. The Celtic word for water,
_dour_, is clearly found in the Dourbie, the Dourdene and the Dourdèze,
the Dourdon, the Dore and the Doire. Another Celtic name for water,
_esca_ is seen in the Ouche, the Essonne. They called a river _avar_;
hence, the Abron, the Jabron, the Aveyron, the Arveiron, the Auron;
hence probably also the Eure, the Auterne, the Authre, the Automne,
the Autruche. _Aven_ means river in the present Breton dialect; now,
we find rivers called: Avène, Avon, Avègne, Avignon. From _glanos_,
meaning brilliant, gleaming, are perhaps derived the Gland, the Glane;
from _vernos_, alder-tree, they have like the Ligurians christened
many rivers: the Vern, the Vernaison, the Vernazon; from _der_, oak,
came the _Dère_. It should be added that all these words came down to
us through the Latin form before acquiring their French form. Thus
_Bièvre_ and its derivatives Beuvron, Brevenne, Brevonne, derive
from the Latin _bibrum_, itself borrowed from a Celtic word meaning
beaver. Is it to the Gauls or the Romans that we owe the names Dive,
Divette, Divonne? Does this mean here the fairy, or the divine one? It
is difficult to ascertain. There were great resemblances between the
tongues.
French and its dialects have naturally named a large number of rivers,
either by rechristening them or modifying the old names to give them
a French meaning. In this class we have the names suggested by the
appearance or the qualities of the river:[1] the Blanche, the Claire,
the Brune, the Noire, the Brillant, the Hideuse, the Vilaine, the
Furieuse, the Rongeant, the Sonnant, the Creuse, the Sensée. At other
times the names come from plants,[2] such as Fusain, Orge, Viorne,
Liane, Gland, Orne, Oignon, Trèfle, Rouvre, Lys, Aunes, Bruyère,
Troëne; names of animals:[3] Oie, Loir, Louvette, Chèvre, Heron,
Ourse, Lionne, Autruche; names of every kind:[4] Mère, Cousin, Sueur,
Coquille, Oeil, Oeuf, Rognon, Brêche, Vie, Automne, Blaise, Armance,
Abîme. Some proudly bear absolute names: le Fleuve (the Stream), la
Rivière (the River); it so happens that they are only rivulets, the
one in la Manche, the other in the Alps. And finally, a little river
that is probably very wise is called la Même (the Same). The majority
of these later names I have taken directly from the map, but a good
part of my learning I have borrowed from M. de Félice, who has given
us a great deal, free from all pedantry, in his book upon _les Noms de
nos Rivières_ (The Names of our Rivers.) Is it not pleasant to know
that the Seine means "the gushing one?" Those who wish to learn more
may consult the source I have indicated. It is with pain that I wrest
myself away from the charms of the rivers of France, for
La rivière est la mère de toute la nature.
The river is the mother of all nature.
[Footnote 1: These signify, in the order of occurrence: white, dear,
dark, black, gleaming, hideous, ugly, furious, gnawing, tinkling,
hollow, sensible.]
[Footnote 2: Prickwood, barley, liburnum, liana, acorn, flowering-ash,
onion, clover, common oak, lily, alder-trees, heather, privet.]
[Footnote 3: Goose, dormouse, she-wolf, goat, heron, bear, lioness,
ostrich.]
[Footnote 4: Mother, cousin, sweat, shell, eye, egg, kidney, breach,
life, autumn, Blase, Armance, abyss.]