Mougás
PontevedraGalicia
Possessive toponym of Germanic root. The most sustained reading derives it from the Gothic anthroponym Mauricius (Hispanicised variant of Maurus, 'Moor, dark-skinned', with the suffix -itius), in Latinised plural genitive. It documents an early-medieval rural villa owned by a Hispanicised Germanic family lineage.
Maurus, 'Moor, dark-skinned, African', was a popular Latin cognomen from antiquity and was Christianised early through the devotion to Saint Maurice martyr (3rd century, an Egyptian Roman officer of the Theban legion). The derived form Mauricius (with affective or derivative suffix -itius) was one of the most used names in Visigothic and early-medieval peninsular anthroponymy. The Galician phonetics of the lenition of the intervocalic -r- and the vocalisation of the final cluster -cii gives the current Mougás. The substantivised plural documents the family lineage (the Mauricios, the descendants of Mauricio). Another reading, today minoritarian, connects the toponym with a pre-Roman base mou- of relief, without firm parallels. The hamlet belongs to the Oia council and sits in the coastal strip between Oia and Baiona, in a small cove protected by Cape Silleiro. The parish church of Santa María, modest, marks the centre of the hamlet. The Costa pilgrim crosses it on the road between the Oia monastery and Baiona.
Evolution of the name
- Mauricius / Mauricii late Latin 6th — 9th centuries
- Mougás medieval Galician from the 12th century
Glossary
- Anthroponym
- A personal name, often used as the base of toponyms (Lucronius → Logroño, Sigerici → Castrojeriz, Sacavus → Sacavém).
- Intervocalic
- A consonant placed between two vowels; in Castilian it tends to drop or voice as the word evolves.
- Substantivised plural
- A device by which an adjective or noun in the plural is fixed as a place name without the noun that governed it: fontanas = "[lands of the] springs", ferreiros = "[place of the] smiths". Frequent in medieval repopulation.
Sources
- Navaza, G. — Toponimia de Galicia
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Camino Portugués de la Costa