Noordhollands vlaar 'vlier', een frisisme als tjad 'vief'en jaar 'uier'

Abstract

The North Holland dialect form vlaar(de) ‘elder (tree)’ cannot be a regular reflex of Old Dutch *fleodra (whence Modern Dutch vlier). Instead, it may be regarded as a Frisian substrate word in North Holland. Modern West Frisian flear can go back to Old Frisian *fliāthar. When borrowed into the North Holland dialect, this yielded *flādar > vlaar. The form vlaarde resulted from metathesis of dr to rd in the oblique case forms (*flādres, etc.). If it is regarded as a substrate word, the word for ‘elder’ would belong to the category of “secondary vocabulary” posited by Cor van Bree. Another word from the North Holland dialect which would fit in with this group is vlaremuis, vlaardemuis ‘bat’ (Standard Dutch vleermuis). It may have been borrowed from Old Frisian *flatharmūs, the preform of the Hindeloopen dialect form fl.«r«müs.