Corconti

Memories of the Riesengebirge, painting by Caspar David Friedrich, before 1835

The Corconti or Korkontoi were a Germanic people in (2.10) of the Geography of Ptolemy (after 83 – 161 AD). They were in the vicinity of Asciburgius Mountain somewhere near the sources of the Vistula. Asciburgius gives away their location, as it is on the edge of the Giant Mountains range (Krkonoše in Czech, Karkonosze in Polish, Riesengebirge in German).

It is clear that the people were named after the terrain, but the identity of those people is not entirely clear. Ptolemy counted them among the Germani on grounds of their inhabiting Magna Germania. Some have hypothesized that they were Marcomanni, as those people were in the region. So also were the Quadi; moreover, Ptolemy also lists the Quadi and Marcomanni. We know the latter were newcomers in the 1st century AD, but the residents of mountains are often hold-outs from an earlier culture.

And finally, the name is not Germanic, but neither is it Slavic or Celtic; or at least, no strong derivations in those languages have been found. Very likely, it is not Indo-European at all, but is Pre-Indo-European. One might connect it to the hypothetical Urbian root, *K-K-, "to swell, inflate; big, huge", from which Sorin Paliga derives German Gigantes. Possibly Sumerian kur-kur, "mountains", is related. Or from Latin cor continens, "heart of continent". Such derivations at this point are weak and speculative.

The question has been of some historical significance as a point of contention between Slavs and Germans of the region. The Slavs appeared centuries later in the region than the Germanic tribes were recorded there.

See also

Ancient Germanic culture portal

• List of Germanic peoples

Resources

• Opera Corcontica - Scientific Journal from the Krkonoše National Park