Veel kord mulkide rumalusest
Once again about the „foolish Mulks”

Summary/Abstract: The article challenges again the widespread belief that the folk name Mulks derives from the Latvian word muļķis, muļķe ’stupid, fool’. The article explores in detail the spread of the byname Mulk and Mulgi in its various forms in early modern Estland, Livland and Kurland and comes to the conclusion that it was strikingly more common in Estonian-speaking areas than in the Latvian-speaking ones. In principle, the word muļķis could fit as a byname, but village dwellers generally preferred more specific words to designate other community members. The byname and place name Mulgi in the Estonian-speaking areas does not have to have one single root but in different cases it can originate either from Balto-Finnic, German or Latvian languages. In two cases Finns had this byname. Land revision materials and church books indicate that in several places all over Estonia the byname Mulgi is related to an earlier or parallel name Mulli(ka) (Fin mulli ~ mullikka ’steer’). We suppose that this relationship between Mulli(ka) and Mulgi cannot be explained by irregular shortening of the word Mulli(ka) but they both derive from the same stem. The varying of Mulk and Mullik close in time resembles the variation of the names Henke/Henneke and Timcke/Timmeke in German.

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