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Concept
Gord (archaeology)
Summary
A gord is a medieval Slavonic fortified settlement, usually built on strategic sites such as hilltops, riverbanks, lake islets or peninsulas between the 6th and 12th centuries in Central and Eastern Europe. The typical gord usually consisted of a group of wooden houses surrounded by a wall made of earth and wood, and a palisade running along the top of the bulwark.
The term ultimately descends from the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European root ǵhortós, enclosure. The Proto-Slavic word *gordъ later differentiated into grad (Cyrillic: град), gorod (Cyrillic: город), gród in Polish, gard in Kashubian, etc. It is the root of various words in modern Slavic languages pertaining to fences and fenced-in areas (Belarusian гарадзіць, Ukrainian horodyty, Slovak ohradiť, Czech ohradit, Russian ogradit, Serbo-Croatian ograditi, and Polish ogradzać, grodzić, to fence off). It also has evolved into words for a garden in certain languages.
Additionally, it has furnished numerous modern Slavic words for a city or town:
Polish gród, plural grody (toponymic; nowadays a town or city is termed miasto, but remnants of a gród are known as grodzisko)
Ancient Pomeranian and modern Kashubian gard
Slovak and Czech hrad ("castle" in the modern language), or hradisko/hradiště/hradec, which are terms for gord
Slovene grad ("castle" in modern Slovene)
Belarusian горад (horad)
Russian город (gorod)
Ukrainian город (horod, dialectal and toponymic; nowadays misto)
Bulgarian, Serbo-Croatian, and Macedonian grad/град
The names of many Central and Eastern European cities harken back to their pasts as gords. Some of them are in countries which once were but no longer are mainly inhabited by Slavic-speaking peoples.
Examples include:
Horodok
Gorod (toponymy)
Hrod (toponymy)
Hrud
Horod
Hrad (toponymy)
Gard (Slavic toponymy)
Grod (toponymy)
Grad (toponymy)
The words in Polish and Slovak for suburbium, podgrodzie and podhradie correspondingly, literally mean a settlement beneath a gord: the gród/hrad was frequently built at the top of a hill, and the podgrodzie/podhradie at its foot.
Official source
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