Category: Etymology

Carefully Garrulous

By Simon

What do the words care and garrulous have in common?

Well, care comes from the Middle English care (grief, sorrow), from the Old English caru/ċearu (worry, anxiety, care, sorrow, grief), from the Proto-West-Germanic *karu (care, worry), from the Proto-Germanic *karō (complaint, lament, grievance, moan, worry, sorrow, care, concern), from the Proto-Indo-European *ǵeh₂r- (to shout, call, cry; voice) [source].

Careful now

Garrulous (excessively or tiresomely talkative) comes from the Latin garrulus (talkative), from garriō (I chatter, prattle), from the Proto-Indo-European *ǵeh₂r- (to call, cry), which is apparently of imitative origin [source].

JAY (Garrulous glandarius)
Pictured above is a Eurasian Jay, also known as Garrulus glandarius – the garrulus part means chattering/noisy and the glandarius part means “of acorns”.

So, they come from the same PIE root, via different paths. Other words from the same root include [source]:

  • Italian: garrire [ɡarˈrire] = to chirp (of birds); to flutter, flap, wave (of flag)
  • Portuguese: garrir [ɡɐˈʁiɾ] = to resound, gossip, shine
  • Irish: gair [ɡaɾʲ] = to call, summon, invoke, name, proclaim, inaugurate, acclaim; and gáir [ɡɑːɾʲ/ɡæːɾʲ] = cry, shout, report, fame, notoriety; to shout, laugh
  • Scottish Gaelic: gàir [ɡaːrʲ] = laugh, cry, shout; outcry, clamour;
    and gairm [ɡɤrʲɤm] = call, cry, declare, announce
  • Manx: gerr = crow, shout
  • Welsh: gair [ɡai̯r] = word, speech, phrase, greeting, salutation
  • Cornish: ger = word
  • Breton: ger = word, speech, question

The English word slogan also comes from the same root, or at least part of it does. It comes from sloggorne/slughorn(e) (battle cry), from the Scottish Gaelic sluagh-ghairm [ˈsl̪ˠuəɣərəm] (slogan, war cry), from the Old Irish slúag/slóg (army, assembly, crowd) and gairm (call, cry).

Fighting Combs

By Simon

The Scots word fecht [fɛçt / feːçt / faeçt] means to fight, or to struggle in the battle of life against misfortune, poverty, etc. It comes from the Middle English fighten (to fight, battle, quarrel), from the Old English feohtan (to fight), from the Proto-West Germanic *fehtan (to fight), from the Proto-Germanic *fehtaną (to comb, detangle, struggle (with), fight, shear) from the Proto-Indo-European *peḱ- (to pluck, ruffle, tousle, shear) [source].

Related words include:

  • fecht, feicht = a fight
  • fechtand, feghtand = fighting
  • fechtar, fechter = one who fights (in battle or in brawls)
  • fechting, fechtine = engaging in fight or battle

Source: DSL Dictionaries of the Scots Language / Dictionars o the Scots Leid

I learnt about this word on a video on Tiktok by @misspunnypennie – part of her Scots word of the day series. This particular video is about the word ilka, which means each or every. The example she gives includes fecht and fechter:

Agin ilka sair fecht there’s a bonnie fechter
(Against every hard fight there’s a fearless fighter)

By the way, if you prefer to avoid Tiktok, you can find compilations of the Scots Word of Day videos, and Scots-related videos by Miss Punny Pennie (a.k.a. Len Pennie) on Twitter and YouTube. Here’s Len talking about Scots:

When I heard the words fecht and fechter, I thought they must be related to the Dutch words vechten [ˈvɛxtə(n] (to fight, fighting) and vechter (fighter, warrior), which I learnt recently – they are indeed related and come from the same Proto-West-Germanic root [source].

20170924-153745LC

Other words from the same Proto-West-Germanic root (*fehtan) include: fight in English, fäkta (to fence, fight) in Swedish, fechten (to fence, fight) in German, and фехтовать [fʲɪxtɐˈvatʲ] (to fence) in Russian, which was borrowed from German. To fence here means to fight with swords rather than to make a fence [source]

There is also a Dutch word related to ilka – elk, which means each or every [source].

Concerts and Beer

By Simon

The Irish word ceolchoirm [ˈcʲolˠ.xorʲəmʲ] means concert. It is made up of ceol (music) and coirm [korʲəmʲ] (feast, banquet, ale, beer). There are similar words in Scottish Gaelic (cuirm-chiùil), and Manx (cuirrey kiaull) [source].

Ánuna

The word coirm comes from the Old Irish word coirm (ale, beer), from the Proto-Celtic *kurmi (beer). Words for beer in the Brythonic Celtic languages come from the same root: cwrw in Welsh, and korev in Cornish and Breton [source].

The Latin word cervēs(i)a [kerˈu̯eː.si.a], which means beer made of wheat, especially of higher quality, comes from the same Proto-Celtic root, as do words for beer in some Romance languages, including cervexa in Galician, cervesa in Catalan and Occitan, cerveza in Spanish and cerveja in Portuguese [source].

From the same Proto-Celtic root we get the French word cervoise [sɛʁ.vwaz], which was a kind of ale or beer made from barley or wheat and without hops during the Middle Ages [source]. The archaic Italian word cervogia [t͡ʃerˈvɔ.d͡ʒa] (beer, ale made from barley or oats) was borrowed from the Old French cervoise [source].

The usual French word for beer is bière [bjɛʁ], which was borrowed from the Middle Dutch bier/bēr (beer), from the Old Dutch *bier, from Frankish *bior (beer), from the Proto-Germanic *beuzą (beer) [source].

Beer samples

Words for beer is some Germanic languages come from the same root, including Bier in German, bier in Dutch, and beer in English [source].

The Italian word for beer, birra, was borrowed from the German Bier, and the Greek word μπίρα (bíra – beer, ale) was borrowed from Italian, as were words for beer in Arabic, بِيرَا‎ (bīrā), Maltese, birra, and Turkish, bira [source].

The Irish word beoir (beer) comes from the Middle Irish beóir (beer), from Old Norse bjórr (beer), which also has descendents in Scottish Gaelic (beòir), Manx (beer), Icelandic (bjór) and Faroese (bjór) [source].

Another word for beer or ale in North Germanic languages is øl (in Danish, Faroese, Norwegian) / öl (in Swedish and Icelandic). This comes from the Old Norse word ǫl (ale, beer), possibly from the Proto-Norse ᚨᛚᚢ (alu – ale), from the Proto-Germanic *alu (beer, ale), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂elut- (beer) [source].

Words for beer in Finnic languages possibly come from the same Proto-Germanic root, including õlu in Estonian, olut in Finnish, Igrian, Karelian and Veps, and oluq in Võro [source].

In Slavic languages words for beer come from the Proto-Slavic *pȋvo (drink, beer, beverage), including пиво (pivo) in Russian, Rusyn, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Macedonian and Serbian, pivo in Slovenian, Czech and Slovak, and piwo in Polish and Sorbian [source].

Here’s a map of words for beer in European languages:

A map of Europe showing words for beer

Source: https://ukdataexplorer.com/european-translator/?word=beer

Water Wagons

By Simon

Sprinkling Wagon

In the French conversation group last night, one of the members mentioned that she has been on the wagon for two weeks, or in other words, she has stopped drinking alcohol. French equivalents of being on the wagon include:

  • s’abstenir de boire (de l’alcool) = to abstain from drinking (alcohol)
  • arrêter de boire = to stop drinking
  • être au régime sec = to be on a dry diet
  • être sobre = to be sobre
  • être clean = to be clean
  • être sur le wagon = to be on the wagon

If you fall of the wagon (go back to drinking), then you could say:

  • replonger (dans l’alcool) = to dive/plunge back (into alcohol)
  • se remettre / recommencer à boire = to start drinking again
  • rechuter = to relapse
  • tomber du wagon = to fall from the wagon
  • craquer = to snap, be unable to resist
  • dérailler = to derail, go off the rails, go off track
  • avoir la gorge en pente = to have a sloping throat

In English, the expression to be on the wagon usually means

“abstaining from drinking any alcoholic drink, usually in the sense of having given it up (as opposed to never having partaken); teetotal”

It can also means “Maintaining a program of self-improvement or abstinence from some other undesirable habit.” (such as smoking).

It was apparently coined in the USA and was originally ‘on the water-cart’, and became ‘on the water-wagon’ the ‘on the wagon’. It referred to carts (like the one pictured above) that were used to hose down dusty roads. The idea was that someone who was ‘on the wagon’ was drinking water rather than alcoholic drinks.

It was possibly first used by the temperance movement, which emerged in the 19th century in organisations such as the Washingtonian movement (founded in 1840), The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (founded in 1874) and The Anti-Saloon League (founded in 1893).

Sources: ReversoDictionary, Wiktionary, The Phrase Finder, Wikipedia

I have been on the wagon (teetotal) since 2002, and didn’t drink much alcohol before then anyway.

How do you talk about being ‘on the wagon’ or ‘falling off the wagon’ in other languages?

Kvetching

By Simon

An interesting Dutch word I learnt recently is kwetsen [ˈkʋɛtsə(n)], which means to hurt (sb’s feelings) or to harm, and in some Dutch dialects it means to wound or injure.

Related words include:

  • kwetsbaar = vulnerable, fragile, vulnarability
  • kwetsend = hurtful, offensive, insulting
  • kwetsuur = injury, lesion, wound

It comes from the Middle Dutch word quetsen, from the Old Dutch quezzon (to damage, hurt), and was possibly influenced by or borrowed from the Old French quasser (to break, annul, quash), from the Latin quassāre (to shake, agitate), from the Proto-Indo-European *kʷeh₁t- (to shake) [source].

The German word quetschen [ˈkvɛtʃən] (to squash, crush, squeeze, mash, strain) probably comes from the same root [source], as does the Yiddish word קוועטשן‎ (kvetshn – to squeeze, pinch; bother, complain), from which we get the English word kvetch [kvɛtʃ] (to whine or complain, often needlessly and incessantly) [source].

Incidentally, the German equivalent of a squeezebox (an informal name for accordions, concertinas and related instruments) is a Quetschkommode, or literally a “squeeze commode / dresser / chest of drawers” [source].

Ciarán, Caitlín & Cathal

The English word quash (to defeat decisively; to void or suppress) comes from the same Old French word (quasser), via the Middle English quaschen, quasshen, cwessen, quassen (to crush, smash, cancel, make void, shake) [source].

From the same PIE root (*kʷeh₁t-) we get the English words pasta, paste, pastiche and pastry [source]. Pasta, for example, comes from the Italian pasta (paste, pasta), from the Late Latin pasta (dough, pastry cake, paste), from the Ancient Greek πάστα (pásta – barley porridge), from παστός (pastós – sprinkled with salt), from πάσσω (pássō – to sprinkle) [source].

Quobbled

By Simon

If your hands and fingers become quobbled, should you be worried?

Quobbled is an dialect word from Wiltshire in the south west of England that means wrinkly – so there would be no need to worry, it’s just a temporary phenomenon.

Mike's wrinkly hands

According to Words and Phrases from the Past, quobbled is defined as:

quobbled, adj. of a woman’s hands: shrivelled and wrinked from being too long in the washtub (English dialect)

Another definition is found in A Glossary of Words Used in the County of Wiltshire
By George Edward Dartnell, and Edward Hungerford Goddard (1893):

quobble. n. and v. After being a long while in the washtub a woman’s hands are apt to get ‘all in a quobble,’ or ‘ter’ble quobbled,’ that is, shrivelled and drawn and wrinkled up.

In Joseph Wright’s 1903 book, The English dialect dictionary, being the complete vocabulary of all dialect words still in use, or known to have been in use during the last two hundred years; founded on the publications of the English Dialect Society and on a large amount of material never before printed. (they really went in for short, snappy title back then), we find:

quobble, v. Of water: to make a noise in boiling

Then there’s:

quob, sb. and v.
1. A marshy spot; a bog, quagmire; a quicksand.
2. all of a quob, in a mess; in a heap; a bad bruise
3. an unfirm layer of fat
4. A throb; a palpitation
5. v. To quiver like jelly; to throb, to palpitate

Related words include:

  • quobby = marshy, boggy, flabby, wanting solidity
  • quobmire, sb. a quagmire

Apparently quob comes from the East Friesian kwabbeln / kwobbeln (to tremble, vibrate). This is probably related to the West Frisian word kwab (weak, blubbery mass of fat or flesh; very fat person; brain lobe; jellyfish) [Source], and the Dutch word kwabbig (flabby, squishy) [Source]

Some other interesting words from Wiltshire dialect include:

  • dumbledore / dumble = the humble-bee
  • gigletting = fond of rough romping; wanton
  • lottle = to sound as water trickling in a small stream
  • muddle-fuss = a persistent meddler with other people’s affairs
  • to womble = to wobble about from weakness

Source: A Glossary of Words Used in the County of Wiltshire.

Iron Ferrets

By Simon

What would you buy in a ferretería?

Trama

When I first saw this (Spanish) word, I thought it was a shop that sells ferrets. I was slightly disappointed to discover that it actually means hardware, or hardware store or ironmongers. Or in other words, a place selling things made of ferrous metal (iron).

ferreteria

It comes from ferrete (branding iron), from the Old French ferret (branding iron), a diminutive of fer (iron), from the Latin ferrum (iron); and -ería (a suffix that turns a noun into a store or restaurant that sells such an item; characteristic of) [source].

A shop selling ferrets (hurones) would be a huronería, and the Spanish word for ferret, hurón, comes from the Latin fūr (thief), which is also the root of the English word ferret [source]. More about ferrets.

Other words for hardware store in Spanish include:

  • quincallería – from quincalla (low-value hardware, junk)
  • tlapalería – from the Classical Nahuatl tlapalli (dye, ink, paint) – used in Mexico

Other words ending in -ería include [source]:

  • joyería = jewellers, jewelery store (not a shop selling joy)
  • ostrería = oyster bar
  • piratería = piracy, theft, booklegging (not a shop selling pirates)
  • sombrerería = hat shop
  • whiskería = whisky bar (not a seller of whiskers)

Climbing Up

By Simon

The other day I came across an interesting Dutch word – klimop [‘klɪ.mɔp], which means ivy (Hedera helix).

Ivy

It comes from opklimmen (to climb up, become greater, become larger), and literally means “climb-up”, which seems like a good name for a plant the climbs up walls and other things [source].

Klimop also features in Afrikaans, and similar words are used in Low German (Klimmop) and Papiamentu (klemòk) [source].

Klimmen (to climb, go up) comes from the Middle Dutch climmen (to climb, rise, to go up, increase), from the Old Dutch *climban (to climb), from the Proto-Germanic *klimbaną (to climb) [source].

The English word climb comes from the same root, via the Middle English climben [ˈkliːmbən/ˈklimbən] (to climb, scale, ascend, soar), and the Old English climban [ˈklim.bɑn] (to climb). In Late Middle English the b was no longer pronounced, so climben became [ˈkliːmən/ˈklimən]. Then the i became a diphthong and the -en ending fell off, resulting in the pronunciation [klaɪm] [source].

The English word ivy comes from the Middle English ivi (ivy), from the Old English īfiġ [ˈiː.vij] (ivy), from the Proto-Germanic *ibahs (ivy), from the Proto-Indo-European *(h₁)ebʰ- [source].

From the same root we get words for ivy in Danish (efeu), German (Efeu) and Norwegian (eføy) [source], and words for yew (trees) in Celtic languages, including iúr in Irish and iubhar in Scottish Gaelic [more details]

Skip to the Bin

By Simon

Yesterday I discovered that a French word for skip is benne [bɛn], which also means cable car, cable way, dumpster, bucket, bin, barrow or dump truck [source].

Skip

It comes from the Latin word benna (a wagon of wicker or basket-work – see below), which comes from the Gaulish word bennā [benːaː] (carriage), from the Proto-Indo-European word *bʰendʰ- (to bind, bond), which is also the root of English words such as band, bandage, bend, bin, bind, bond and bundle, and also the Welsh word ben (cart, wagon, carriage), and the Italian word benna (bucket, grab) [source].

Benna
Similar wagons are still used in parts of Italy, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium. In Beligum they are known as banne, and they are benne in Switzerland. Sources: gutenberg.org and perseus.tufts.edu

Some related words in French include:

  • benne preneuse = grab bucket
  • benne basculante = dump bucket
  • benne à béton = concrete mixer
  • benne à boues = sludge skip
  • benne à papiers = paper recycling dumpster
  • benne à ordures = bin lorry, garbage truck
  • benne à déchets = rubbish bin, garbage bin
  • benne à cartons = cardboard bin

Incidentally, after I booked a skip the other day, my builder called to tell me that I didn’t need one after all. They will use a truck to take away all the detritus from the work in my garden. Fortunately I was able to cancel the booking and get a refund. Unfortuantely I can’t a refund on the skip permit, which the skip hire people applied for on my behalf.

Skips and Dumpsters

By Simon

The hedge in my garden was cut down yesterday, and soon work will start clearing the end of the garden where my new studio will be built. Now I need to hire a skip for all the stuff that needs to be taken away.

My garden after the hedge was removed.
This is how my garden looks at the moment. The shed and the mound next to it will be removed next. The wooden fence on the left belongs to my neighbours, and hopefully they’ll fix it or replace it soon.

A skip in this sense is “a large open-topped container for waste, designed to be lifted onto the back of a truck to remove it along with its contents” (see below). It can also refer to a transportation container in a mine, usually for ore or mullock (waste material from a mine), a wheeled basket used in cotton factories, a charge of syrup in the pans (in sugar manufacture), or a beehive.

Skip

It comes from the Middle English word skep(pe) (basket, beehive made of straw or wicker), from the Old English sceppe, from Old Norse skeppa (basket), which is of unknown origin [source].

From the same Old Norse root we get the Swedish word skeppa [ɧɛpʰa] (to ship; to transport by ship or boat) [source].

Apparently the word skip is mainly used in the UK, and the equivalent in North America is a dumpster. Is that right? What about in other places?

The word dumpster comes from dump and Dempster, a brand name for such things that became generic [source].