The Andrea Ferrara, or Scottish broadsword, carried by Fergus M'Ivor, bears, according to some authorities, the name of an armourer of Ferrara, in Italy. According to others, Andrea dei Ferrari was a sword-maker at Belluno. I have heard it affirmed by a Scottish drill-sergeant that the real name of this genius was Andrew Ferrars,[38] and that he belonged to the same nationality as other great men.

[Page Heading: LATEEN—GUINEA-PIG]

An argosy, formerly also ragusye, was named from the Adriatic port of Ragusa, and a lateen sail is a Latin, i.e. Mediterranean, sail; gamboge is the Fr. Cambodge, Cambodia, and indigo is from Span. indico, Indian. Of wines, malmsey, chiefly remembered in connection with George of Clarence, and malvoisie are doublets, from Monemvasia in the Morea. Port is named from Oporto, i.e. o porto, the harbour (cf. le Havre), and sherry (see p. 116) from Xeres, Lat. Caesaris (urbs); cf. Saragossa, from Caesarea Augusta.

But it is possible to be mistaken in connecting countries with products. Brazil wood is not named from the country, but vice-versa. It was known as a dye-wood as early as the 12th century, and the name is found in many of the European languages. The Portuguese navigators found large quantities of it in South America and named the country accordingly. They christened an island Madeira, timber, Lat. materia, for a similar reason. The canary comes from the Canary Islands, but its name is good Latin. The largest of these islands, Canaria, was so called by the Romans from the dogs found there. The guinea-fowl and guinea gold came first from the west coast of Africa, but the guinea-pig is a native of Brazil. The name probably came from the Guinea-men, or slave-ships, which regularly followed a triangular course. They sailed outward to the west coast of Africa with English goods. These they exchanged for slaves, whom they transported to the West Indies, the horrible "middle passage," and finally they sailed homeward with New World produce, including, no doubt, guinea-pigs brought home by sailors. The turkey is also called guinea-fowl in the 17th century, probably to be explained in the same way. The German name for guinea-pig, Meerschweinchen, seems to mean little pig from over the sea.

Guinea was a vague geographical expression in the 17th century, but not so vague as India or Turkey. Indian ink comes from China (Fr. encre de Chine), and Indian corn from America. The names given to the turkey are extraordinary. We are not surprised that, as an American bird, it should be naturally connected with India; cf. West Indies, Red Indian, etc. Turk was in the 16th and 17th centuries a vague term for non-Christians—

"Jews, Turks, infidels, and hereticks." (Collect for Good Friday.)

and we find also Turkey wheat for maize. The following names for the turkey, given in a Nomenclator in eight languages, published in Germany in 1602, do not exhaust the list:—

German.—Indianisch oder Kalekuttisch[39] oder Welsch[40] Hun. Dutch.—Calcoensche oft Turckische Henne. French.—Geline ou poulle d'Inde, ou d'Africque. Italian.—Gallina d'India. Spanish.—Pavon (peacock) de las Indias. English.—Cok off Inde!

No doubt the turkey was confused with other birds, for we find Fr. geline d'Inde before the discovery of America. D'Inde has become dinde, whence a new masculine dindon has been formed.

[Page Heading: HANSOM]

The early etymologists were fond of identifying foreign wares with place-names. They connected diaper with Ypres, gingham with Guingamp (in Brittany), drugget with Drogheda, and the sedan chair with Sedan. Such guesses are almost always wrong. The origin of diaper is doubtful, that of drugget quite unknown, and gingham is Malay. As far as we know at present, the sedan came from Italy in the 16th century, and it is there, among derivatives of Lat. sedere, to sit, that its origin must be sought, unless indeed the original Sedan was some mute, inglorious Hansom.[41]

FOOTNOTES:

[36] Whence also cheval de frise, a contrivance used by the Frieslanders against cavalry. The German name is die spanischen Reiter, explained by Ludwig as "a bar with iron-spikes; cheval de frise, a warlick instrument, to keep off the horse."

[37] The form jeans appears to be usual in America—"His hands were thrust carelessly into the side pockets of a gray jeans coat." (Meredith Nicholson, War of the Carolinas, Ch. 15.)

[38] A Scotch reviewer (Glasgow Herald, 13th April 1912) corrects me here—"His name was certainly not Ferrars, but Ferrier. He was probably an Arbroath man." Some readers may remember that, after General Todleben's brilliant defence of Sebastopol (1854-5), Punch discovered a respectable ancestry for him also. In some lines commencing—

"I ken him weel, the chield was born in Fife, The bairn of Andrew Drummond and his wife,"

it was shown that the apparently foreign name had been conferred on the gifted child because of the agility with which he used to "toddle ben the hoose."

[39] Calicut, not Calcutta.

[40] See walnut (p. 151).

[41] As the hansom has now become of archaeological interest only, it may be recorded here that it took its name from that of its inventor—"The Hansom's patent (cab) is especially constructed for getting quickly over the ground" (Pulleyn's Etymological Compendium, 1853). Sic transit!



CHAPTER V

PHONETIC ACCIDENTS

The history of a word has to be studied from the double point of view of sound and sense, or, to use more technical terms, phonetics and semantics. In the logical order of things it seems natural to deal first with the less interesting aspect, phonetics, the physical processes by which sounds are gradually transformed. Speaking generally, it may be said that phonetic changes are governed by the law of least resistance, a sound which presents difficulty being gradually and unconsciously modified by a whole community or race. With the general principles of phonetics I do not propose to deal, but a few simple examples will serve to illustrate the one great law on which this science is based.

The population of this country is educationally divided by the letter h into three classes, which we may describe as the confident, the anxious, and the indifferent. The same division existed in imperial Rome, where educated people sounded the aspirate, which completely disappeared from the every-day language of the lower classes, the so-called Vulgar Latin, from which the Romance languages are descended, so far as their working vocabulary is concerned. The anxious class was also represented. A Latin epigrammatist[42] remarks that since Arrius, prophetic name, has visited the Ionic islands, they will probably be henceforth known as the Hionic islands. To the disappearance of the h from Vulgar Latin is due the fact that the Romance languages have no aspirate. French still writes the initial h in some words by etymological reaction, e.g., homme for Old Fr. ome, and also at one time really had an aspirate in the case of words of Germanic origin, e.g., la honte, shame. But this h is no longer sounded, although it still, by tradition, prevents elision and liaison, mistakes in which are regarded much in the same way as a misplaced aspirate in English. The "educated" h of modern English is largely an artificial restoration; cf. the modern hotel-keeper with the older word ostler (see p. 164), or the family name Armitage with the restored hermitage.

[Page Heading: PHONETIC LAZINESS]

We have dropped the k sound in initial kn, as in knave, still sounded in Ger. Knabe, boy. French gets over the difficulty by inserting a vowel between the two consonants, e.g., canif is a Germanic word cognate with Eng. knife. This is a common device in French when a word of Germanic origin begins with two consonants. Cf. Fr. derive, drift, Eng. drive; Fr. varech, sea-weed, Eng. wrack. Harangue, formerly harengue, is Old High Ger. hring, Eng. ring, the allusion being to the circle formed by the audience. Fr. chenapan, rogue, is Ger. Schnapphahn, robber, lit. fowl-stealer. The shallop that "flitteth silken-sail'd, skimming down to Camelot," is Fr. chaloupe, probably identical with Du. sloep, sloop.

The general dislike that French has for a double consonant sound at the beginning of a word appears also in the transformation of all Latin words which began with sc, sp, st, e.g., scola > escole (ecole), spongia > esponge (eponge), stabulum > estable (etable). English words derived from French generally show the older form, but without the initial vowel, school, sponge, stable.

The above are very simple examples of sound change. There are certain less regular changes, which appear to work in a more arbitrary fashion and bring about more picturesque results. Three of the most important of these are assimilation, dissimilation, and metathesis.

Assimilation is the tendency of a sound to imitate its neighbour. The tree called the lime was formerly the line, and earlier still the lind. We see the older form in linden and in such place-names as Lyndhurst, lime wood. Line often occurred in such compounds as line-bark, line-bast, line-wood, where the second component began with a lip consonant. The n became also a lip consonant because it was easier to pronounce, and by the 17th century we generally find lime instead of line. We have a similar change in Lombard for Ger. lang-bart, long-beard, or, according to some, long-axe. For Liverpool we find also Litherpool in early records. If the reader attempts to pronounce both names rapidly, he will be able to form his own opinion as to whether it is more natural for Liverpool to become Litherpool or vice-versa, a vexed question with philologists. Fr. velin, a derivative of Old Fr. veel (veau), calf, and venin, Lat. venenum, have given Eng. vellum and venom, the final consonant being in each case assimilated[43] to the initial labial. So also mushroom, Fr. mousseron, from mousse, moss.

Vulgar Lat. circare (from circa, around) gave Old Fr. cerchier, Eng. search. In modern Fr. chercher the initial consonant has been influenced by the medial ch. The m of the curious word ampersand, variously spelt, is due to the neighbouring p. It is applied to the sign &. I thought it obsolete till I came across it on successive days in two contemporary writers—

"One of my mother's chief cares was to teach me my letters, which I learnt from big A to Ampersand in the old hornbook at Lantrig." (QUILLER-COUCH, Dead Man's Rock, Ch. 2.)

"Tommy knew all about the work. Knew every letter in it from A to Emperzan." (PETT RIDGE, In the Wars.)

Children used to repeat the alphabet thus—"A per se A, B per se B," and so on to "and per se and." The symbol & is an abbreviation of Lat. et, written &.

[Page Heading: DISSIMILATION]

Dissimilation is the opposite process. The archaic word pomander—

"I have sold all my trumpery; not a counterfeit stone, not a riband, glass, pomander, brooch, ... to keep my pack from fasting." (Winter's Tale, iv. 3.)

was formerly spelt pomeamber. It comes from Old Fr. pome ambre, apple of amber, a ball of perfume once carried by the delicate. In this case one of the two lip consonants has been dissimilated. A like change has occurred in Fr. nappe, cloth, from Lat. mappa, whence our napkin, apron (p. 113), and the family name Napier.

The sounds most frequently affected by dissimilation are those represented by the letters l, n, and r. Fr. gonfalon is for older gonfanon. Chaucer uses the older form, Milton the newer—

"Ten thousand thousand ensigns high advanc'd, Standards and gonfalons, 'twixt van and rear, Stream in the air." (Paradise Lost, v. 589.)

Gonfanon is of Germanic origin. It means literally "battle-flag," and the second element is cognate with English fane or vane (Ger. Fahne). Eng. pilgrim and Fr. pelerin, from Lat. peregrinus, illustrate the change from r to l, while the word frail, an osier basket for figs, is due to a change from l to r, which goes back to Roman times. A grammarian of imperial Rome named Probus compiled, about the 3rd or 4th century, A.D., a list of cautions as to mispronunciation. In this list we find "flagellum, non fragellum." In the sense of switch, twig, fragellum gave Old Fr. freel, basket made of twigs, whence Eng. frail; while the correct flagellum gave Old Fr. fleel (fleau), whence Eng. flail. A Vulgar Lat. *mora, mulberry, from Lat. morus, mulberry tree, has given Fr. mure. The r of berry has brought about dissimilation in Eng. mulberry and Ger. Maulbeere. Colonel has the spelling of Fr. colonel, but its pronunciation points rather to the dissimilated Spanish form coronel which is common in Elizabethan English. Cotgrave has colonel, "a colonell, or coronell; the commander of a regiment."

The female name Annabel is a dissimilation of Amabel, whence Mabel. By confusion with the popular medieval name Orable, Lat. orabilis, Annabel has become Arabel or Arabella. Our level is Old Fr. livel, Vulgar Lat. *libellum, for libella, a plummet, diminutive of libra, scales. Old Fr. livel became by dissimilation nivel, now niveau. Many conjectures have been made as to the etymology of oriel. It is from Old Fr. oriol, a recess, or sanctum, which first occurs in an Anglo-Norman poem of the 12th century on Becket. This is from a Late Latin diminutive aulaeolum, a small chapel or shrine, which was dissimilated into auraeolum.

Sometimes dissimilation leads to the disappearance of a consonant, e.g., Eng. feeble, Fr. faible, represents Lat. flebilis, lamentable, from flere, to weep. Fugleman was once flugelman, from Ger. Fluegelmann, wing man, i.e., a tall soldier on the wing who exaggerated the movements of musketry drill for the guidance of the rest.

[Page Heading: METATHESIS]

Metathesis is the transposition of two sounds. A simple case is our trouble, Fr. troubler, from Lat. turbulare. Maggot is for Mid. Eng. maddok, a diminutive of Anglo-Sax. maa; cf. Ger. Made, maggot. Kittle, in the phrase "kittle cattle," is identical with tickle; cf. Ger. kitzeln, to tickle. One theory for the origin of tankard is that it stands for *cantar, from Lat. cantharus, with which it corresponds exactly in meaning; e.g., cantharus, "a pot, a jugge, a tankerd" (Cooper); cantharo, a "tankard or jug that houldeth much" (Florio); canthare, "a great jugge, or tankard" (Cotgrave). The metathesis may be due to association with the name Tankard (Tancred).

Wattle and wallet are used indifferently in Mid. English for a little bag. Shakespeare no doubt had in mind the wattles of a cock or turkey when he made Gonzalo speak of mountaineers—

"Dew-lapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging at them Wallets of flesh." (Tempest, iii. 3.)

Fr. moustique is for earlier mousquite, from Span. mosquito, a diminutive from Lat. musca, a fly. Tinsel is Fr. etincelle, spark, earlier estincele, which supposes a Lat. *stincilla for scintilla. The old word anlace, dagger, common in Mid. English and revived by Byron and Scott—

"His harp in silken scarf was slung, And by his side an anlace hung." (Rokeby, v. 15.)

has provoked many guesses. Its oldest form, anelas, is a metathesis of the common Old Fr. alenas, dagger. This is formed from alene, of Germanic origin, cognate with awl; cf. cutlass, Fr. coutelas (p. 126). Beverage is from Old Fr. bevrage, or beuvrage, now breuvage, Vulgar Lat. *biberaticum, from bibere, to drink. Here, as in the case of level (p. 58), and search (p. 57), English preserves the older form. In Martello tower, from a fort taken by the British (1794) in Mortella, i.e., Myrtle, Bay, Corsica, we have vowel metathesis.

It goes without saying that such linguistic phenomena are often observed in the case of children and uneducated people. Not long ago the writer was urged by a gardener to embellish his garden with a ruskit arch. When metathesis extends beyond one word we have what is known as a Spoonerism, the original type of which is said to be—

"Kinquerings congs their titles take."

We have seen (p. 57) that the letters l, n, r are particularly subject to dissimilation and metathesis. But we sometimes find them alternating without apparent reason. Thus banister is a modern form for the correct baluster.[44] This was not at first applied to the rail, but to the bulging colonnettes on which it rests. Fr. balustre comes, through Italian, from Greco-Lat. balaustium, a pomegranate flower, the shape of which resembles the supports of a balustrade. Cotgrave explains balustres as "ballisters; little, round and short pillars, ranked on the outside of cloisters, terraces, galleries, etc." Glamour is a doublet of grammar (see p. 145), and flounce was formerly frounce, from Fr. froncer, now only used of "knitting" the brows—

"Till civil-suited morn appear, Not trickt and frounc't as she was wont With the Attic boy to hunt." (Penseroso, l. 123.)

Fr. flibustier, whence our filibuster, was earlier fribustier, a corruption of Du. vrijbuiter, whence directly the Eng. freebooter.[45]

[Page Heading: SHRINKAGE OF WORDS]

All words tend in popular usage to undergo a certain amount of shrinkage. The reduction of Lat. digitale, from digitus, finger, to Fr. de, thimble (little thumb) is a striking example. The strong tonic accent of English, which is usually on the first, or root, syllable, brings about a kind of telescoping which makes us very unintelligible to foreigners. This is seen in the pronunciation of names such as Cholmondeley and Marjoribanks. Bethlehem hospital, for lunatics, becomes bedlam; Mary Magdalene, taken as a type of tearful repentance, gives us maudlin, now generally used of the lachrymose stage of intoxication. Sacristan is contracted into sexton. Fr. paralysie becomes palsy, and hydropisie becomes dropsy. The fuller form of the word usually persists in the literary language, or is artificially introduced at a later period, so that we get such doublets as proctor and procurator.

In the case of French words which have a prefix, this prefix is very frequently dropped in English, e.g., raiment for arrayment; while suffixes, or final syllables, often disappear, e.g., treasure trove, for Old Fr. trove (trouve), or become assimilated to some familiar English ending, e.g., parish, Fr. paroisse, skirmish, Fr. escarmouche; cartridge, Fr. cartouche, partridge, Fr. perdrix. A good example of such shrinkage is the word vamp, part of a shoe, Old Fr. avant-pie (pied), which became Mid. Eng. vampey, and then lost its final syllable. We may compare vambrace, armour for the forearm, Fr. avant-bras, vanguard, Fr. avant-garde, often reduced to van—

"Go, charge Agrippa Plant those that have revolted in the van; That Antony may seem to spend his fury Upon himself." (Antony and Cleopatra, iv. 6.)

and the obsolete vaunt-courier, forerunner—

"You sulphurous and thought-executing fires, Vaunt-couriers of oak-cleaving thunderbolts." (Lear, iii. 2.)

When the initial vowel is a-, its loss may have been helped by confusion with the indefinite article. Thus for anatomy we find atomy, for a skeleton or scarecrow figure, applied by Mistress Quickly to the constable (2 Henry IV., v. 4). Peal is for appeal, call; mend for amend, lone for alone, i.e., all one. Peach, used by Falstaff—

"If I be ta'en, I'll peach for this." (1 Henry IV., ii. 2.)

is for older appeach, related to impeach. Size, in all its senses, is for assize, Fr. assise, with a general meaning of allowance or assessment, from Fr. asseoir, to put, lay. Sizars at Cambridge are properly students in receipt of certain allowances called sizings. With painters' size we may compare Ital. assisa, "size that painters use" (Florio). We use the form assize in speaking of the "sitting" of the judges, but those most familiar with this tribunal speak of being tried at the 'sizes. The obsolete word cate, on which Petruchio plays—

"For dainties are all cates—and therefore, Kate, Take this of me, Kate of my consolation." (Taming of the Shrew, ii. 1.)

is for earlier acate, an Old French dialect form corresponding to modern Fr. achat, purchase. The man entrusted with purchasing was called an acatour or catour (whence the name Cator), later cater, now extended to caterer, like fruiterer for fruiter, poulterer for poulter and upholsterer for upholdster or upholder.[46]

Limbeck has been squeezed out by the orthodox alembic—

"Memory the warder of the brain, Shall be a fume, and the receipt of reason A limbeck only." (Macbeth, i. 7.)

and prentice has given way to apprentice. Tire and attire both survive, and maze persists by the side of amaze with the special sense which I have heard a Notts collier express by puzzle-garden (cf. Ger. Irrgarten). Binnacle is a corruption, perhaps due to association with bin, of earlier bittacle, from Lat. habitaculum, a little dwelling. It may have come to us through Fr. habitacle or Port. bitacola, "the bittacle, a frame of timber in the steerage, where the compass is placed on board a ship" (Vieyra, Port. Dict., 1794). As King of Scotland, King George has a household official known as the limner, or painter. For limner[47] we find in the 15th century lumner and luminour, which is aphetic for alluminour, or enlumineur. Cotgrave, s.v. enlumineur de livres, says, "we call one that coloureth, or painteth upon, paper, or parchment, an alluminer."

[Page Heading: APHESIS]

But confusion with the article is not necessary in order to bring about aphesis. It occurs regularly in the case of words beginning with esc, esp, est, borrowed from Old French (see p. 56). Thus we have squire from escuyer (ecuyer), skew from Old Fr. eschuer, to dodge, "eschew," ultimately cognate with Eng. shy, spice from espice (epice), sprite from esprit, stage from estage (etage), etc. In some cases we have the fuller form also, e.g., esquire, eschew; cf. sample and example. Fender, whether before a fireplace or slung outside a ship, is for defender; fence is always for defence, either in the sense of a barrier or in allusion to the noble art of self-defence.[48] The tender of a ship or of a locomotive is the attender, and taint is aphetic for attaint, Fr. atteinte, touch—

"I will not poison thee with my attaint." (Lucrece, l. 1072.)

Puzzle was in Mid. Eng. opposaile, i.e., something put before one. We still speak of "a poser."

Spital, for hospital, survives in Spitalfields, and Spittlegate at Grantham and elsewhere. Crew is for accrewe (Holinshed). It meant properly a reinforcement, lit. on-growth, from Fr. accroitre, to accrue. In recruit, we have a later instance of the same idea. Fr. recrue, recruit, from recroitre, to grow again, is still feminine, like many other military terms which were originally abstract or collective. Cotgrave has recreue, "a supplie, or filling up of a defective company of souldiers, etc." We have possum for opossum, and coon for racoon, and this for arrahacoune, which I find in a 16th-century record of travel; cf. American skeeter for mosquito. In these two cases we perhaps have also the deliberate intention to shorten (see p. 66), as also in the obsolete Australian tench, for the aphetic 'tentiary, i.e., penitentiary. With this we may compare 'tec for detective.

[Page Heading: APHESIS]

Drawing-room is for withdrawing room, and only the final t of saint is left in Tooley St., famed for its three tailors, formerly Saint Olave Street, and tawdry. This latter word is well known to be derived from Saint Audrey's fair. It was not originally depreciatory—

"Come, you promised me a tawdry lace, and a pair of sweet gloves." (Winter's Tale, iv. 3.)

and the full form is recorded by Palsgrave, who has Seynt Andries (read Audrie's) lace, "cordon." The verb vie comes from Old Fr. envier, to challenge, Lat. invitare, whence the phrase a l'envi l'un de l'autre, "in emulation one of the other" (Cotgrave); cf. gin (trap), Fr. engin, Lat. ingenium. The prefix dis or des is lost in Spencer (see p. 165), spite, splay, sport, stain, etc.

In drat, formerly 'od rot, zounds for God's wounds, 'sdeath, odsbodikins, etc., there is probably a deliberate avoidance of profanity. The same intention appears in Gogs—

"'Ay, by gogs-wouns!' quoth he; and swore so loud, That, all amaz'd, the priest let fall the book." (Taming of the Shrew, iii. 2.)

Cf. Fr. parbleu for par Dieu, and Ger. Potz for Gottes.

This English tendency to aphesis is satirised in a French song of the 14th century, intentionally written in bad French. Thus, in the line—

"Or sont il vint le tans que Glais voura vauchier."[49]

Glais is for Anglais and vauchier is for chevauchier (chevaucher), to ride on a foray. The literary language runs counter to this instinct, though Shakespeare wrote haviour for behaviour and longing for belonging, while such forms as billiments for habiliments and sparagus for asparagus are regular up to the 18th century. Children keep up the national practice when they say member for remember and zamine for examine. It is quite certain that baccy and tater would be recognised literary forms if America had been discovered two centuries sooner or printing invented two centuries later.

Many words are shortened, not by natural and gradual shrinkage, but by deliberate laziness. The national distaste for many syllables appears in wire for telegram, the Artful Dodger's wipe for the clumsy pocket handkerchief, soccer for association, and such portmanteau words as squarson, an individual who is at once squire and parson, or Bakerloo for Baker St. and Waterloo.

The simplest way of reducing a word is to take the first syllable and make it a symbol for the rest. Of comparatively modern formation are pub and Zoo, with which we may compare Bart's, for Saint Bartholomew's, Cri, Pav, "half a mo'" bike, and even paj, for pageant.

[Page Heading: CLIPPED FORMS]

This method of shortening words was very popular in the 17th century, from which period date cit(izen), mob(ile vulgus), the fickle crowd, and, pun(digrion). We often find the fuller mobile used for mob. The origin of pundigrion is uncertain. It may be an illiterate attempt at Ital. puntiglio, which, like Fr. pointe, was used of a verbal quibble or fine distinction. Most of these clipped forms are easily identified, e.g., cab(riolet), gent(leman), hack(ney), vet(erinary surgeon). Cad is for Scot. caddie, errand boy, now familiar in connection with golf, and caddie is from Fr. cadet, younger. The word had not always the very strong meaning we now associate with it. Among Sketches by Boz is one entitled—

"The last Cab driver and the first Omnibus Cad,"

where cad means conductor. On tick, for on ticket, is found in the 17th century. We may compare the more modern biz and spec. Brig is for brigantine, Ital. brigantino, "a kinde of pinnasse or small barke called a brigantine" (Florio). The original meaning is pirate ship; cf. brigand. Wag has improved in meaning. It is for older waghalter. Cotgrave has baboin (babouin), "a trifling, busie, or crafty knave; a crackrope, waghalter, etc." The older sense survives in the phrase "to play the wag," i.e. truant. For the "rope" figure we may compare Scot. hempie, a minx, and obsolete Ital. cavestrolo, a diminutive from Lat. capistrum, halter, explained by Florio as "a wag, a haltersacke." Modern Ital. capestro is used in the same sense. Crack-rope is shortened to crack. Justice Shallow remembered Falstaff breaking Skogan's head—

"When he was a crack, not thus high." (2 Henry IV., iii. 2.)

Chap is for chapman, once in general use for a merchant and still a common family name. It is cognate with cheap, chaffer, and Ger. kaufen, to buy, and probably comes from Lat. caupo, tavern keeper. We have the Dutch form in horse-coper, and also in the word coopering, the illicit sale of spirits by Dutch boats to North Sea fishermen.[50] Merchant was used by the Elizabethans in the same way as our chap. Thus the Countess of Auvergne calls Talbot a "riddling merchant" (1 Henry VI., ii. 3). We may also compare Scot. callant, lad, from the Picard form of Fr. chaland, customer—

"He had seen many a braw callant, far less than Guse Gibbie, fight brawly under Montrose." (Old Mortality, Ch. 1.)

and our own expression "a rum customer," reduced in America to "a rum cuss." Hock, for Hochheimer, wine from Hochheim, occurs as early as Beaumont and Fletcher; and rum, spirit, is for earlier rumbullion, of obscure origin. Gin is for geneva, a corruption of Fr. genievre, Lat. juniperus, with the berries of which it is flavoured. The history of grog is more complicated. The stuff called grogram, earlier grograyne, is from Fr. gros grain, coarse grain. Admiral Vernon (18th century) was called by the sailors "Old Grog" from his habit of wearing grogram breeches. When he issued orders that the regular allowance of rum was henceforth to be diluted with water, the sailors promptly baptized the mixture with his nickname.

[Page Heading: CLIPPED FORMS]

Sometimes the two first syllables survive. We have navvy for navigator, brandy for brandywine, from Du. brandewyn, lit. burnt wine, and whisky for usquebaugh, Gaelic uisge-beatha, water of life (cf. eau-de-vie), so that the literal meaning of whisky is very innocent. It has a doublet in the river-name Usk. Before the 18th century usquebaugh is the regular form. In the following passage the Irish variety is referred to—

"The prime is usquebaugh, which cannot be made anywhere in that perfection; and whereas we drink it here in aqua vitae measures, it goes down there by beer-glassfuls, being more natural to the nation." (HOWELL, 1634.)

Canter is for Canterbury gallop, the pace of pilgrims riding to the shrine of St Thomas. John Dennis, known as Dennis the Critic, says of Pope—

"Boileau's Pegasus has all his paces. The Pegasus of Pope, like a Kentish post-horse, is always on the Canterbury." (On the Preliminaries to the Dunciad.)

In bugle, for bugle-horn, lit. wild-ox-horn, Old Fr. bugle, Lat. buculus, a diminutive of bos, ox, we have perhaps rather an ellipsis, like waterproof (coat), than a clipped form—

"Comrades, leave me here a little, while as yet 'tis early morn: Leave me here, and when you want me, sound upon the bugle-horn." (Locksley Hall.)

Patter is no doubt for paternoster—

"Fitz-Eustace, you, with Lady Clare, May bid your beads and patter prayer." (Marmion, vi. 27.)

and the use of the word marble for a toy sometimes made of that stone makes it very probable that the alley, most precious of marbles, is short for alabaster.

Less frequently the final syllable is selected, e.g., bus for omnibus, loo for lanterloo, variously spelt in the 17th and 18th centuries—

"Ev'n mighty Pam,[51] that Kings and Queens o'erthrew, And mow'd down armies in the fights of lu." (Rape of the Lock, iii. 62.)

Fr. lanturelu was originally the meaningless refrain or "tol de rol" of a popular song in Richelieu's time. Van is for caravan, a Persian word, properly a company of merchants or ships travelling together, "also of late corruptly used with us for a kind of waggon to carry passengers to and from London" (Blount, Glossographia, 1674). Wig is for periwig, a corruption of Fr. perruque, of obscure origin. With the 17th century 'varsity, for university, we may compare Sam Weller's 'Tizer, for Morning Advertiser.

Christian names are treated in the same way. Alexander gives Alec and Sandy, Herbert, 'Erb or Bert. Ib (see p. 172) was once common for Isabella, while the modern language prefers Bella; Maud for Matilda is a telescoped form of Old Fr. Maheut, while 'Tilda is perhaps due to unconscious aphesis, like Denry—

"She saved a certain amount of time every day by addressing her son as Denry, instead of Edward Henry." (ARNOLD BENNETT, The Card, Ch. 1.)

Among conscious word-formations may be classed many reduplicated forms, whether riming, as hurly-burly, or alliterative, as tittle-tattle, though reduplication belongs to the natural speech of children, and, in at least one case, Fr. tante, from ante-ante, Lat. amita, the baby word has prevailed. In a reduplicated form only one half as a rule needs to be explained. Thus seesaw is from saw, the motion suggesting two sawyers at work on a log. Zigzag, from French, and Ger. zickzack are of unknown origin. Shilly-shally is for shill I, shall I? Namby-pamby commemorates the poet Ambrose Philips, who was thus nicknamed by Pope and his friends. The weapon called a snickersnee—

"'First let me say my catechism, Which my poor mammy taught to me.' 'Make haste, make haste,' says guzzling Jimmy, While Jack pulled out his snickersnee." (THACKERAY, Little Billee, l. 21.)

is of Dutch origin and means something like "cut and thrust." It is usually mentioned in connection with the Hollanders—

"Among other customs they have in that town, one is, that none must carry a pointed knife about him; which makes the Hollander, who is us'd to snik and snee, to leave his horn-sheath and knife a ship-board when he comes ashore." (HOWELL, Letter from Florence, 1621.)

Here the reduplication is only apparent, for the older form was to stick or snee, representing the Dutch verbs steken, to thrust, snijden or snijen, to cut. The initial of the first verb has been assimilated to that of the second—

"It is our countrie custome onely to stick or snee." (GLAPTHORNE, The Hollander.)

Reduplication is responsible for pickaback, earlier pickpack, from pack, bundle. The modern form is due to popular association with back.

[Page Heading: PREFIXED CONSONANTS]

Occasionally we have what is apparently the arbitrary prefixing of a consonant, e.g., spruce for pruce (p. 48). Dapple gray corresponds so exactly to Fr. gris pommele, Mid. Eng. pomeli gris, Ger. apfelgrau, and Ital. pomellato, "spotted, bespeckled, pide, dapple-graie, or fleabitten, the colour of a horse" (Florio), that it is hard not to believe in an unrecorded *apple-gray, especially as we have daffodil for earlier affodil, i.e., asphodel. Cotgrave has asphodile (asphodele), "the daffadill, affodill, or asphodill, flower." The playful elaboration daffadowndilly is as old as Spenser.

FOOTNOTES:

[42]

"Nec sibi postilla metuebant talia verba, Cum subito adfertur nuntius horribilis, Ionios fluctus, postquam illuc Arrius isset, Iam non Ionios esse, sed Hionios." (Catullus, 84.)

[43] Apart from assimilation, there is a tendency in English to substitute -m for -n, e.g. grogram for grogran (see p. 68). In the family name Hansom, for Hanson, we have dissimilation of n (see p. 57).

[44] Cf. the similar change in the family name Banister (p. 179).

[45] It may be noted here that a buccaneer was not originally a pirate, but a man whose business was the smoking of beef in the West Indies. The name comes from a native word boucan, adopted into French, and explained by Cotgrave as a "woodden-gridiron whereon the cannibals broile pieces of men, and other flesh."

[46] Upholsterer has become specialised in sense; cf. undertaker (of funerals), and stationer, properly a tradesman with a station or stall. Costermonger illustrates the converse process. It meant originally a dealer in costards, i.e. apples. The French costermonger has the more appropriate name of marchand des quatre saisons.

[47] English i sometimes occurs as an attempt at the French and Celtic u; cf. brisk from brusque, periwig (p. 69), and whisky (p. 68).

[48] Our ancestors appear to have been essentially pacific. With fence, for defence, we may compare Ger. schirmen, to fence, from Schirm, screen (cf. Regenschirm, umbrella), which, passing through Italian and French, has given us skirmish, scrimmage, scaramouch (see p. 142), and Shakespearean scrimer, fencer (Hamlet, iv. 7). So also Ger. Gewehr, weapon, is cognate with Eng. weir, and means defence—

"Cet animal est tres mechant; Quand on l'attaque, il se defend."

[49] "Now the time has come when the English will wish to ride."

[50] Cf. also Dan. Kjoebenhavn (Copenhagen), the merchants' haven, the numerous Swedish place-names ending in -koeping, e.g. Joenkoeping, and our own Chippings, or market-towns.

[51] The knave of clubs. The name was also given to Lord Palmerston.



CHAPTER VI

WORDS AND MEANINGS

We have all noticed the fantastic way in which ideas are linked together in our thoughts. One thing suggests another with which it is accidentally associated in memory, the second suggests a third, and, in the course even of a few seconds, we find that we have travelled from one subject to another so remote that it requires an effort to reconstruct the series of links which connects them. The same thing happens with words. A large number of words, despite great changes of sense, retain the fundamental meaning of the original, but in many cases this is quite lost. A truer image than that of the linked chain would be that of a sphere giving off in various directions a number of rays each of which may form the nucleus of a fresh sphere. Or we may say that at each link of the chain there is a possibility of another chain branching off in a direction of its own. In Cotgrave's time to garble (see p. 21) and to canvass, i.e. sift through canvas, meant the same thing. Yet how different is their later sense development.

[Page Heading: BAN—BUREAU]

There is a word ban, found in Old High German and Anglo-Saxon, and meaning, as far back as it can be traced, a proclamation containing a threat, hence a command or prohibition. We have it in banish, to put under the ban. The proclamation idea survives in the banns of marriage and in Fr. arriere-ban, "a proclamation, whereby those that hold authority of the king in mesne tenure, are summoned to assemble, and serve him in his warres" (Cotgrave). This is folk-etymology for Old Fr. arban, Old High Ger. hari-ban, army summons. Slanting off from the primitive idea of proclamation is that of rule or authority. The French for outskirts is banlieue, properly the "circuit of a league, or thereabouts" (Cotgrave) over which the local authority extended. All public institutions within such a radius were associated with ban, e.g., un four, un moulin a ban, "a comon oven or mill whereat all men may, and every tenant and vassall must, bake, and grind" (Cotgrave). The French adjective banal, used in this connection, gradually developed from the meaning of "common" that of "common-place," in which sense it is now familiar in English.[52]

Bureau, a desk, was borrowed from French in the 17th century. In modern French it means not only the desk, but also the office itself and the authority exercised by the office. Hence our familiar bureaucracy, likely to become increasingly familiar. The desk was so called because covered with bureau, Old Fr. burel, "a thicke course cloath, of a brown russet, or darke mingled, colour" (Cotgrave), whence Mid. Eng. borel, rustic, clownish, lit. roughly clad, which occurs as late as Spenser—

"How be I am but rude and borrel, Yet nearer ways I know." (Shepherd's Calendar, July, l. 95.)

With this we may compare the metaphorical use of home-spun—

"What hempen home-spuns have we swaggering here, So near the cradle of the fairy queen?" (Midsummer Night's Dream, iii. 1.)

The source of Old Fr. burel is perhaps Lat. burrus, fiery, from Gk. {pyr}, fire.

Romance was originally an adverb. To write in the vulgar tongue, instead of in classical Latin, was called romanice scribere, Old Fr. romanz escrire. When romanz became felt as a noun, it developed a "singular" roman or romant, the latter of which gave the archaic Eng. romaunt. The most famous of Old French romances are the epic poems called Chansons de geste, songs of exploits, geste coming from the Lat. gesta, deeds. Eng. gest or jest is common in the 16th and 17th centuries in the sense of act, deed, and jest-book meant a story-book. As the favourite story-books were merry tales, the word gradually acquired its present meaning.

A part of our Anglo-Saxon church vocabulary was supplanted by Latin or French words. Thus Anglo-Sax. ge-bed, prayer, was gradually expelled by Old Fr. preiere (priere), Lat. precaria. It has survived in beadsman—

"The beadsman, after thousand aves told, For aye unsought-for slept among his ashes cold." (KEATS, Eve of St Agnes.)

beadroll, and bead, now applied only to the humble device employed in counting prayers.

Not only the Romance languages, but also German and Dutch, adopted, with the Roman character, Lat. scribere, to write. English, on the contrary, preserved the native to write, i.e. to scratch (runes), giving to scribere only a limited sense, to shrive. The curious change of meaning was perhaps due to the fact that the priestly absolution was felt as having the validity of a "written" law or enactment.

[Page Heading: PUDDING—STICKLER]

The meaning which we generally give to pudding is comparatively modern. The older sense appears in black pudding, a sausage made of pig's blood. This is also the meaning of Fr. boudin, whence pudding comes. A still older meaning of both words is intestine, a sense still common in dialect. The derivation of the word is obscure, but it is probably related to Fr. bouder, to pout, whence boudoir, lit. a sulking-room.

A hearse, now the vehicle in which a coffin is carried, is used by Shakespeare for a coffin or tomb. Its earlier meaning is a framework to support candles, usually put round the coffin at a funeral. This framework was so named from some resemblance to a harrow,[53] Fr. herse, Lat. hirpex, hirpic-, a rake.

Treacle is a stock example of great change of meaning. It is used in Coverdale's Bible (1535) for the "balm in Gilead" of the Authorised Version—

"There is no more triacle at Galaad."[54] (Jeremiah, vii. 22.)

Old Fr. triacle is from Greco-Lat. theriaca, a remedy against poison or snake-bite ({ther}, a wild beast). In Mid. English and later it was used of a sovereign remedy. It has, like sirup (p. 146), acquired its present meaning via the apothecary's shop.

A stickler is now a man who is fussy about small points of etiquette or procedure. In Shakespeare he is one who parts combatants—

"The dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth, And, stickler-like, the armies separates." (Troilus and Cressida, v. 8.)

An earlier sense is that of seeing fair-play. The word has been popularly associated with the stick, or staff, used by the umpires in duels, and Torriano gives stickler as one of the meanings of bastoniere, a verger or mace-bearer. But it probably comes from Mid. Eng. stightlen, to arrange, keep order (see p. 172, n. 2).

Infantry comes, through French, from Italian. It means a collection of "infants" or juniors, so called by contrast with the proved veterans who composed the cavalry.

The pastern of a horse, defined by Dr Johnson as the knee, from "ignorance, madam, pure ignorance," still means in Cotgrave and Florio "shackle." Florio even recognises a verb to pastern, e.g., pastoiare, "to fetter, to clog, to shackle, to pastern, to give (gyve)." It comes from Old Fr. pasturon (paturon), a derivative of pasture, such shackles being used to prevent grazing horses from straying. Pester (p. 167) is connected with it. The modern Fr. paturon has changed its meaning in the same way.

To rummage means in the Elizabethan navigators to stow goods in a hold. A rummager was what we call a stevedore.[55] Rummage is Old Fr. arrumage (arrimage), from arrumer, to stow, the middle syllable of which is probably cognate with English room; cf. arranger, to put in "rank."

The Christmas waits were originally watchmen, Anglo-Fr. waite, Old Fr. gaite, from the Old High German form of modern Ger. Wacht, watch. Modern French still has the verb guetter, to lie in wait for, and guet, the watch. Minstrel comes from an Old French derivative of Lat. minister, servant. Modern Fr. menetrier is only used of a country fiddler who attends village weddings.

The lumber-room is supposed to be for Lombard room, i.e., the room in which pawnbrokers used to store pledged property. The Lombards introduced into this country the three balls, said to be taken from the arms of the Medici family.

[Page Heading: LIVERY—FAIRY]

Livery is correctly explained by the poet Spenser—

"What livery is, we by common use in England know well enough, namely, that it is allowance of horse-meat, as they commonly use the word in stabling; as, to keep horses at livery; the which word, I guess, is derived of livering or delivering forth their nightly food. So in great houses, the livery is said to be served up for all night, that is, their evening allowance for drink; and livery is also called the upper weed (see p. 2) which a serving-man wears; so called, as I suppose, for that it was delivered and taken from him at pleasure." (View of the State of Ireland.)

This passage explains also livery stable.[56] Our word comes from Fr. livree, the feminine past participle of livrer, from Lat. liberare, to deliver.

Pedigree was in Mid. English pedegrew, petigrew, etc. It represents Old Fr. pie (pied) de grue, crane's foot, from the shape of a sign used in showing lines of descent in genealogical charts. The older form survives in the family name Pettigrew. Here it is a nickname, like Pettifer (pied de fer), iron-foot; cf. Sheepshanks.

Fairy is a collective, Fr. feerie, its modern use being perhaps due to its occurrence in such phrases as Faerie Queen, i.e., Queen of Fairyland. Cf. paynim, used by some poets for pagan, but really a doublet of paganism, occurring in paynim host, paynim knight, etc. The correct name for the individual fairy is fay, Fr. fee, Vulgar Lat. *fata, connected with fatum, fate. This appears in Ital. fata, "a fairie, a witch, an enchantres, an elfe" (Florio). The fata morgana, the mirage sometimes seen in the Strait of Messina, is attributed to the fairy Morgana of Tasso, the Morgan le Fay of our own Arthurian legends.

Many people must have wondered at some time why the clubs and spades on cards are so called. The latter figure, it is true, bears some resemblance to a spade, but no giant of fiction is depicted with a club with a triple head. The explanation is that we have adopted the French pattern, carreau (see p. 161), diamond, c[oe]ur, heart, pique, pike, spear-head, trefle, trefoil, clover-leaf, but have given to the two latter the names used in the Italian and Spanish pattern, which, instead of the pike and trefoil, has the sword (Ital. spada) and mace (Ital. bastone). Etymologically both spades are identical, the origin being Greco-Lat. spatha, the name of a number of blade-shaped objects; cf. the diminutive spatula.

Wafer, in both its senses, is related to Ger. Wabe, honeycomb. We find Anglo-Fr. wafre in the sense of a thin cake, perhaps stamped with a honeycomb pattern. The cognate Fr. gaufre is the name of a similar cake, which not only has the honeycomb pattern, but is also largely composed of honey. Hence our verb to goffer, to give a cellular appearance to a frill.

[Page Heading: MEANINGS OF ADJECTIVES]

The meanings of adjectives are especially subject to change. Quaint now conveys the idea of what is unusual, and, as early as the 17th century, we find it explained as "strange, unknown." This is the exact opposite of its original meaning, Old Fr. cointe, Lat. cognitus; cf. acquaint, Old Fr. acointier, to make known. It is possible to trace roughly the process by which this remarkable volte-face has been brought about. The intermediate sense of trim or pretty is common in Shakespeare—

"For a fine, quaint, graceful, and excellent fashion, yours is worth ten on't." (Much Ado, iii. 4.)

We apply restive to a horse that will not stand still. It means properly a horse that will not do anything else. Fr. retif, Old Fr. restif, from rester, to remain, Lat. re-stare, has kept more of the original sense of stubbornness. Scot. reest, reist, means to stand stock-still—

"Certain it was that Shagram reisted, and I ken Martin thinks he saw something." (Monastery, Ch. 4.)

Dryden even uses restive in the sense of sluggish—

"So James the drowsy genius wakes Of Britain, long entranced in charms, Restive, and slumbering on its arms." (Threnodia Augustalis.)

Reasty, used of meat that has "stood" too long, is the same word (cf. testy, Old Fr. testif, heady), and rusty bacon is probably folk-etymology for reasty bacon—

"And then came haltyng Jone, And brought a gambone Of bakon that was reasty." (SKELTON, Elynour Rummyng.)

Sterling has an obscure history. It is from Old Fr. esterlin, a coin which etymologists of an earlier age connected with the Easterlings, or Hanse merchants, who formed one of the great mercantile communities of the Middle Ages; and perhaps some such association is responsible for the meaning that sterling has acquired; but chronology shows this traditional etymology to be impossible. We find unus sterlingus in a medieval Latin document of 1184, and the Old Fr. esterlin occurs in Wace's Roman de Rou (Romaunt of Rollo the Sea King), which was written before 1175. Hence it is conjectured that the original coin was named from the star which appears on some Norman pennies.

When Horatio says—

"It is a nipping and an eager air." (Hamlet, i. 4.)

we are reminded that eager is identical with the second part of vin-egar, Fr. aigre, sour, Lat. acer, keen. It seems hardly possible to explain the modern sense of nice, which in the course of its history has traversed nearly the whole diatonic scale between "rotten" and "ripping." In Mid. English and Old French it means foolish. Cotgrave explains it by "lither, lazie, sloathful, idle; faint, slack; dull, simple," and Shakespeare uses it in a great variety of meanings. It is supposed to come from Lat. nescius, ignorant. The transition from fond, foolish, which survives in "fond hopes," to fond, loving, is easy. French fou is used in exactly the same way. Cf. also to dote on, i.e., to be foolish about. Puny is Fr. puine, from puis ne, later born, junior, whence the puisne justices. Milton uses it of a minor—

"He must appear in print like a puny with his guardian." (Areopagitica.)

Petty, Fr. petit, was similarly used for a small boy.

In some cases a complimentary adjective loses its true meaning and takes on a contemptuous or ironic sense. None of us care to be called bland, and to describe a man as worthy is to apologise for his existence. We may compare Fr. bonhomme, which now means generally an old fool, and bonne femme, good-wife, goody. Dapper, the Dutch for brave (cf. Ger. tapfer), and pert, Mid. Eng. apert, representing in meaning Lat. expertus, have changed much since Milton wrote of—

"The pert fairies and the dapper elves." (Comus, l. 118.)

Pert seems in fact to have acquired the meaning of its opposite malapert, though the older sense of brisk, sprightly, survives in dialect—

"He looks spry and peart for once." (Phillpotts, American Prisoner, Ch. 3.)

Smug, cognate with Ger. schmuck, trim, elegant, beautiful, has its original sense in Shakespeare—

"And here the smug and silver Trent shall run In a new channel, fair and evenly." (1 Henry IV., iii. 1.)

The degeneration of an adjective is sometimes due to its employment for euphemistic purposes. The favourite substitute for fat is stout, properly strong,[57] dauntless, etc., cognate with Ger. stolz, proud. Precisely the same euphemism appears in French, e.g., "une dame un peu forte." Ugly is replaced in English by plain, and in American by homely—

"She is not so handsome as these, maybe, but her homeliness is not actually alarming." (MAX ADELER, Mr Skinner's Night in the Underworld.)

In the case of this word, as in many others, the American use preserves a meaning which was once common in English. Kersey's Dictionary (1720) explains homely as "ugly, disagreeable, course (coarse), mean."

[Page Heading: INFLUENCE OF ASSOCIATION]

Change of meaning may be brought about by association. A miniature is a small portrait, and we even use the word as an adjective meaning small, on a reduced scale. But the true sense of miniature is something painted in minium, red lead. Florio explains miniatura as "a limning (see p. 63), a painting with vermilion." Such paintings were usually small, hence the later meaning. The word was first applied to the ornamental red initial capitals in manuscripts. Vignette still means technically in French an interlaced vine-pattern on a frontispiece.[58] Cotgrave has vignettes, "vignets; branches, or branch-like borders, or flourishes in painting, or ingravery."

The degeneration in the meaning of a noun may be partly due to frequent association with disparaging adjectives. Thus hussy, i.e. housewife, quean,[59] woman, wench, child, have absorbed such adjectives as impudent, idle, light, saucy, etc. Shakespeare uses quean only three times, and these three include "cozening quean" (Merry Wives, iv. 2) and "scolding quean" (All's Well, ii. 2). With wench, still used without any disparaging sense by country folk, we may compare Fr. garce, lass, and Ger. Dirne, maid-servant, both of which are now insulting epithets, but, in the older language, could be applied to Joan of Arc and the Virgin Mary respectively. Garce was replaced by fille, which has acquired in its turn a meaning so offensive that it has now given way to jeune fille. Minx, earlier minkes, is probably the Low Ger. minsk, Ger. Mensch, lit. human, but used also in the sense of "wench." For the consonantal change cf. hunks, Dan. hundsk, stingy, lit. doggish. These examples show that the indignant "Who are you calling a woman?" is, philologically, in all likelihood a case of intelligent anticipation.

[Page Heading: BUXOM—PLUCK]

Adjectives are affected in their turn by being regularly coupled with certain nouns. A buxom help-mate was once obedient, the word being cognate with Ger. biegsam, flexible, yielding—

"The place where thou and Death Shall dwell at ease, and up and down unseen Wing silently the buxom air." (Paradise Lost, ii. 840.)

An obedient nature is "buxom, blithe and debonair," qualities which affect the physique and result in heartiness of aspect and a comely plumpness. An arch damsel is etymologically akin to an archbishop, both descending from the Greek prefix {archi}, from {arche}, a beginning, first cause. Shakespeare uses arch as a noun—

"The noble duke my master, My worthy arch and patron comes to-night." (Lear, ii. 1.)

Occurring chiefly in such phrases as arch enemy, arch heretic, arch hypocrite, arch rogue, it acquired a depreciatory sense, which has now become so weakened that archness is not altogether an unpleasing attribute. We may compare the cognate German prefix Erz. Ludwig has, as successive entries, Ertz-dieb, "an arch-thief, an arrant thief," and Ertz-engel, "an arch-angel." The meaning of arrant is almost entirely due to association with "thief." It means lit. wandering, vagabond, so that the arrant thief is nearly related to the knight errant, and to the Justices in eyre, Old Fr. eire, Lat. iter, a way, journey. Fr. errer, to wander, stray, is compounded of Vulgar Lat. iterare, to journey, and Lat. errare, to stray, and it would be difficult to calculate how much of each enters into the composition of le Juif errant.

As I have suggested above, association accounts to some extent for changes of meaning, but the process is in reality more complex, and usually a number of factors are working together or in opposition to each other. A low word may gradually acquire right of citizenship. "That article blackguardly called pluck" (Scott) is now much respected. It is the same word as pluck, the heart, liver, and lungs of an animal—

"During the Crimean war, plucky, signifying courageous, seemed likely to become a favourite term in Mayfair, even among the ladies." (HOTTEN'S Slang Dictionary, 1864.)

Having become respectable, it is now replaced in sporting circles by the more emphatic guts, which reproduces the original metaphor. A word may die out in its general sense, surviving only in some special meaning. Thus the poetic sward, scarcely used except with "green," meant originally the skin or crust of anything. It is cognate with Ger. Schwarte, "the sward, or rind, of a thing" (Ludwig), which now means especially bacon-rind. Related words may meet with very different fates in kindred languages. Eng. knight is cognate with Ger. Knecht, servant, which had, in Mid. High German, a wide range of meanings, including "warrior, hero." There is no more complimentary epithet than knightly, while Ger. knechtisch means servile. The degeneration of words like boor,[60] churl, farmer, is a familiar phenomenon (cf. villain, p. 150). The same thing has happened to blackguard, the modern meaning of which bears hardly on a humble but useful class. The name black guard was given collectively to the kitchen detachment of a great man's retinue. The scavenger has also come down in the world, rather an unusual phenomenon in the case of official titles. The medieval scavager[61] was an important official who seems to have been originally a kind of inspector of customs. He was called in Anglo-French scawageour, from the noun scawage, showing. The Old French dialect verb escauwer is of Germanic origin and cognate with Eng. show and Ger. schauen, to look. The cheater, now usually cheat, probably deserved his fate. The escheators looked after escheats, i.e., estates or property that lapsed and were forfeited. The origin of the word is Old Fr. escheoir (echoir), to fall due, Vulgar Lat. ex *cadēre for cadĕre. Their reputation was unsavoury, and cheat has already its present meaning in Shakespeare. He also plays on the double meaning—

"I will be cheater to them both, and they shall be exchequers to me." (Merry Wives, i. 3.)

[Page Heading: CHEAT—BELCHER]

Beldam implies "hag" as early as Shakespeare, but he also uses it in its proper sense of "grandmother," e.g., Hotspur refers to "old beldam earth" and "our grandam earth" in the same speech (1 Henry IV., iii. 1), and Milton speaks of "beldam nature"—

"Then sing of secret things that came to pass When Beldam Nature in her cradle was." (Vacation Exercise, l. 46.)

It is of course from belle-dame, used in Mid. English for grandmother, as belsire was for grandfather. Hence it is a doublet of belladonna. The masculine belsire survives as a family name, Belcher[62]; and to Jim Belcher, most gentlemanly of prize-fighters, we owe the belcher handkerchief, which had large white spots with a dark blue dot in the centre of each on a medium blue ground. It was also known to the "fancy" as a "bird's-eye wipe."

FOOTNOTES:

[52] Archaic Eng. bannal already existed in the technical sense.

[53] This is the usual explanation. But Fr. herse also acquired the meaning "portcullis," the pointed bars of which were naturally likened to the blades of a harrow; and it seems possible that it is to this later sense that we owe the older English meaning of hearse (see p. 154).

[54] "Numquid resina non est in Galaad?" (Vulgate.)

[55] A Spanish word, Lat. stipator, "one that stoppeth chinkes" (Cooper). It came to England in connection with the wool trade.

[56] In "livery and bait" there is pleonasm. Bait, connected with bite, is the same word as in bear-baiting and fishermen's bait. We have it also, via Old French, in abet, whence the aphetic bet, originally to egg on.

[57] Hence the use of stout for a "strong" beer. Porter was once the favourite tap of porters, and a mixture of stout and ale, now known as cooper, was especially relished by the brewery cooper.

[58] Folk-etymology for frontispice, Lat. frontispicium, front view.

[59] Related to, but not identical with, queen.

[60] The older meaning of boor survives in the compound neighbour, i.e., nigh boor, the farmer near at hand. Du. boer is of course the same word.

[61] English regularly inserts n in words thus formed; cf. harbinger, messenger, passenger, pottinger, etc.

[62] Other forms of the same name are Bowser and Bewsher. The form Belcher is Picard—

"On assomma la pauvre bete. Un manant lui coupa le pied droit et la tete. Le seigneur du village a sa porte les mit; Et ce dicton picard a l'entour fut ecrit: 'Biaux chires leups, n'ecoutez mie Mere tenchent (grondant) chen fieux (son fils) qui crie.'" (LA FONTAINE, Fables, iv. 16.)



CHAPTER VII

SEMANTICS

The convenient name semantics has been applied of late to the science of meanings, as distinguished from phonetics, the science of sound. The comparative study of languages enables us to observe and codify the general laws which govern sense development, and to understand why meanings become extended or restricted. One phenomenon which seems to occur normally in language results from what we may call the simplicity of the olden times. Thus the whole vocabulary which is etymologically related to writing and books has developed from an old Germanic verb that means to scratch and the Germanic name for the beech. Our earliest books were wooden tablets on which inscriptions were scratched. The word book itself comes from Anglo-Sax. bōc, beech; cf. Ger. Buchstabe, letter, lit. beech-stave. Lat. liber, book, whence a large family of words in the Romance languages, means the inner bark of a tree, and bible is ultimately from Greek {byblos}, the inner rind of the papyrus, the Egyptian rush from which paper was made.[63]

The earliest measurements were calculated from the human body. All European languages use the foot, and we still measure horses by hands, while span survives in table-books. Cubit is Latin for elbow, the first part of which is the same as ell, cognate with Lat. ulna, also used in both senses. Fr. brasse, fathom, is Lat. brachia, the two arms, and pouce, thumb, means inch. A further set of measures are represented by simple devices: a yard[64] is a small "stick," and the rod, pole, or perch (cf. perch for birds, Fr. perche, pole) which gives charm to our arithmetic is a larger one. A furlong is a furrow-long. For weights common objects were used, e.g., a grain, or a scruple, Lat. scrupulus, "a little sharpe stone falling sometime into a man's shooe" (Cooper), for very small things, a stone for heavier goods. Gk. {drachma}, whence our dram, means a handful. Our decimal system is due to our possession of ten digits, or fingers, and calculation comes from Lat. calculus, a pebble.

[Page Heading: FINANCIAL TERMS]

A modern Chancellor of the Exchequer, considering his budget, is not so near the reality of things as his medieval predecessor, who literally sat in his counting-house, counting up his money. For the exchequer, named from the Old Fr. eschequier (echiquier), chess-board, was once the board marked out in squares on which the treasurer reckoned up with counters the king's taxes. This Old Fr. eschequier, which has also given chequer, is a derivative of Old Fr. eschec (echec), check. Thus "check trousers" and a "chequered career" are both directly related to an eastern potentate (see chess, p. 120.). The chancellor himself was originally a kind of door-keeper in charge of a chancel, a latticed barrier which we now know in church architecture only. Chancel is derived, through Fr. chancel or cancel, from Lat. cancellus, a cross-bar, occurring more usually in the plural in the sense of lattice, grating. We still cancel a document by drawing such a pattern on it. In German cancellus has given Kanzel, pulpit. The budget, now a document in which millions are mere items, was the chancellor's little bag or purse—

"If tinkers may have leave to live, And bear the sow-skin budget, Then my account I well may give, And in the stocks avouch it." (Winter's Tale, iv. 2.)

Fr. bougette, from which it is borrowed, is a diminutive of bouge, a leathern bag, which comes from Lat. bulga, "a male or bouget of leather; a purse; a bagge" (Cooper). Modern French has borrowed back our budget, together with several other words dealing with business and finance.

Among the most important servants of the exchequer were the controllers. We now call them officially comptroller, through a mistaken association with Fr. compte, account. The controller had charge of the counter-rolls (cf. counterfoil), from Old Fr. contre-rolle, "the copy of a role (of accounts, etc.), a paralell of the same quality and content, with the originall" (Cotgrave). In French controle has preserved the sense of supervision or verification which it has lost in ordinary English.

A very ancient functionary of the exchequer, the tally-cutter, was abolished in the reign of George III. Tallies (Fr. tailler, to cut) were sticks "scored" across in such a way that the notches could be compared for purposes of verification. Jack Cade preferred those good old ways—

"Our fore-fathers had no other books but the score and the tally; thou hast caused books to be used." (2 Henry VI., iv. 7.)

This rudimentary method of calculation was still in use in the Kentish hop-gardens within fairly recent times; and some of us can remember very old gentlemen asking us, after a cricket match, how many "notches" we had "scored"—

"The scorers were prepared to notch the runs." (Pickwick, Ch. 7.)

This use of score, for a reckoning in general, or for twenty, occurs in Anglo-Saxon, but the word is Scandinavian. The words score and tally, originally of identical meaning, were soon differentiated, a common phenomenon in such cases. For the exchequer tally was substituted an "indented cheque receipt." An indenture, chiefly familiar to us in connection with apprenticeship, was a duplicate document of which the "indented" or toothed edges had to correspond like the notches of the score or tally. Cheque, earlier check, is identical with check, rebuff. The metaphor is from the game of chess (see p. 120), to check a man's accounts involving a sort of control, or pulling up short, if necessary. A cheque is a method of payment which makes "checking" easy. The modern spelling is due to popular association with exchequer, which is etymologically right, though the words have reached their modern functions by very different paths.

[Page Heading: OFFICIAL TITLES]

The development of the meaning of chancellor can be paralleled in the case of many other functionaries, once humble but now important. The titles of two great medieval officers, the constable and the marshal, mean the same thing. Constable, Old Fr. conestable (connetable), is Lat. comes stabuli, stable fellow. Marshal, the first element of which is cognate with mare, while the second corresponds to modern Ger. Schalk, rascal, expresses the same idea in German. Both constable and marshal are now used of very high positions, but Policeman X. and the farrier-marshal, or shoeing-smith, of a troop of cavalry, remind them of the base degrees by which they did ascend. The Marshalsea where Little Dorrit lived is for marshalsy, marshals' office, etc. The steward, or sty-ward, looked after his master's pigs. He rose in importance until, by the marriage of Marjorie Bruce to Walter the Stewart of Scotland, he founded the most picturesque of royal houses. The chamberlain, as his name suggests, attended to the royal comforts long before he became a judge of wholesome literature.

All these names now stand for a great number of functions of varying importance. Other titles which are equally vague are sergeant (see p. 148) and usher, Old Fr. uissier[65] (huissier), lit. door-keeper, Lat. ostiarius, a porter. Another official was the harbinger, who survives only in poetry. He was a forerunner, or vauntcourier, who preceded the great man to secure him "harbourage" for the night, and his name comes from Old Fr. herberger (heberger), to shelter (see p. 164). As late as the reign of Charles II. we read that—

"On the removal of the court to pass the summer at Winchester, Bishop Ken's house, which he held in the right of his prebend, was marked by the harbinger for the use of Mrs Eleanor Gwyn; but he refused to grant her admittance, and she was forced to seek for lodgings in another place." (HAWKINS, Life of Bishop Ken.)

[Page Heading: PARALLEL METAPHORS]

One of the most interesting branches of semantics, and the most useful to the etymologist, deals with the study of parallel metaphors in different languages. We have seen (p. 29) how, for instance, the names of flowers show that the same likeness has been observed by various races. The spice called clove and the clove-pink both belong to Lat. clavus, a nail. The German for pink is Nelke, a Low German diminutive, nail-kin, of Nagel, nail. The spice, or Gewuerznelke, is called in South Germany Naegele, little nail. A clove of garlic is quite a separate word; but, as it has some interesting cognates, it may be mentioned here. It is so called because the bulb cleaves naturally into segments.[66] The German name is Knoblauch, for Mid. High Ger. klobe-louch, clove-leek, by dissimilation of one l. The Dutch doublet is kloof, a chasm, gully, familiar in South Africa.

Fr. poison, Lat. potio, potion-, a drink, and Ger. Gift, poison, lit. gift, seem to date from treacherous times. On the other hand, Ger. Geschenk, a present, means something poured out (see nuncheon, p. 124), while a tip is in French pourboire and in German Trinkgeld, even when accepted by a lifelong abstainer. In English we "ride a hobby," i.e., a hobby-horse, or wooden horse. German has the same metaphor, "ein Steckenpferd reiten," and French says "enfourcher un dada," i.e., to bestride a gee-gee. Hobby, for Mid. Eng. hobin, a nag, was a proper name for a horse. Like Dobbin and Robin, it belongs to the numerous progeny of Robert.

In some cases the reason for a metaphor is not quite clear to the modern mind. The bloodthirsty weasel is called in French belette,[67] little beauty, in Italian donnola, in Portuguese doninha, little lady, in Spanish comadreja, gossip (Fr. commere, Scot. cummer, p. 94), in Bavarian Schoentierlein, beautiful little animal, in Danish kjoenne, beautiful, and in older English fairy.[68] From Lat. medius we get mediastinus, "a drugge (drudge) or lubber to doe all vile service in the house; a kitching slave" (Cooper). Why this drudge should have a name implying a middle position I cannot say; but to-day in the North of England a maid-of-all-work is called a tweeny (between maid).

A stock semantic parallel occurs in the relation between age and respectability. All of us, as soon as we get to reasonable maturity, lay great stress on the importance of deference to "elders." It follows naturally that many titles of more or less dignity should be evolved from this idea of seniority. The Eng. alderman is obvious. Priest, Old Fr. prestre[69] (pretre), from Gk. {presbyteros}, comparative of {presbys}, old, is not so obvious. In the Romance languages we have a whole group of words, e.g., Fr. sire, sieur, seigneur, Ital. signor, Span. senor, with their compounds monsieur, messer, etc., all representing either senior or seniorem. Ger. Eltern, parents, is the plural comparative of alt, old, and the first element of seneschal (see marshal, p. 90) is cognate with Lat. senex. From Fr. sire comes Eng. sir, and from this was formed the adjective sirly,[70] now spelt surly, which in Shakespeare still means haughty, arrogant—

"See how the surly Warwick mans the wall." (3 Henry VI., v. 1.)

[Page Heading: LIST—MATELOT]

A list, in the sense of enumeration, is a "strip." The cognate German word is Leiste, border. We have the original meaning in "list slippers." Fr. bordereau, a list, which became very familiar in connection with the Dreyfus case, is a diminutive of bord, edge. Label is the same word as Old Fr. lambel (lambeau), rag. Scroll is an alteration, perhaps due to roll, of Mid. Eng. scrow or escrow, from Old Fr. escroue,[71] rag, shred. Docket, earlier dogget, is from an old Italian diminutive of doga, cask-stave, which meant a bendlet in heraldry. Schedule is a diminutive of Lat. scheda, "a scrowe" (Cooper), properly a strip of papyrus. Ger. Zettel, bill, ticket, is the same word. Thus all these words, more or less kindred in meaning, can be reduced to the primitive notion of strip or scrap.

Farce, from French, means stuffing. The verb to farce, which represents Lat. farcire, survives in the perverted force-meat. A parallel is satire, from Lat. satura (lanx), a full dish, hence a medley. Somewhat similar is the modern meaning of magazine, a "store-house" of amusement or information.

The closest form of intimacy is represented by community of board and lodging, or, in older phraseology, "bed and board." Companion, with its related words, belongs to Vulgar Lat. *companio, companion-, bread-sharer. The same idea is represented by the pleonastic Eng. messmate, the second part of which, mate, is related to meat. Mess, food, Old Fr. mes (mets), Lat. missum, is in modern English only military or naval, but was once the usual name for a dish of food—

"Herbs and other country messes Which the neat-handed Phillis dresses." (Allegro, l. 85.)

With mate we may compare Fr. matelot, earlier matenot, representing Du. maat, meat, and genoot, a companion. The latter word is cognate with Ger. Genosse, a companion, from geniessen, to enjoy or use together. In early Dutch we find also mattegenoet, through popular association with matte, hammock, one hammock serving, by a Box and Cox arrangement, for two sailors.

Comrade is from Fr. camarade, and this from Span. camarada, originally a "room-full," called in the French army une chambree. This corresponds to Ger. Geselle, comrade, from Saal, room. The reduction of the collective to the individual is paralleled by Ger. Bursche, fellow, from Mid. High Ger. burse, college hostel; cf. Frauenzimmer, wench, lit. women's room. It can hardly be doubted that chum is a corrupted clip from chamber-fellow.[72] It is thus explained in a Dictionary of the Canting Crew (1690), within a few years of its earliest recorded occurrence, and the reader will remember Mr Pickwick's introduction to the chummage system in the Fleet (Ch. 42).

[Page Heading: CUMMER—GREENHORN]

English gossip, earlier god-sib, related in God, a sponsor, soon developed the subsidiary meanings of boon companion, crony, tippler, babbler, etc., all of which are represented in Shakespeare. The case of Fr. compere and commere, godfather and godmother, is similar. Cotgrave explains commerage as "gossiping; the acquaintance, affinity, or league that growes betweene women by christning a child together, or one for another." Ger. Gevatter, godfather, has also acquired the sense of Fr. bonhomme (p. 80), Eng. daddy. From commere comes Scot. cummer or kimmer—

"A canty quean was Kate, and a special cummer of my ain." (Monastery, Ch. 8.)

While christenings led to cheerful garrulity, the wilder fun of weddings has given the Fr. faire la noce, to go on the spree. In Ger. Hochzeit, wedding, lit. high time, we have a converse development of meaning.

Parallel sense development in different languages sometimes gives us a glimpse of the life of our ancestors. Our verb to curry (leather) comes from Old Fr. correer[73] (courroyer), to make ready, put in order, which represents a theoretical *con-red-are, the root syllable of which is Germanic and cognate with our ready. Ger. gerben, to tan, Old High Ger. garawen, to make ready, is a derivative of gar, ready, complete, now used only as an adverb meaning "quite," but cognate with our yare—

"Our ship— Which, but three glasses since, we gave out split— Is tight, and yare, and bravely rigg'd." (Tempest, v. 1.)

Both curry and gerben must have acquired their restricted meaning at a time when there was literally nothing like leather.

Even in slang we find the same parallelism exemplified. We call an old-fashioned watch a turnip. In German it is called Zwiebel, onion, and in French oignon. Eng. greenhorn likens an inexperienced person to an animal whose horns have just begun to sprout. In Ger. Gelbschnabel, yellow-bill, and Fr. bec-jaune, we have the metaphor of the fledgling. Ludwig explains Gelbschnabel by "chitty-face," chit, cognate with kit-ten, being a general term in Mid. English for a young animal. From bec-jaune we have archaic Scot. beejam, university freshman. Cotgrave spells the French word bejaune, and gives, as he usually does for such words,[74] a very full gloss, which happens, by exception, to be quotable—

"A novice; a late prentice to, or young beginner in, a trade, or art; also, a simple, ignorant, unexperienced, asse; a rude, unfashioned, home-bred hoydon; a sot, ninny, doult, noddy; one that's blankt, and hath nought to say, when he hath most need to speake."

The Englishman intimates that a thing has ceased to please by saying that he is "fed up" with it. The Frenchman says, "J'en ai soupe." Both these metaphors are quite modern, but they express in flippant form the same figure of physical satiety which is as old as language. Padding is a comparatively new word in connection with literary composition, but it reproduces, with a slightly different meaning, the figure expressed by bombast, lit. wadding, a derivative of Greco-Lat. bombyx, originally "silk-worm," whence also bombasine. We may compare also "fustian eloquence"—

"And he, whose fustian's so sublimely bad, It is not poetry, but prose run mad." (POPE, Prologue to the Satires, l. 187.)

And a very similar image is found in the Latin poet Ausonius—

"At nos illepidum, rudem libellum, Burras, quisquilias ineptiasque Credemus gremio cui fovendum?" (Drepanio Filio.)

Even to "take the cake" is paralleled by the Gk. {labein ton pyramounta}, to be awarded the cake of roasted wheat and honey which was originally the prize of him who best kept awake during a night-watch.

In the proverbial expressions which contain the concentrated wisdom of the ages we sometimes find exact correspondences. Thus "to look a gift-horse in the mouth" is literally reproduced in French and German. Sometimes the symbols vary, e.g., the risk one is exposed to in acquiring goods without examination is called by us "buying a pig in a poke."[75] French and German substitute the cat. We say that "a cat may look at a king." The French dramatis personae are a dog and a bishop. The "bird in hand" which we regard as the equivalent of two in the bush is in German compared advantageously with ten on the roof.

[Page Heading: NAUTICAL METAPHOR]

Every language has an immense number of metaphors to describe the various stages of intoxication. We, as a seafaring nation, have naturally a set of such metaphors taken from nautical English. In French and German the state of being "half-seas over" or "three sheets in the wind," and the practice of "splicing the main-brace" are expressed by various land metaphors. But the more obvious nautical figures are common property. We speak of being stranded; French says "echouer (to run ashore) dans une entreprise," and German uses scheitern, to strand, split on a rock, in the same way.

Finally, we observe the same principle in euphemism, or that form of speech which avoids calling things by their names. Euphemism is the result of various human instincts which range from religious reverence down to common decency. There is, however, a special type of euphemism which may be described as the delicacy of the partially educated. It is a matter of common observation that for educated people a spade is a spade, while the more outspoken class prefers to call it a decorated shovel. Between these two classes come those delicate beings whose work in life is—

"le retranchement de ces syllabes sales Qui dans les plus beaux mots produisent des scandales; Ces jouets eternels des sots de tous les temps; Ces fades lieux-communs de nos mechants plaisants; Ces sources d'un amas d'equivoques infames, Dont on vient faire insulte a la pudeur des femmes." (MOLIERE, Les Femmes savantes, iii. 2.)

In the United States refined society has succeeded in banning as improper the word leg, which must now be replaced by limb, even when the possessor is a boiled fowl, and this refinement is not unknown in England. The coloured ladies of Barbados appear to have been equally sensitive—

"Fate had placed me opposite to a fine turkey. I asked my partner if I should have the pleasure of helping her to a piece of the breast. She looked at me indignantly, and said, 'Curse your impudence, sar; I wonder where you larn manners. Sar, I take a lilly turkey bosom, if you please.'" (Peter Simple, Ch. 31.)

This tendency shows itself especially in connection with the more intimate garments and articles intended for personal use. We have the absurd name pocket handkerchief, i.e., pocket hand-cover-head, for a comparatively modern convenience, the earlier names of which have more of the directness of the Artful Dodger's "wipe." Ben Jonson calls it a muckinder. In 1829 the use of the word mouchoir in a French adaptation of Othello caused a riot at the Comedie Francaise. History repeats itself, for, in 1907, a play by J. M. Synge was produced in Dublin, but—

"The audience broke up in disorder at the word shift." (Academy, 14th Oct. 1911.)

This is all the more ludicrous when we reflect that shift, i.e. change of raiment, is itself an early euphemism for smock; cf. Ital. mutande, "thinne under-breeches" (Florio), from a country and century not usually regarded as prudish. The fact is that, just as the low word, when once accepted, loses its primitive vigour (see pluck, p. 83), the euphemism is, by inevitable association, doomed from its very birth.

[Page Heading: SEMANTIC ETYMOLOGY]

I will now give a few examples of the way in which the study of semantics helps the etymologist. The antlers of a deer are properly the lowest branches of the horns, what we now call brow-antlers. The word comes from Old Fr. antoilliers, which answers phonetically to a conjectured Lat. *ante-oculares, from oculus, eye. This conjecture is confirmed by the Ger. Augensprosse, brow-antler, lit. eye-sprout.

Eng. plover, from Fr. pluvier, could come from a Vulgar Lat. *pluviarius, belonging to rain. The German name Regenpfeifer, lit. rain-piper, shows this to be correct. It does not matter, etymologically, whether the bird really has any connection with rain, for rustic observation, interesting as it is, is essentially unscientific. The honeysuckle is useless to the bee. The slow-worm, which appears to be for slay-worm, strike-serpent,[76] is perfectly harmless, and the toad, though ugly, is not venomous, nor does he bear a jewel in his head.

Kestrel, a kind of hawk, represents Old Fr. quercerelle (crecerelle), "a kastrell" (Cotgrave). Crecerelle is a diminutive of crecelle, a rattle, used in Old French especially of the leper's rattle or clapper, with which he warned people away from his neighbourhood. It is connected with Lat. crepare, to resound. The Latin name for the kestrel is tinnunculus, lit. a little ringer, derived from the verb tinnire, to clink, jingle, "tintinnabulate." Cooper tells us that "they use to set them (kestrels) in pigeon houses, to make doves to love the place, bicause they feare away other haukes with their ringing voyce." This information is obtained from the Latin agriculturist Columella. This parallel makes it clear that Fr. crecerelle, kestrel, is a metaphorical application of the same word, meaning a leper's "clicket."

The curious word akimbo occurs first in Mid. English in the form in kenebowe. In half a dozen languages we find this attitude expressed by the figure of a jug-handle, or, as it used to be called, a pot-ear. The oldest equivalent is Lat. ansatus, used by Plautus, from ansa, a jug-handle. Ansatus homo is explained by Cooper as "a man with his arms on kenbow." Archaic French for to stand with arms akimbo is "faire le pot a deux anses," and the same striking image occurs in German, Dutch, and Spanish. Hence it seems a plausible conjecture that kenebowe means "jug-handle." This is confirmed by the fact that Dryden translates ansa, "the eare or handle of a cuppe or pot" (Cooper), by "kimbo handle" (Vergil, Ecl. iii. 44). Eng. bow, meaning anything bent, is used in many connections for handle. The first element may be can, applied to every description of vessel in earlier English, as it still is in Scottish, or it may be some Scandinavian word. In fact the whole compound may be Scandinavian. Thomas' Latin Dictionary (1644) explains ansatus homo as "one that in bragging manner strowteth up and down with his armes a-canne-bow."

[Page Heading: DEMURE—LUGGER]

Demure has been explained as from Mid. Eng. mure, ripe, mature, with prefixed de. But demure is the older word of the two, and while the loss of the atonic first syllable is normal in English (p. 61), it would be hard to find a case in which a meaningless prefix has been added. Nor does the meaning of demure approximate very closely to that of ripe. It now has a suggestion of slyness, but in Milton's time meant sedate—

"Come, pensive nun, devout and pure, Sober, stedfast, and demure." (Penseroso, l. 31.)

and its oldest meaning is calm, settled, used of the sea. When we consider that it is nearly equivalent to staid, earlier stayed, and compare the equivalent terms in other languages, e.g., Lat. sedatus, Fr. rassis, Ger. gesetzt, etc., it seems likely that it is formed from the Old Norman demurer (demeurer), to "stay," just as stale is formed from Old Fr. estaler (etaler), to display on a stall, or trove, in "treasure trove," from Old Fr. trover (trouver).

The origin of lugger is unknown, but the word is recorded a century later than lugsail, whence it is probably derived. The explanation of lugsail as a sail that is lugged seems to be a piece of folk-etymology. The French for lugsail is voile de fortune, and a still earlier name, which occurs also in Tudor English, is bonaventure, i.e., good luck. Hence it is not unreasonable to conjecture that lugsail stands for *luck-sail, just as the name Higson stands for Hickson (see p. 172).

The pips on cards or dice have nothing to do with apple pips. The oldest spelling is peeps. In the Germanic languages they are called "eyes," and in the Romance languages "points"; and the Romance derivatives of Lat. punctus, point, also mean "peep of day." Hence the peeps are connected with the verb to peep.

The game called dominoes is French, and the name is taken from the phrase faire domino, to win the game. Domino, a hooded cloak worn by priests in winter, is an Italian word, apparently connected with Lat. dominus. French also has, in various games, the phrase faire capot, with a meaning like that of faire domino. Capot, related to Eng. cap and Fr. chapeau, means properly a hooded cloak. The two metaphors are quite parallel, but it is impossible to say what was the original idea. Perhaps it was that of extinguishing the opponent by putting, as it were, his head in a bag.

The card game called gleek is often mentioned in Tudor literature. It is derived from Old Fr. glic, used by Rabelais, and the word is very common in the works of the more disreputable French poets of the 15th century. According to French archaeologists the game was also called bonheur, chance, fortune, and hasard. Hence glic represents in all probability Ger. Glueck, luck.[77] The Old French form ghelicque would correspond to Mid. High Ger. geluecke. The history of tennis (p. 10) and trump (p. 9) shows that it is not necessary to find the German word recorded in the same sense.

[Page Heading: SENTRY]

The word sentry, which occurs in English only, has no connection at all with sentinel, the earliest form of which is Ital. sentinella, of unknown origin. The older lexicographers obscured the etymology of sentry, which is really quite simple, by always attempting to treat it along with sentinel. It is a common phenomenon in military language that the abstract name of an action is applied to the building or station in which the action is performed, then to the group of men thus employed, and finally to the individual soldier. Thus Lat. custodia means (1) guardianship, (2) a ward-room, watch-tower, (3) the watch collectively, (4) a watchman. Fr. vigie, the look-out man on board ship, can be traced back in a similar series of meanings to Lat. vigilia, watching.[78] A sentry, now a single soldier, was formerly a band of soldiers—

"What strength, what art can then Suffice, or what evasion bear him safe Through the strict senteries and stations thick Of angels watching round?" (Paradise Lost, ii. 410.)

and earlier still a watch-tower, e.g., Cotgrave explains Old Fr. eschauguette (echauguette) as "a sentrie, watch-tower, beacon." The purely abstract sense survives in the phrase "to keep sentry" i.e. guard—

"Here toils, and Death, and Death's half-brother, Sleep, Forms terrible to view their centry[79] keep." (DRYDEN, AEneid, vi. 277.)

It is a contracted form of sanctuary. In the 17th century it is a pretty familiar word in this sense.[79] The earliest example I have come across is in Nashe—

"He hath no way now to slyppe out of my hands, but to take sentrie in the Hospital of Warwick." (First Part of PASQUIL'S Apologie, 1590.)

Fr. guerite, a sentry box, can be traced back in the same way to Old Fr. garir (guerir), to save. Cotgrave explains it as "a place of refuge, and of safe retyrall," also "a sentrie, or little lodge for a sentinell, built on high." It is to this latter sense that we owe Eng. garret. In medieval French guerite means refuge, sanctuary—

"Ceste roche est Ihesucrist meismes qui est li refuges et la garite aus humbles."[80]

If French had not borrowed sentinelle from Italian, guerite would probably now mean "sentry"; cf. the history of vigie (p. 103), or of vedette, a cavalry sentry, but originally "a prying or peeping hole" (Florio), from Ital. vedere, to see.

FOOTNOTES:

[63] Parchment (see p. 49) was invented as a substitute when the supply of papyrus failed.

[64] The "stick" meaning survives in the yards of a ship. Yard was once the general word for rod, wand. Thus the "cheating yardwand" of Tennyson's "smooth-faced snubnosed rogue" (Maud, I. i. 16) is a pleonasm of the same type as greyhound (p. 135). Yard, an enclosure, is a separate word, related to garden. The doublet garth, used in the Eastern counties, is of Scandinavian origin—

"I climb'd to the top of the garth, and stood by the road at the gate." (TENNYSON, The Grandmother, l. 38.)

[65] As Old Fr. uissier has given usher, I would suggest that the family names Lush and Lusher, which Bardsley (Dict. of English Surnames) gives up, are for Old Fr. l'uis (cf. Laporte) and l'uissier. In modern French Lhuissier is not an uncommon name.

[66] The onion, Fr. oignon, Lat. unio, union-, is so named because successive skins form an harmonious one-ness. It is a doublet of union.

[67] Perhaps a diminutive of Cymric bele, marten, but felt as from Fr. belle.

[68] Dozens of similar names for the weasel could be collected from the European languages and dialects. It is probable that these complimentary names were propitiatory, the weasel being an animal regarded with superstitious dread.

[69] Cf. Prester John, the fabulous priest monarch of Ethiopia.

[70] Cf. lordly, princely, etc., and Ger. herrisch, imperious, from Herr, sir.

[71] Modern Fr. ecrou is used only in the sense of prison register.

[72] The vowel is not so great a difficulty as it might appear, and we actually have the same change in comrade itself, formerly pronounced cumrade. In the London pronunciation the u of such words as but, cup, hurry, etc., represents roughly a continental short a. This fact, familiar to phoneticians but disbelieved by others, is one of the first peculiarities noted by foreigners beginning to learn English. It is quite possible that chum is an accidental spelling for *cham, just as we write bungalow for bangla (Bengal), pundit for pandit, and Punjaub for Panjab, five rivers, whence also probably the liquid called punch, from its five ingredients. Cf. also American to slug, i.e. to slog, which appears to represent Du. slag, blow—"That was for slugging the guard" (Kipling, An Error in the Fourth Dimension)—and the adjective bluff, from obsolete Du. blaf, broad-faced.

[73] Array, Old Fr. arreer, is related.

[74] This is a characteristic of the old dictionary makers. The gem of my collection is Ludwig's gloss for Luemmel, "a long lubber, a lazy lubber, a slouch, a lordant, a lordane, a looby, a booby, a tony, a fop, a dunce, a simpleton, a wise-acre, a sot, a logger-head, a block-head, a nickampoop, a lingerer, a drowsy or dreaming lusk, a pill-garlick, a slowback, a lathback, a pitiful sneaking fellow, a lungis, a tall slim fellow, a slim longback, a great he-fellow, a lubberly fellow, a lozel, an awkward fellow."

[75] Poke, sack, is still common in dialect, e.g. in the Kentish hop-gardens. It is a doublet of pouch, and its diminutive is pocket.