Monthly etymology gleanings for July 2014

By Anatoly Liberman

Given that I’ll be out of city at the conclude of July, I was not sure I would be in a position to publish these “gleanings.” But the queries have been a lot of, and I could solution some of them ahead of time.

Autumn: its etymology

Our correspondent miracles irrespective of whether the Latin word from which English, by way of French, has autumn, could be recognized with the name of the Egyptian god Autun. The Romans derived the phrase autumnus, which was each an adjective (“autumnal”) and a noun (“autumn”), from augere “to raise.” This verb’s excellent participle is auctus “rich (“autumn as a prosperous season”). The Roman derivation, though not implausible, looks like a tribute to folks etymology. A far more critical conjecture allies autumn to the Germanic root aud-, as in Gothic aud–ags “blessed” (in the connected languages, also “rich”). But, much more likely, Latin autumnus goes again to Etruscan. The primary argument for the Etruscan origin is the resemblance of autumnus to Vertumnus, the name of a seasonal deity (or so it appears), about whom tiny is recognized moreover the tale of his seduction, in the form of an previous female, of Pomona, as advised by Ovid. Vertumnus, or Vortumnus, might be a Latinized variety of an Etruscan identify. A definite summary about autumnus is barely achievable, even though some sources, though tracing this phrase to Etruscan, incorporate “without question.” The Egyptian Autun was a generation god and the god of the setting sunlight, so that his relationship with autumn is remote at best. Nor do we have any proof that Autun had a cult in Historic Rome. Every little thing is so unsure here that the origin of autumnus ought to needs continue being unfamiliar. In my opinion, the Egyptian hypothesis retains out little guarantee.

The origin of so extended

I been given an attention-grabbing letter from Mr. Paul Nance. He writes about so extensive:

“It looks the kind of expression that really should have derived from some fuller social nicety, these as I regret that it will be so extended prior to we satisfy again or the like, but no a person has proposed a crystal clear antecedent. An oddity is its unexpected physical appearance in the early nineteenth century there are only a handful of sightings prior to Walt Whitman’s use of it in a poem (together with the title) in the 1860-1861 version of Leaves of Grass. I can, by the way, offer you an antedating to the OED citations: so, fantastic bye, so long in the tale ‘Cruise of a Guinean Man’. Knickerbocker: New York (Regular monthly Journal 5, February 1835, p. 105 readily available on Google Publications). Provided the absence of a fuller antecedent, tips as to its origin all suggest a borrowing from a further language. Does this appear to be acceptable to you?”

Mr. Nance was variety sufficient to append two article content (by Alan S. Kaye and Joachim Grzega) on so extended, each of which I experienced in my folders but have not reread because 2004 and 2005, when I identified and copied them. Grzega’s contribution is especially detailed. My databases contains only one more very small remark on so lengthy by Frank Penny: “About twenty several years back I was knowledgeable that it [the expression so long] is allied to Samuel Pepys’s expression so household, and should be composed so alongside or so ’long, this means that the man or woman using the expression need to go his way” (Notes and Queries, Collection 12, vol. IX, 1921, p. 419). The group so property does turn up in the Diary more than once, but no citation I could come across appears to be like a method. Maybe Stephen Goranson will ferret it out. In any case, so prolonged appears like an Americanism, and it is unlikely that such a common phrase need to have remained dormant in texts for practically two generations.

Be that as it could, I concur with Mr. Nance that a method of this form probably arose in civil dialogue. The quite a few tries to obtain a foreign resource for it carry very little conviction. Norwegian does have an almost identical phrase, but, given that its antecedents are unidentified, it may well have been borrowed from English. I suspect (a preferred turn of speech by outdated etymologists) that so prolonged is in truth a curtailed version of a at the time much more comprehensible parting formula, until it belongs with the likes of for auld lang sine. It may perhaps have been brought to the New World from England or Scotland and later abbreviated and reinterpreted.

“Heavy rain” in languages other than English

The moment I wrote a post titled “When it rains, it does not essentially pour.” There I mentioned numerous German and Swedish idioms like it is raining cats and canine, and, somewhat than recycling that text, will refer our previous correspondent Mr. John Larsson to it.

Ukraine and Baltic put names

The comment on this make a difference was welcome. In my reaction, I favored not to speak about the things alien to me, but I wondered regardless of whether the Latvian location identify could be of Slavic origin. That is why I said cautiously: “If this is a indigenous Latvian word…” The issue, as I fully grasp, remains unanswered, but the recommendation is tempting. And yes, of study course, Serb/Croat Krajna is an precise counterpart of Ukraina, only without the need of a prefix. In Russian, strain falls on i in Ukrainian, I consider, the 1st a is stressed. The same retains for the derived adjectives: ukrainskii ~ ukrainskii. Pushkin claimed ukrainskaia (feminine).

Slough, sloo, and the rest

Quite a few thanks to these who knowledgeable me about their pronunciation of slough “mire.” It was new to me that the surname Slough is pronounced differently in England and the United States. I also obtained a problem about the history of slew. The earlier tense of slay (Aged Engl. slahan) was sloh (with a prolonged vowel), and this variety developed like scoh “shoe,” although the verb vacillated among the 6th and the 7th class. The simple fact that slew and shoe have this sort of dissimilar published kinds is thanks to the vagaries of English spelling. A person can consider of too, who, you, group, fruit, cruise, rheum, truth, and true, which have the very same vowel as slew. In addition, take into consideration Bruin and ruin, which search deceptively like fruit, and add maleoeuver for excellent measure. A delicate spelling reform appears like a superior concept, does not it?

The pronunciation of February

In a person of the letters I acquired, the author expresses her indignation that some individuals insist on sounding the first r in February. Most people, she asserts, says Febyooary. In this kind of matters, everybody is a harmful phrase (as we will also see from the subsequent product). All of us tend to think that what we say is the only correct norm. Text with the succession r…r are inclined to reduce a person of them. But library is more generally pronounced with the two, and Drury, brewery, and prurient have withstood the inclination. February has changed its variety a lot of periods. Hence, very long ago feverer (from Outdated French) became feverel (perhaps underneath the impact of averel “April”). In the more mature language of New England, January and February turned into Janry and Febry. Having said that powerful the phonetic forces may possibly have been in impacting the pronunciation of February, of wonderful worth was also the simple fact that the names of the months frequently occur in enumeration. With no the initial r, January and February rhyme. A identical problem is properly-known from the etymology of some numerals. Though the pronunciation Febyooary is similarly popular on the two sides of the Atlantic and is identified as regular all over the English-speaking entire world, not “everybody” has approved it. The consonant b in February is due to the Latinization of the French etymon (late Latin februarius).

Who vs . whom

Dialogue of these pronouns misplaced all fascination very long ago, simply because the confusion of who and whom and the defeat of whom in American English go again to outdated times. But I am not confident that what I reported about the educated norm is “nonsense.” Who will marry our son? Whom will our son marry? Is it “nonsense” to distinguish them, and should really (or only can) it be who in each instances? Irrespective of the rebuke, I believe that that even in Modern day American English the woman who we visited will not put up with if who is changed with whom. But, contrary to my opponent, I acknowledge that tastes vary.

Wrap

Yet another concern I acquired was about the origin of the verb wrap. This is a instead extended story, and I made the decision to commit a exclusive publish to it in the foreseeable upcoming.

PS. I observe that of the two issues questioned by our correspondent previous thirty day period only copacetic captivated some focus (go through Stephen Goranson’s response). But what about hubba hubba?

Anatoly Liberman is the creator of Term Origins And How We Know Them as well as An Analytic Dictionary of English Etymology: An Introduction. His column on term origins, The Oxford Etymologist, appears on the OUPblog each individual Wednesday. Send out your etymology problem to him care of [email protected] he’ll do his finest to stay away from responding with “origin unidentified.” Subscribe to Anatoly Liberman’s weekly etymology content articles via email or RSS.

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