More fun from my dictionary editing! To begin with, two pairs of homonyms that one might think had the same Greek origins but that come from words with different vowel lengths:
colon 'part of the large intestine' goes back to Greek κόλον [kolon], but colon 'punctuation mark (:); rhythmical unit' is from κῶλον [kōlon] 'limb; part of a strophe.'
coma 'cloud of gas and dust around a comet; optical aberration' goes back to Greek κόμη [komē] 'hair,' but coma 'state of unconsciousness' derives from κῶμα [kōma] 'deep sleep.'
colporteur 'peddler' is straight from an identical French word, but that in turn is from Old French comporteur, someone who "comports" in the etymological sense, carrying things with them (comporter from Latin com-portare 'carry with'); the American Heritage Dictionary says that it's "influenced by col, neck, from the idea that peddlers carry their wares on trays suspended from straps around their necks."
Finally, a funny-sounding word that looks like it should be Latin but in fact has no known etymology: colugo, a kind of flying lemur.
Oh, and I keep forgetting to mention that MMcM at Polyglot Vegetarian, after months of radio silence, has burst out with three new posts, Pineapple, Zapiekanki, and Bhut Jolokia; hie thee thither for more multilingual etymology than you can shake a stick at!
Posted by languagehat at March 5, 2010 02:12 PMEnglish 'much' and Spanish 'mucho,' often assumed to come from the same word, come from different PIE roots, I've heard.
much - PIE *meg- "great."
mucho - PIE *mel- "strong, great, numerous"
Posted by: Marc at March 5, 2010 02:41 PMCole Porter, on the other hand, came from Peru.
Posted by: Q. Pheevr at March 5, 2010 03:06 PMI was going to suggest forming a committee to assign etymologies to words which don't have them. But then I realized that an an informal volunteer system has been doing this job all too well for centuries. (Is this the surplus of the signifier? I've never been able to figure it out.)
Posted by: John Emerson at March 5, 2010 03:43 PM'the American Heritage Dictionary says that it's "influenced by col, neck, from the idea that peddlers carry their wares on trays suspended from straps around their necks.'
A French eggcorn?
Posted by: Bill Walderman at March 5, 2010 03:52 PMThe "French eggcorn" may have become standard with that meaning in order to keep the activity of the pedlar distinct from the verb comporter 'to include' or se comporter 'to behave (in a certain way)'.
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 5, 2010 07:34 PM... And if you think Pineapple is interesting, try Peanut; if you check out M's links there's enough obscure information to keep you reading all weekend (in a good way).
Posted by: A.J.P. Crown at March 5, 2010 08:54 PMCan you tell us what the book is, Hat? Or is that a trade secret? Sounds interesting!
Posted by: mab at March 6, 2010 04:03 AMκόμη is Greek for hair? presumably the cloud looks like a covering of hair-from which comet, it seems.
And the story of the name of constellation Coma Berenices is quite appealing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coma_Berenices
Posted by: Gremin at March 6, 2010 05:31 AMCan you tell us what the book is, Hat? Or is that a trade secret?
I'd rather not name the book, but it's just a new edition of a dictionary that's been around for a while. Any dictionary that has etymologies makes for an interesting read!
Posted by: language hat at March 6, 2010 09:02 AMκόμη is Greek for hair?
Yes, and that definition should have been in the post, so I've added it—thanks for reminding me.
Posted by: language hat at March 6, 2010 09:05 AMthe cloud looks like a covering of hair
It is rather the "tail" which looks like long hair streaming behind the "head".
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 6, 2010 09:44 AMAKA "mare's tail" clouds, a type of cirrus presaging rain.
Posted by: J. Del Col at March 6, 2010 10:38 AMJDC, would you use this expression in the context of a comet?
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 6, 2010 11:36 AMInteresting that the wikipedia article quoted shows no knowledge of the literary history of berenice's hair. The poem by Callimachus about the debacle was considered important enough to become the basis for one of the few direct Latin translations (by Catulllus) of major Greek poems that we have.
Posted by: Gary at March 6, 2010 04:26 PMI wrote about it here.
Posted by: language hat at March 6, 2010 06:36 PMOh, Languagehat, is there anything you haven't written about??
Posted by: Chorus of LH Readers at March 6, 2010 06:38 PMYes, yes, my children, I have many marvels yet to share with you!
Posted by: language hat at March 6, 2010 06:38 PMthe wikipedia article quoted shows no knowledge of the literary history of berenice's hair
Some wikipedia articles are translations from each other, but many are not, or perhaps they get to be different because additional writers add different details or rewrite differently from an original article.
I checked the English, French, Spanish, Italian and German versions by looking up "Berenice's Hair" and then the list of languages. Only the English version says that Berenice had blond hair, for instance. The other versions, although agreeing on the basic story, are all slightly different in wording or in details. Most of them tell the story at the beginning of the article, but the German version tells it towards the end. On the other hand, only the German version mentions both Callimachus and Catullus (briefly), and only the Spanish version gives a translation of Callimachus' poem (written from the point of view of the hair).
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 6, 2010 07:11 PMThe Counter-Reformation had problems with pagan women's hair and Julius Schiller has it as the gruesome (cherub notwithstanding) Flagelli ☧i.
Posted by: MMcM at March 6, 2010 08:24 PMthe gruesome (cherub notwithstanding) Flagelli
It seems slightly hermaphroditic, by pictorial convention. The right breast is flat as on a man, the left breast appears to be female. It's the left hand that holds the whip, Nietzsche notwithstanding.
Is ☧i a siglum for pinxit ?
Posted by: Grumbly Stu at March 7, 2010 12:53 AMChi Rho, for Christi (I confess I made it a ligature: he had Χ Ρ Ι). Look at the text on the preceding page.
Posted by: MMcM at March 7, 2010 01:01 AMI see. FLAGELLIXRI Salvatoris in the heading of that page is supposed to be
Flagelli Christi salvatorisas it is farther down. The printer apparently ran out of spacing leads.
I feel a sudden uncontrollable urge to have my carpets cleaned, and we don't even have any carpets.
Posted by: John Emerson at March 7, 2010 07:55 AM(I just deleted a bunch of carpet-related spam, in case anyone is wondering what John is talking about.)
Posted by: language hat at March 7, 2010 08:34 AMThe cherub's left hand is not wielding the scourge in a menacing manner, just holding it like a toy while his right arm makes some sort of happy gesture (his expression seems to say "hey, look what I found!"). I don't find him hermaphroditic: the right breast does not look to me quite like a woman's but more like a fat baby's, or something in between (the line looks like it has been corrected), and the left one seems to have been just forgotten by the engraver (or his apprentice working on the minor details). The background figures of constellations seem to be by another hand altogether.
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 7, 2010 09:19 AMIs that a flying carpet?
Posted by: Trond Engen at March 7, 2010 09:23 AMI wrote about it here. Well of course you did, LH. That's one of the great things about this place.
I was just commenting on wikipedia's rigid devotion to a late mythographer, who seems to have introduced the confusion the wikipedia entry natters on about, without any sign that the authors know that the sources of the mythographer are extant. I don't imagine (and certainly didn't intend to imply) that you were unaware of the literary history.
Posted by: Gary at March 7, 2010 10:40 AMI was unaware of the literary history, so I am glad that Mr Hat mentioned it again.
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 7, 2010 11:14 AMI always used to drive around with our old parrot. Now I just take the dogs, unless it's an emergency.
Posted by: AJP Crown at March 7, 2010 01:19 PMMarie-Lucie:
No, I completely misread the context. Sorry.
Posted by: j. del col at March 8, 2010 04:53 PMEmergency, as in going to the Polly clinic?
Posted by: Trond Engen at March 8, 2010 06:40 PMFrom this comment I deduced the existence of a word "polyclinic".
Googling it, I found that it is in fact some kind of clinic or hospital. Who knew? We don't seem to have that word here.
Posted by: Ø at March 8, 2010 08:13 PMIn Canada a "clinic" usually specializes in a particular kind of disease or condition, so a "polyclinic" is more comprehensive, but it does not provide all the services of a hospital.
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 8, 2010 08:51 PMso a "polyclinic" is more comprehensive
...and in fact it's a policlinic, from pólis "city". Or so I hear.
Posted by: David Marjanović at March 9, 2010 05:12 PMI saw it spelled both ways. Two dictionary entries with etymology:
I'd bet on the latter, mainly because it agrees with David (who knows everything), but also because it gives some supporting detail: that poliklinik existed in German in the 1820's.
Posted by: Ø at March 9, 2010 05:47 PMThey've always been kind to parrots in Tyskland.
Posted by: A.J.P. Heavy Traffic at March 9, 2010 06:10 PMIn English I have only seen polyclinic, but I am only familiar with the English Canadian context.
Posted by: marie-lucie at March 9, 2010 06:23 PMNorwegian Blue?
Posted by: John Emerson at March 9, 2010 08:27 PMI've just realised that Norwegian Blue must have been some kind of play on Danish blue, which was a popular cheese in the sixties (Cleese's father having changed his name from Cheese).
Posted by: A. J. P. Crown at March 11, 2010 04:27 AM