text:
Wiktionary:Etymology scriptorium/2020/April

coronavirus
Our etymology first says this is from (as in stellar corona) and then says it's from  (referring to the crown-like spikes). Which is it? I've more often heard the second explanation. See also the question on the talk page about whether this compound was formed in English or derives from the old genus name (or the other way round). - -sche (discuss) 01:35, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't have access to the 1968 Nature paper but that seems like a good place to start looking. DTLHS (talk) 01:37, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Found it: "Particles are more or less rounded in profile; although there is a certain amount of poly-morphism, there is also a characteristic "fringe" of projections 200 A long, which are rounded or petal shaped, rather than sharp or pointed, as in the myxoviruses. This appearance, recalling the solar corona, is shared by mouse hepatitis virus and several viruses recently recovered from man, namely strain B814, 229E and several others." DTLHS (talk) 04:39, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
 * It was correct until fairly recently. --Lambiam 07:21, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

🇨🇬
Any ideas on this one? It's apparently cognate with the Gaulish source of the tribe, but I can't find it in any etymological dictionaries... DJ K-Çel (talk) 00:24, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Can you please stop working on Celtic tribe name etymologies, thanks. -- 00:44, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

like, once again
After the etymologies for like were consolidated, it would be nice if the roots would be carefully checked up. Now it just looks as if the ugly bits were swept under the carpet.

Many people will appreciate a clean main space, but the large etymologies are impenetrable if the meat is between the lines while the roots offer little insight. The truth might be that what looks like a paradigm is rather poorly understood. The entry for PIE *leyg- is not what the link promisses and "body" (or "corpse") remains a Germanic isogloss. There's no proper treatment of the paradigm, only marginalia and miscellania in the literature, I expect, as if it was a certain fact. There's not a single reference noted in these pages. The first reference I consulted, Kroonen, rather disagrees with these pages, though also not fully convincing. Can't say I like to complain. 109.41.1.43 03:44, 6 April 2020 (UTC)

 * Do you imply that some of these Proto-Germanic lemmas: *līkāną, *galīkaz, *līką, *-līkaz; aren't related to each other? I agree that shouldn't be linked or even mentioned, as long as it doesn't list the meaning on the article.

Anatol Rath (talk) 14:48, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

materialism, matérialisme
The etymologies of and  can rightly be called a circular mess. Online Merriam-Webster gives a late 17th century date for the English. TLFi dates the French to the early 18th century and supports the etymology in the French entry. ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  16:48, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
 * In the chapter ”Boyle’s Influence on Locke” of the book The Bloomsbury Companion to Robert Boyle (Jan-Erik Jones, editor; 2019; Bloomsbury Publishing; ISBN 978-1-3500-2935-4) Peter R. Anstey wrotes, on p. 59, that in the French edition of 1700 of Essay IV. iii. 16, the translator, Pierre Coste, translated Boyle’s term “corpuscularian Hypothesis” by “l’hypothese des Philosophes Materialistes” [the italics are Anstey’s], which is explained in a gloss to mean those “'who explain the effects of nature by the sole consideration of the size, figure and movement of the parts of matter” – thus, similar to the natural philosophy of Democritus, not what now is understood by the term. Perhaps the French term was also introduced by the translator. Unfortunately, it is not clear which work is meant by “Essay”. The date 1674 in the etymology section of  suggests that it is something Boyle originally published in 1674 – but perhaps it refers to another translation that appeared that year. Le Trésor mentions the title “The Excellency and Grounds of the mechanical Hypothesis”, which is according to other sources an annex to “The Excellency of Theology compared with Natural Philosophy”, written in 1665. Indeed, both GBS (No preview) and the French Wikipedia’s article on  give 1674 for “The Excellency of Theology compared with Natural Philosophy” (French title: L’Excellence de la théologie comparée à la philosophie naturelle). Then, in the chapter “Boyle’s Epistemology: The Interaction between Scientific and Religious Knowledge” in the same book, J. J. Macintosh has a section entitled “The argument [for the existence of God. —L.] from the necessary failure of materialism”. The author sketches Boyle’s argument, which is twofold. The description of the first one, which is similar to that of the, starts with the words, “Materialism (‘somatism’) relies too much on chance”. This suggests (to me) that the term somatism is Boyle’s for what now is understood by “materialism“. Boyle formulated and embraced the “corpuscularian Hypothesis” for explaining phenomena in the realms of chemistry and physics, but rejected materialism as we understand the term for explaining life and the mind.  --Lambiam 21:01, 6 April 2020 (UTC)
 * thank you for that, that's quite an article. :) Perhaps one option is that was modelled on . Such a direction would also be consistent with the dates given by the dictionaries, though of course they aren't very far apart and there might well be older uses in either language. ←₰-→  Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  13:43, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I see now that Le Trésor, at the lemma matérialiste, identifies the Essay translated by Conte in which the term appears. It is actually an essay by Locke, not by Boyle (). But in other senses the French term is already attested from 1555. In the sense of “someone ascribing all manifestations, also the apparently mental ones, to matter”, it is attested in a manuscript from 1698, preceding Conte’s translation (which does not have that strong sense). In any case, I think the indications that Boyle did not himself coin the term materialism are strong, but it would be nice if we had access to the text of The Excellency of Theology compared with Natural Philosophy and its translation (or at least of L’Excellence de la théologie). The OEtymD gives 1748 as the date of the appearance of the term materialism in English, but “1660s and after in various philosophical and theological senses” for materialist. If materialist was used since the 1660s in various senses (Le Trésor has more precisely 1668), it is only by accident that materialism is not attested earlier. What does the OED say? --Lambiam 18:45, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Is this/ what you're looking for? or perhaps this?/ Chuck Entz (talk) 02:57, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks. No materialism found, but the text has, in good ole plain English: “materialiſts”. The same linked to Google Books: “materialiſts”. This edition is from 1744, but the work dates from 1664 (according to the English Wikipedia) or 1674 (according to the French Wikipedia). The French translation may be the missing link. --Lambiam 21:25, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

wildernis, wilderness
The etymology given at wildernis would seem to imply that the fact that the English and Dutch cognates here appear formationally identical is a coincidence (when contrasted with, say, German Wildnis).

Tharthan (talk) 01:55, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The etymology in the entry is practically identical to the one provided by the Etymologisch Woordenboek van het Nederlands. Nederlands Etymologisch Woordenboek elaborates on the English term, stating that it presumably wasn't borrowed from continental Germanic, but is related to the noun wilder, with the meaning "game, wild animal(s)" (it is not clarified what stage of English this is, but there's an entry here for Old English).  ←₰-→  Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  09:10, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

Tinne van Rompaey has written a detailed account of the diachronic development of several Dutch nominalizing suffixes (“A diachronic account of Dutch -nis, -heid, -dom and -schap”. Tijdschrift voor Nederlandse Taal- en Letterkunde 129:2 (2013), pp. 87–121. Download PDF). Inasmuch as relevant, the following is a summary. The suffix -(e)nesse, -(e)nisse, originally deverbal and very productive, was generalized in Old Dutch to also being deadjectival. Like most other etymologists, she ascribes the r in Middle Dutch wildernisse to the majority of adjectives used with -nisse ending in -er, as seen e.g. in duysternisse, from Old Dutch thiusternussi. But she also offers an alternative theory (p. 95), viz. that this was influenced by the co-existence of the synonym wildert (“desert”). Van Rompaey calls wildernisse “Late Middle Dutch”, but the Vroegmiddelnederlands Woordenboek states the word is attested as early as 1279. It also ascribes the r to the influence of other words such as donkernesse and deemsternesse. --Lambiam 12:18, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I assume that by “German cognate” you (Thartan) mean . To complicate the issue, there is also a poetic variant Wildernis, found e.g. in Goethe’s Faust. The Grimms give two more attestations. According to Trübners dictionary this form is found from the 16th to 19th century.
 * If there was a rare poetic variant of Wildnis in German, Wildernis, then doesn't that take away somewhat from the notion that Dutch wildernis solely exists as wildernis because of historical influence from other words ending in -nis (or, rather, older forms of such words in Middle Dutch)?
 * Or are we arguing that Finsternis led to the form of the poetic German Wildernis? Or perhaps that influence from the Dutch word led to the poetic German term? Tharthan (talk) 19:40, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I am not arguing anything about the genesis of German Wildernis, nor am I aware of anyone else having proffered arguments. The German term is attested only some 2 to 3 centuries after the Middle Dutch and English terms, so any outside influence must have worked in the Eastward direction. Goethe may have known the Dutch or English term and found the poetic freedom of borrowing an extra syllable convenient in view of the exigencies of the metre. Look, now, you got me arguing. --Lambiam 22:32, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The German might be a borrowing from the Low German, which I have just created. The term has been attested since Middle Low German as . Leasnam (talk) 00:04, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
 * So then where did the MLG German -er come from? An independent but identical epenthesis as seen in MDu? The plot thickens. --Lambiam 08:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Well, as in the case of the English word, it may be a -der ("animal, deer") rather than -er. The English word is likely an extension of ME wilderne "wilderness" or from ME wildern "uninhabited, desolate" + -ness, with wildern and wilderne coming from OE wild-dēoren "of wild beasts". If this were also true of Old Saxon and Old Dutch, we could postulate a *wild-diorin/*wildi-diorin from *wild-dior/*wildi-dior ("wild animal") (cp. 🇨🇬, ), with a similar evolutionary development as in English. Leasnam (talk) 19:08, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
 * note that v. wildern has quite different connotations relevant to border transgression. 109.41.3.154 10:12, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thank you, I am aware of that. However I never made mention of any verb wildern. I don't mean to sound rude, but I don't see how this is relevant... Leasnam (talk) 17:14, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't mean to sound ignorant, but I wouldn't know how that helped and I couldn't know how much you do know. I do mean to sound indifferent, but hoped it might help. Maybe you can help me out here, "poach" does not seem like an apt translation for e.g. intruding into the king's forrest, or another tribe's hunting grounds for game.
 * bewilder reinforces my impression that "wildern" has a connotation of danger (my impression only). The allusion to hunting further reminds of an archaic root in Weidmann "hunter", which gives incongruent accounts: once at weiden which shows some polysemy and implies "hunt" were secondary, another at, etc. with linking, without further explanation, Weide, that does however not link back and maybe has no suitable definition either (I also consulted DWDS/weiden but that didn't help). It is notable that "Weidmannsheil" as a greet is more often heared as "Waldmannsheil", I mean it's said correctly, but it is prone for misunderstanding because Wald (cp. Waldmeister "woodruff, forrest master", Förster) is a much more common word. Whereas Engl, whereas wilder rather derives a convergence with wander. That's a very flimsy connection to draw, and many other words spring to mind (Geweih, unendliche Weiten, Waldemar ~ Vladimir, further Wilkür, wolf ~ ylgr, ... w*), only to suggest that maybe wilderness as a poetic term was indeed quite obscure.
 * Most of all, it was the -er in wilder that was warranted to level against -der "dear". 109.41.3.8 17:00, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

ax to grind
Why have two etymology sections? PUC – 14:20, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

 * The rationale for the split etymologies is somewhat understandable in this older revision which introduced the split. --Lambiam 18:51, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

slå
How sensible is it to list Norwegian slå under the etymology of the English word slap, unless we intend to suggest that Proto-Germanic *slahaną had consonantally-altered descendants in some daughter languages.

Off of the top of my head, the consonantal alteration seen in a certain German verb borrowed from a Middle Dutch verb meaning "to breed" that is closely related to a certain vulgar English verb of otherwise identical meaning, when compared to its Middle Dutch original, would be pretty similar to such a supposed alteration (although with /k/ → /p/, rather than /x/ → /p/).

But do we have any evidence that slap may somehow be a derivative of Proto-Germanic *slahaną? Or is that perhaps given there for some other reason? Tharthan (talk) 02:52, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I've updated the Etymology, and removed the reference to . Leasnam (talk) 13:43, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

dormir etymology
(Moved from the WT:Tea room, where I erroneously raised it first)

Several (though not all) of the "etymology" sections in dormir go beyond Latin dormio and cite PIE *drem- (“run, sleep”). However, that entry does not mention "sleep", and all the derivatives it does mention relate to "run".

I haven't a copy of Pokorny to hand: is this simply a mistake? Perhaps two distinct PIE roots conflated? Or is there evidence that the PIE root did have this surprising range of meanings? --ColinFine (talk) 19:50, 7 April 2020 (UTC)

 * (I should credit that this question was actually raised on Linguistics Stack Exchange by Ergative Man.) --ColinFine (talk) 20:00, 7 April 2020 (UTC)
 * According to de Vaan p. 179-180:
 * " The PIE roots *drem- and *dreH- both have two meanings: 'run' and 'sleep'. The meaning 'sleep' is only found in Latin and Slavic for *drem, in Indic for *dreH, and in Greek for *dr-."
 * The PIE entry should probably be updated to reflect the meaning of 'sleep,' but the Slavic terms are missing. DJ K-Çel (talk) 03:48, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
 * For Slavic see . — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 09:29, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

 * Actually, there is also *Hnidrā́H in Proto-Indo-Iranian, which gives *niδrā- in Iranian whence Armenian նիրհ, and Sanskrit निद्रा, निद्राति. I assume then that the PII is an evolution of the *dreH reported in the quotation? MGorrone (talk) 11:42, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Gypsobelum
Gypsobelum, noun - This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.

Gypsobelum refers to “love darts” of snails. A love dart (also known as a gypsobelum) is a sharp, calcareous or chitinous dart which some hermaphroditic land snails and slugs create. What all the shapes of love darts have in common is their harpoon-like or needle-like ability to pierce.

The word comes from two Greek words.

Gypso -

Gypsum is a soft white or grey mineral consisting of hydrated calcium sulphate. It occurs chiefly in sedimentary deposits and is used to make plaster of Paris and fertilizers, and in the building industry.

The word comes from Greek gupsos (γύψος) meaning plaster.

Belum -

From Ancient Greek βελόνη (belónē, “needle”) meaning needle.

 * Thanks. Isn't a more likely source for the second component?  --Lambiam 07:59, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
 * That is in fact how John W. Taylor explained it. I suppose he was the coiner. Wikipedia has no article on this eminent malacologist, and he is not even mentioned in the there, but see this obituary: John William Taylor, 1845–1931.  --Lambiam 08:20, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Etymology of सृगाल and the root *śr̩gʰu-
Over at सृगाल, we find the following Etymology section:

«Several etymologies have been proposed: literally "howling"; or from Proto-Indo-Iranian *śr̩gʰu- (Blažek)[1]; or from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *s-k-jwal (“wild canine”).[2]»

Apparently, *śr̩gʰu- means "Blažek". Except, what does that mean? It seems to be a name… proponent of the theory? But the reference is by Michael Witzel, not by a Blažek… is it «Blažek apud Witzel», meaning that Witzel paper cites Blažek's proposal? Then why not refer to a Blažek work? Is that proposal not recorded in writing before the Witzel paper? And in the end, what does *śr̩gʰu- mean? Was it created specifically for the Sanskrit word, or are there other descendants? Which?

Note: Cross-posted from Tea Room after a long time of no replies.

MGorrone (talk) 15:12, 27 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It seems the etymology of which you speak has been altered a week or two ago. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 11:48, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

 * is a historical linguist. Undoubtedly the reference means that Witzel mentions Blažek's proposal. --Lambiam 16:36, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Egyptian tjt and Egyptian twt
Anyone know if these two words are related, etymologically? (Not too important. Just wondering...) 76.111.168.184 02:41, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Seems reasonable, but this is a question. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 02:45, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * It’s a good thought, but not too likely, as is feminine and its root is only, which leaves us with a single consonant in common. Some distant connection is still possible, but it’s not much to go off. I’ve not found any scholarly sources etymologically linking the two. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 04:19, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

艅艎 in ancient Wu-Yue (吳越) languages
餘皇 (Zuozhuan transcription, Zhengzhang: /*la ɡʷaːŋ/) > (orthographic descendant). Originally, name of the personal vessel of the ancient Kings of Wu (吳).

Has there been a credible reconstruction based on a 吳-越 substrate language candidate?

raft: sal in Turkic languages ~ Chinese 槎?
Is the word for raft in Turkic languages, e.g. Turkish, Kazakh , related to Old Chinese (Zhengzhang: /*zraːl/)?

Etymology of the Armenian word 'շուշտ' [shusht] - doubtful
Moved from the Tea room.

The current etymology of 'շուշտ' [shusht] - 'Doubtful', 'mistrustful' is listed as unknown. However, I speculate that the word could be related to Georgian word for 'weak' - სუსტი [sust'i] which in turn came from 🇨🇬.

After all, a weak man doesn't trust... but neither does a strong man. Vxern (talk) 21:50, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
 * PUC – 20:58, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't see any semantic connexion between "lazy, loose" and "doubtful, mistrustful". —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 21:42, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The connection that the strong can expend to trust other people since he cannot be hit by them as hard as a weak men, and that a strong man can trust more in his own power and a strong man is usually someone who trusts in himself because bravery is what lets you obtain power. While a connection is there the a change in meaning from one to the other is rather hard. Fay Freak (talk) 23:02, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Etymological discussions should be posted to WT:ES. "Doubtful, mistrustful" is not a good translation. The word means "uncertain, dithering" or similar. Much more common is. The connection with Persian is attractive and has been proposed before. The semantics are easy buts > š needs an explanation. , can s ~ š be explained within Iranian? --Vahag (talk) 21:27, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Well we have NW -št vs SW -st in MIr.; compare Parthian rāšt vs MP rāst. However if we derive MP sust form OIr. *θrusta-, then it doesn't yield NW sušt (OIr. *θr- > NW MIr. hr-, SW MIr. s-).
 * For s ~ š in Iranian languages compare Persian šoš "lung" form MP suš (in fact it is s...š > š...š assimilation).--Calak (talk) 08:31, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

fury
Is there any possibility this word comes from Greek mythology (the Furies)? ---> Tooironic (talk) 05:40, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * No, because they're not called "Furies" in the original Greek, they're the . The English name is descriptive, not borrowed.Chuck Entz (talk) 06:29, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I see. Thank you. ---> Tooironic (talk) 07:47, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The name Furiae for these disagreeable goddesses was already used in Classical Latin, the plural of the common noun used as a proper noun. I think  can be seen as a calque of the Latin sobriquet.  --Lambiam 12:59, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

tamada
According to "Tamada", the word means "head of the table" in Georgian. Would a Georgian speaker kindly have a look at the etymology in the entry and see if it is all right? Thanks. (Pinging in case you are able to assist.) — SGconlaw (talk) 17:08, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * What you have there is a folk etymology. See https://twitter.com/thomas_wier/status/1170962679940505600 for the correct etymology. --Vahag (talk) 17:12, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * thanks! I see. I understand that "Circassian" is not one language but a family of languages. Which Circassian language is tħamada ("old man") from? — SGconlaw (talk) 17:43, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I have expanded with references. The borrowings are said to be from "Common Circassian". I don't know if that should be equated with Proto-Circassian. For the sake of convenience, I have dumped the descendants in the Kabardian page. --Vahag (talk) 19:48, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
 * OK, great. Thanks again. — SGconlaw (talk) 19:55, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

virus, directly from Latin?
Most of the etymologies at virus present the borrowings of the word into all the presented languages as independently from Latin. However, Beijerinck's article from 1898 in which he is said to have coined the modern virological sense was written in German (page 5) and I reckon a prior Dutch intermediary is also possible. So while a direct borrowing from Latin is justified or reasonable for languages in which the archaic sense "venom" can be attested, that seems less the case for languages that only have it in a more modern sense, where German and in quite a few cases probably English and French functioned as intermediaries. ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  18:49, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Before the “modern virological sense” was “coined” – it rather developed until virusses could be seen with microscopes around the 1930s – there had been apart from a literal sense “venom” a vague metaphorical sense of something unseen but harmful, also  and the like, so you cannot just “attest“ two distinct senses. Why does there need to be an intermediary anyway? A learned man could have looked at multiple languages at the same time and borrowed from all. And if a learned man could do that, even more so it happened in different scientific communties in different countries, like i.e. the Arabic ones. So the Arabic term is from French, from English, from German, from Russian, from Turkish, from Latin directly etc. etc. Fay Freak (talk) 19:06, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

 * By “independently from Latin”, do you mean “independent from each other and directly from Latin”? From Beijerinck's text it is clear he treats Virus (like it is in Latin) as a mass noun denoting a “contagious living fluid”, denying a corpuscular character. Apparently he could not imagine corpuscular pathogens smaller than the pores of his filter. Since he does not bother to introduce the term, it is reasonable to assume he thought it was familiar to his audience. --Lambiam 10:19, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Is borrowed from Old Norse?
In Old English, the form appears to be the regular inheritance of the PG form, which is a z-stem. In PWG, this appears to have been reformed as an i-stem, which then gives the OE form without issue. If we assume that is a leftover of the original PG oblique stem, then it must reflect PWG, which most certainly gives  in OE and not the form with the back vowel and no palatalisation that's actually attested. Therefore I wonder if this form is actually borrowed from Old Norse, which has no such palatalisation. The addition of the epenthetic -o- would then be the natural OE choice, as it's the only epenthetic vowel that's allowed after a non-palatal. —Rua (mew) 08:06, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Googling yields a suggestion that it forms a pair like dǣg : dōgor, hrēð : hrōðor, sæl : salor etc.; Henry Sweet has some more. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 11:19, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Lissoir
Etymology: From French verb "lisser" = "to smoooth". Hence "lissoir" = "smoother" i.e. an object that smooths.

 * Thanks. More precisely, borrowed from French lissoir, from lisser + -oir. In French the meaning is any tool used for smoothing a surface, also a contemporary one, and it need not be made of bone but can be any smooth and hard material such as steel or marble, and the term also used for tools to smooth e.g. paper or fabrics. Is the English use really strictly confined to Neanderthal bone tools for smoothing leather? --Lambiam 20:26, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

crown
I contest somewhat the etymology as it is presently, as "crown of thorns" in very late Old English was "þornene crune". Moreover, Middle English used "crune" as an alternative form of coroune. It is true that Old English used corōna, but evidently "crune" is not "corōna".

If we can reasonably say that "rock" is partially inherited from Old English because of stānrocc, and can say that "war" is partially inherited from Old English because of its presence very late in it, then I insist that we say the same about "crown".

 * What say you? Tharthan (talk) 03:43, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I think a legitimate argument could be made that a word entered late Old English as ( ?) that led to Middle English, ; and that a second, slightly later borrowing (re-borrowing) of the same word from Anglo-Norman resulted in what we find in Middle English as , . Leasnam (talk) 05:49, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * And since all of those are considered variations of the same word, and since our etymology section for crown indicates that the modern word is derived from "Middle English coroune, croune, crowne", I'd say that we could say that it is "partially from late Old English crune". Tharthan (talk) 12:52, 19 April 2020 (UTC)
 * I'll wait a bit, but if no one objects by some time tomorrow, I will modify the etymology given at crown to indicate that it was partially inherited from (late) Old English. Tharthan (talk) 02:39, 20 April 2020 (UTC)
 * It is my opinion the passage "þornene crune" under discussion is Middle English, not Old English; therefore any attempt to say that the word was present in Old English based on it is misguided. Firstly, the MED dates the text to around 1225. This is later than usual dating of the , which is definitely Middle English.
 * Secondly, the text, despite some archaising spellings, displays features which are unmistakably characteristic of Middle English, such as  (OE  ),  (OE ),  (OE ), iblescede (OE gebletsode, dat. of gebletsod),  (OE ), neiles (OE  ). Additionally, there's a few French loans evident in the text (sacremens, merci, grace, obedience, seint), none of which are known in OE AFAIK. Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 04:48, 20 April 2020 (UTC)
 * saint merged somewhat with earlier (inherited) sanct, though, as you know. Hence forms such as "senct", "sainct" and "seinct".
 * Secondly, what of https://quod.lib.umich.edu/c/cme/AHA2688.0001.001/1:3.22?rgn=div2;submit=Go;subview=detail;type=simple;view=fulltext ? The exact final "cut off line" for all of Old English is somewhat grey, because it appears to have held on longer in some areas than in others. Hence why a number of years are often cited. You are right that by 1225, it is way too far past the Anglo-Saxon period, but instances of earlier use are fair game. Some overcautious sources simply deeming that anything on or slightly after 1100 is automatically Early Middle English, hardly means that Late Old English wasn't used on or after that year.
 * Tharthan (talk) 20:28, 20 April 2020 (UTC)
 * That link is displaying a error for me, but I'm assuming you mean this. The reason why it says "Old English Homilies" is because in the Victorian era, when it was published, the Old English period was sometimes considered to extend well into the 1200s; people called things such as and  Henry III's 1258 proclamation "Old English". Hazarasp (parlement · werkis) 05:06, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Chinese glyph origin: 更
The earlier forms of the glyph could be 隸定ed as, which is an alternative form in the Shuowen. The lower component of 㪅, namely, shows a hand (see ) holding a mallet or stick reaching to an object — the component which looks like a bell or some other hollow instrument. A graphic reading of the pictogram 㪅 is thus "ringing a bell (or some other hollow thing); striking the hour (manually)."

As noun, is meant to be struck, as in  or  (to signal the hour at night).

Has there been verifiable source mentioning a reading for the glyph 更 as striking an instrument? Frigoris (talk) 08:17, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

🇨🇬
1. Between 🇨🇬, 🇨🇬, 🇨🇬 and Old Dutch/🇨🇬,, is this a good candidate for an entry? Sadly, Kroonen does not cover these terms.

2. Is this from 🇨🇬? cf. Pokorny p. 3318, where he at least derives the Gothic word from that root via. DJ K-Çel (talk) 22:44, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

 * Orel has an entry for it, I say go ahead. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 15:29, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

Romanian -ețe, Portuguese -ic(i)e, Spanish -ez: from Latin -itiae or from Latin -itiem?
Taken together, the entries for, and  (all at least partially cognate) mention two different explanations for the form: derivation from a Latin plural form -itiae or derivation from the Latin fifth-declension variant -itiem instead of the first-declension -itiam. Does anyone know more about this point of etymology? I find the plural etymology a little less believable but I might be wrong.--Urszag (talk) 00:38, 22 April 2020 (UTC)
 * In general Romance nouns inherited from Latin are derived from the nominative or accusative singular, so indeed a plural etymology would be somewhat surprising. The derivation from appears to me to explain the Romance forms adequately.  --Lambiam 09:23, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Why liar?
An IP asked this on the talk page. It sounded like a good question, so I brought it here.

A look for similar cases turned up a number of terms that had something like -er in Middle English or other source:

 * 1) briar from
 * 2) cedar from
 * 3) medlar from
 * 4) friar from
 * 5) mar from
 * 6) poplar from
 * 7) star from
 * 8) vinegar from

 * dollar was borrowed from some language after Middle English times- but all the candidates have -er
 * tar is from, but that's not explained by

Others that have some sort of possible indirect explanation:

 * 1) burglar from, from Anglo-Latin / from  (1st declension)
 * 2) caterpillar from - may have been influenced by pillar
 * 3) cellar from
 * 4) collar from
 * 5) mortar from
 * 6) pillar from
 * 7) scholar from
 * 8) sugar from
 * 9) war from

The ones where I included Latin terms were probably part of a crusade that existed at one time to make English as much like Latin as possible.

Etymonline quotes Barnhart: "The form in -ar is probably in imitation of the refashioned forms such as scholar for scoler and pillar for piler". That, of course, doesn't answer why liar got this treatment, and not other agent nouns. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:22, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Maybe interference from lier (which came first?)? DTLHS (talk) 01:41, 25 April 2020 (UTC)

 * Some more terms to consider:, / ,  (blend with liar?),   . — Ungoliant (falai) 01:54, 25 April 2020 (UTC)
 * is another. Although it superficially looks like fore- + bear, it is actually forebe + -ar (i.e. 'fore-be-er'). -ar was used alternatively to -er or -ere in Middle English, so it's not at all out of the ordinary. Leasnam (talk) 06:20, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Another couple of "doer" words in -ar are beggar (which we say is from, -ar from ) and registrar (which we say is from from  + ). I'm not quite clear why the suffix in "beggar" would mean "of, pertaining to", however. Mihia (talk) 17:13, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
 * that -ar in beggar is Etymology 3 @ . Leasnam (talk) 01:52, 28 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Oops, yes, thanks. Mihia (talk) 09:35, 28 April 2020 (UTC)
 * The monosyllabic examples with /ɑɹ/ (mar, star, war) represent regular lowering-and-backing of /ɛ/ in Middle English (as reflected also in e.g. the doublets /,  /  and the spelling of ). This is probably unrelated to examples that have unstressed /əɹ/ — unless we wanted to speculate on Middle English having had a contrast between unstressed /ɛɹ/ > /ɑɹ/ versus /əɹ/ which would only survive in orthography.
 * Sugar and vinegar could be a graphical device; suger, vineger could suggest the incorrect pronunciations /sjuːdʒəɹ/, /vɪnədʒəɹ/. There do not seem to be unsegmentable English words ending in -gher, -guer which would be the other two expected ways to force a pronunciation with /g/. --Tropylium (talk) 22:33, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Womble
Presently the entry says:

 * Created by author Elisabeth Beresford; they originally appeared in a series of children's novels from 1968. Possibly related to the dialectal word, or derived from , where they were said to live.

It is easy to find sources saying that this derives from a child's pronunciation of "Wimbledon" as "Wombledon". I can't find any mention elsewhere of the relationship to the dialect word. Is there any evidence for this? Mihia (talk) 02:30, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

 * Unless this obituary is made of whole cloth, the origin is solely the mispronunciation by Elisabeth Beresford’s young daughter, Kate. --Lambiam 15:09, 26 April 2020 (UTC). See also this interview with Kate herself.  --Lambiam 15:14, 26 April 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I think I'll just delete the reference to the dialect word. Mihia (talk) 17:29, 26 April 2020 (UTC)

ἀδελφός
How is the loss of initial /h/ due to ? As the Wikipedia article says, that law states that "if an aspirated consonant is followed by another aspirated consonant in the next syllable, the first one loses the aspiration". That doesn't seem to be the the case here. PUC – 08:42, 1 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The entry says this: “The form without the rough breathing is due to  or analogy .” (My emphasis by underlining.) Presumably this loss was then by analogy. Beekes does not discuss the loss of aspiration, but writes “with copulative α < *sm̥” (with a despirited alpha) and reconstructs *ha-gwelpheh-o-.  --Lambiam 18:20, 2 May 2020 (UTC)


text:
Wiktionary:Etymology scriptorium/2020/May

details of flibustier
is now presented as a direct borrowing from Dutch, but several sources state that its direct source is English (from freebooter per TLFi, from flibutor per EWN). Both sources also assert influence from or a descendant (the EWN states that this word had already influenced the English flibutor). The odd -s- is apparently an 18th-century hypercorrection (TLFi). Any opinions on this? ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  10:39, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It is all fuzzy. I see some online claims that Dutch dates back to 1378, but reliable sources give 1572 for the earliest attestation. The oldest attestation of a cognate that I saw is Swedish fribytare, attested in 1559 and said to be from Low German fribüter,Svensk ordbok 2009 for which I did not find attestation dates. Kluge has  < (1579) Freybeuter < frībüter < . All these Germanic forms can be analyzed as native forms (like Swedish fri + byte + -are). This is also true for earlier, said to be attested in the 1560s, earlier than vrijbuiter. The Dutch term is universally said to be derived from the noun , but this noun is only attested in 1575. I do not understand the basis on which the etymologists have constructed their tree of descent. It looks as if TLFi states that  is a loan from  ("Empr. ... à l'angl. freebooter ...; également empr. par le néerl. vrijbuiter de même sens"). The explanation of the appearance of fl- in English as by influence of , overriding the obvious and strong association with free, appears particularly weak to me. (And association with  should have resulted in *flyboaters.) Spanish, which did have the loan word flibote, or French with flibot, neither of which have a prior semantic association with *fri, seem much more likely environments for this specific mutation.  --Lambiam 14:11, 2 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Fortunately the SAOB references its citations excellently, the attestation is in a collection of government documents from the rule of Gustav I that is available here. The citation in question, which I cannot read, is from a letter to Klas Kristersson Horn dated 25 July 1559, who was then a military commander at Viborg. I have bolded the attested spelling of fribytare:
 * Till thett fempte. Um thett förbudh på thett räffvelsche seglatz thu schriffver, ther um våre undersåter sigh schole besväre, sammeledes um then Henrick v. Brygge, för thett han någen tilföring till Vijborg medt någre nödtorffter göre vilde etc., så veest thu tigh väll till erinnere, hure för:ne the räffvelsche sigh och elliest fast onaborligen och otilbörligen emott oss och våre undersåter förhollett haffve bådhe medt the frijbytere, the uthgiortt haffve, och elliest, som the och ähnnu icke vele lathe komme thett godtz tilbake igenn, som togz ifrå rydzerne under vårtt landt, hvilckitt storfursten hoss oss fordrer og vethe vill, och elliest udi alle måtte, så mykitt them haffver stått tilgörendes, varett oss emott och under ögenen, thesföruthen pläge the og vanvyrde then deell, som våre undersåter tijtt till them före, och icke giffve them therföre halfft värde eller lijke etc.
 * The English attestation from 1570 (which I reckon can technically count as being from the 1560s in absence of a year zero) is apparently spelt frebetter, which may not reflect a particularly transparant pronunciation. The spelling freebooter seems to be dated to 1598 and this is later than the oldest attestations of the fl- forms. The assertion by French etymologists that it was taken from English seems to be based on the date of attestation (not that this loyalty to chronology is observed anywhere else in this complex etymological construct). I too am sceptical that all these obviously related words descend from Dutch vrijbuiter, especially if the Low German can be found earlier, although all these early attestations are less than 15 years apart. The early English forms are apparently all in the OED, which I unfortunately cannot access for the time being. It would be interesting to see if the context of these attestations were the reason for the almost universal view that the English is a calque of the Dutch term.
 * Anyway, are you okay with it if I edit the French etymology to tone down the certainty of a borrowing rather than general derivation from Dutch, to note the possibility of influence from vlieboot (or a descendant of that word) and to give a date to the appearance of the unetymological -s- to the 18th century? ←₰-→  Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  14:11, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Fine with me. I think it is good practice in general to present all theories that have an acceptable degree of plausibility (and a bad habit of some etymologists to present just one preferred theory as the only one without disclosing the reasoning that led to this preference). --Lambiam 15:49, 3 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Smashhoof has been so kind to look up the OED entry of "freebooter"; it turns out that all their earliest cites were in relation to the Eighty Years' War. That is likely their reason for supposing it derives from Dutch. ←₰-→  Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  17:36, 4 May 2020 (UTC)
 * We are still in the dark why Kluge supposes that frībüter < vrijbuiter. I too cannot decipher the letter by Klas Kristersson Horn of 1559 to understand to whom the term frijbytere refers, and I have not found other references to Henrick v. Brygge other than in connection with equally undecipherable accounts of some event in 1559 in Viborg. --Lambiam 12:24, 5 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I'm having the original Idea that "frij" implies Frisian (/ˈfɹɪʒən/, /ˈfɹɪzi.ən/), obsolete Dutch Vriesch, but I don't see how (and I'm getting ahead of myself with Wismar, thus Weimar, the River Weser, family name Wischmeyer). "free", as in Frank is surely one of the more attractive interpretations.
 * "räffvelsche" in the second sentence very much reminds of Rotwelsch (räv "red") though raff, Raub "rape, rob" would be topical as well.
 * These names seem to be not one and the same, alas I cannot really read the text, either. 109.41.2.11 18:01, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * And they speak of notdürftig (makeshift), which looks as if it indeed described the boats (viz "nödtorffter göre",taken out of context). 109.41.2.71 17:45, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Compare Vlieland, cf. Zuiderzee: "part of the area was later called Vlie". Found at Chauci, who are a scantly attested people, but suspected as associates to notorious sea raiders. 109.41.0.124 19:52, 10 August 2020 (UTC)
 * I think that is quite too speculative for inclusion in an etymology section. But thanks anyway for your cogitations on the matter. ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  09:22, 11 August 2020 (UTC)

and 🇨🇬
Kangxi Dictionary claims 土撥 in (literally "soil-pushing rat") was a corruption of  (attested in Bencao Gangmu published in 1596 CE). sounds quite similar to 🇨🇬 (> 🇨🇬), which is "perhaps separable into, with the second element recurring in other animal names". The is found in China (Inner Mongolia and Heilongjiang), northern and western Mongolia, and parts of Siberia, which historically all had Mongols. Is there any chance the Chinese word was borrowed from Proto-Mongolic or Classical Mongolian? RcAlex36 (talk) 16:16, 6 May 2020 (UTC)
 * You have already backed up this assumption well enough: The only other option is that the word is from a language or otherwise somehow obscure related language with the same word and the same suffix (Turkic also has this animal- and plant suffix). But 🇨🇬 appears to have a different word for the marmot. Fay Freak (talk) 16:26, 6 May 2020 (UTC)

stenogram
Stenogram is a word that has been marginally adopted into English, and I've so added it. However, while I'd put a bet on the main use coming from the Russian, it does seem possible at least some use comes from the Polish stenogram, and given "stenography", the form in theory could have been formed in English. (Every single example I've found comes from a Slavic origin, so it's clearly a borrowing, but arguably one that has properties of a calque.) The Russian word is стенограмма, I guess? Could someone with some Slavic knowledge add at least a basic etymology for English and if possible Polish?--Prosfilaes (talk) 10:09, 8 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It is also Albanian, Dutch, Indonesian and Swedish, and French has and German Stenogramm. Here are some English uses without ostensible Slavic connection:, , .  --Lambiam 21:24, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

Should "日" be "甶" in the IDS for "禺"?
Should "日" be "甶" in the IDS for "禺"? (I am a novice, & this may not be the correct forum so please direct me; I hesitated to edit the page without some feedback, and the talk page was empty)

In the ideographic description "composition" for "禺" [禺 (radical 114, 禸+4, 9 strokes, cangjie input 田中月戈 (WLBI), four-corner 60427, composition ⿻日禸)] https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E7%A6%BA

I think the component "日" linking to https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E6%97%A5 should be "甶" linking to https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E7%94%B6#Chinese

ref1: same page: Glyph origin: "Unclear. Shuowen considers it to be an ideogrammic compound (會意): 甶 (“head of a ghost”) + 禸 (“to trample”) – a kind of monkey."

ref2: https://ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=gb&char=%E7%A6%BA 說文解字:	《甶部》禺：母猴屬. 頭似鬼. 从甶从禸

... the component _could_ be: 田: ref2: https://zidian.911cha.com/zi79ba.html

or it could be 甲 as in my Pleco, but I cannot find any source that offers "日" Cheers,

 * "composition" is only a technical description of rather than anything directly to do with the character's origin, and it seems accurate to me: 禺 looks like 禸 superimposed (⿻) on 日. 甶 would not work here because of the extra stroke at the top. —Nizolan (talk) 14:04, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

 * How a given hanzi is digitized has little to do with its origin. Just because you see similar components in different characters does not necessarily mean there is any etymological connection between them. In fact, 禺 is a 獨體字; it cannot be broken down any further. When in doubt, check a good reference tool like 字源. (It says it's a 象形字.) ---> Tooironic (talk) 21:02, 10 May 2020 (UTC)

Thank you for the patient feedback. I understand now a little more... too soon old, but eager to learn

camaeus
RFE not posted here before. The English cameo "appearance" indirectly links to camaeus, but that gives a circular definition linking back to cameo. So I'm not sure if this belongs to the Tea Room or here in the ES, because the etymology is missing, too. Slightly confusing, the intermediary link in Italian cammeo etymologizes Mediaevil Latin cammaeus, that is apparently just a geminated variant of camaeus without dedicated entry. 109.41.3.156 07:44, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Unfortunately the most recent discussion of this word I can find, Dimitros Plantzos (1996), "Hellenistic Cameos: Problems of Classification and Chronology", Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 41(1), at 115–116, states that the etymology is unknown and previous proposals are implausible. The first attestation is in Old French in 1222, preceding the first Medieval Latin attestation in 1295. The most popular (19th-century) proposal was apparently that it's a Crusades-era derivation from Byzantine Greek κειμήλιον ("heirloom"), but this suggestion does nothing to explain its specific meaning (a relief). —Nizolan (talk) 14:50, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Also not sure where the proposed German etymology that User:Leasnam added at camaïeu fits in (separate from camée, the derivation from Latin camaeus). Possibly they are separate derivations that became assimilated. —Nizolan (talk) 15:18, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

 * There is no circularity in the etymologies: <etym  <etym . There is also no circularity in the definitions:  <def .  --Lambiam 20:37, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * That derivation from Middle High German comes from the link in the entry's Reference section located here [] Leasnam (talk) 22:21, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks. I just read through the entry and it actually says the opposite: "cependant aucun étymon germ. valable ne peut être avancé et le corresp. m. h. all. gâmahiu (Lexer) est empr. au fr." i.e. "however no valid Germanic etymon can be advanced and Middle High German gâmahiu is a loan from French" (emprunter à is borrow from). Have edited camaïeu accordingly. —Nizolan (talk) 23:13, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Germanic is interesting, because it can explain a from *ga. A comparison to co-, con-, cum is actually the reason of my inquiry. So I am not impressed if the TLF, whose expertise lies primarily with French, makes an unsourced statement about Middle High German. They might be right, the timing is in favour of this interpretation, but it could have gone back and forth if Latin shows *g* in "gemma" much earlier. For -meo, (or the whole) cp., Latvian dārgakmens "precious stone", Ru. kamen "stone", etc.
 * I dig the TLF's comparison to Greek, but can't read it. Can't we add that?
 * I remember that Sanskrit has many entries for gem, jewel under "k-", too. It's surreal. 109.41.2.11 18:18, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Based on the academic sources I can find about this word, it seems the problem that has led scholars to discount all the more obvious possible etymologies is figuring out where the specific meaning of a relief carved in multiple colours comes from. The word pops up in the middle of the 13th century with this sense from the very start—and simply chalking it up as a variant of the "gem" stem does little to explain it. This is what made Greek and Arabic etymologies attractive to scholars earlier in the 20th century, who traced it to the Crusades—the Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch also tentatively favours Arabic—but they're now considered linguistically problematic. —Nizolan (talk) 13:50, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

Old Armenian
Is the second 'n' a shared irregular development with 🇨🇬, or from the final -n in 🇨🇬?

RubixLang (talk) 15:04, 9 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It is from the final -n in 🇨🇬. See Martirosyan 2010 for a review of possible phonological developments. Most likely from, adopting the zero-grade vocalism of ordinal . --Vahag (talk) 16:24, 9 May 2020 (UTC)

costee
The (English) racial classification... what's the etymology? - -sche (discuss) 08:46, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I can't find or think of any Latin root that would usefully parallel the etymology of mestizo, but after searching around a bit I wonder if it has something to do with Nahuatl coztic, "yellow"? Sources also mention "fustee" as another one alongside mustee and costee, and that might be connected to the yellow dye fustic. —Nizolan (talk) 14:20, 12 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Never mind, it's almost certainly from castizo (sense 4, e.g.), by the same clipping as mestizo → mustee —Nizolan (talk) 02:48, 13 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Aha! Good find, thank you. - -sche (discuss) 07:55, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

mew
I have added the slang neologism sense of "to flatten the tongue against the roof of the mouth for supposed health benefits". Would anyone happen to know its likely etymology? I have put it under Etymology 3 Onomatopoeic for now. ---> Tooironic (talk) 20:54, 10 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It is named after and his son Michael Mew. I added a separate etymology section. – Einstein2 (talk) 15:01, 12 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Many thanks! ---> Tooironic (talk) 22:40, 12 May 2020 (UTC)

dhampir
There've been recurring efforts to either remove any mention of the folk etymology that explains the spelling, or alternatively to assert that the folk etymology is the etymology. I had previously added as many references as I could, but if anyone with more interest in or knowledge of Balkan languages wants to refine our etymology, it'd be appreciate. (I protected the page but perhaps that should be undone, especially if it stops anyone here from adding anything constructive.) - -sche (discuss) 21:14, 11 May 2020 (UTC)

Garangao
I added entries for Gargee'an and Garangao, English names for the recent Ramadan festival. Etymology for the first comes from Wikipedia. Etymology for the second is beyond my ability. Apparently the "gar" prefix has a common origin, but the words must have diverged in Arabic or its regional dialects before being borrowed. Vox Sciurorum (talk) 13:01, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

Grand Teton
I added Grand Teton and copied the etymology from Wikipedia. I only knew about the standard "French for big boobs" explanation but some editor on Wikipedia thinks it could be from an Indian tribe. I know what I want the etymology to be but I don't know what it is. Any of our experts have an opinion? Vox Sciurorum (talk) 20:24, 13 May 2020 (UTC)

appears to be a rare corruption of the character especially in print. Specifically, it appears to be used for the phonetic value in transliteration of foreign names in Chinese. One finds in a Qing-era reprint of 史記 with in-line annotations (from 史記正義 by Zhang Shoujie, Tang era) that quoted from the long-lost 括地志 (Tang era)

(In the English gloss above I tried to show reconstructed Middle Chinese readings of the Han-characters. The names were probably related to, , , or .)

The names 率都沙那/蘇對沙那 also appeared in the 《新唐書·西域傳》.

An image of the Qing era print with can be found at https://ctext.org/library.pl?if=en&file=79522&page=68 (in the last vertical line)

The point is that the character

 * is visually similar to, and
 * appears to follow the common usage of in transliteration of the foreign languages

Can we conclude that is a corrupted form of ? --Frigoris (talk) 13:43, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

it's all Greek to me
"It's all Greek to me" is listed as a possible calque from Medieval Latin but without the specific Latin phrase. According to Wikipedia the phrase is "Graecum est, non legitur" ("It's Greek, it cannot be read"), which isn't cited there but echoes many other sources. The hitch is that I can't find it in any actual medieval corpus.

The earliest example I can find is in a French book from 1586 by the Calvinist printer Henri Estienne, where it's brought up as part of a jibe against Catholics (here is the 1607 English translation for context). Later English citations also follow this vein, and tellingly a 1618 Jesuit Life and Martyrdom of Edmund Campion claims that he was taunted with the phrase around the time of his death (in 1581). One 17th-century book cites it as "the proverb of honest ", and following that lead I found that some contemporary scholars have taken this at face value, but the phrase does not exist in Accursius' texts (—the citation given here for the claim is also 17th-century).

Apparently the earliest recorded English use of "Greek" as "incomprehensible" is from 1566, well before the first Latin citation. In that case an English translator used it to render a play that doesn't mention "Greek" in its original Italian. Given all this I wonder whether this is not a Medieval Latin phrase at all but a Reformation-era invention projected back from an existing English/French phrase. —Nizolan (talk) 15:54, 14 May 2020 (UTC)

映 and 影
Any etymological connection? Is it plausible that is an -s suffixed derivative of ? The semantics are tempting, and from what I gather a verbalizing -s with various resultant meanings was pretty common in Old Chinese. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 03:57, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I think may have been a late descendant  and a cognate of . Both points to  etymologically. I'm not aware of  itself being attested commonly in early (say, Pre-Qin) writings, but it's quite interesting to notice that both  and  carry the senses of "bright; illuminate" and "not bright; shade". --Frigoris (talk) 08:49, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I've updated their etymologies. — justin(r)leung { (t...) 21:19, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks, all! — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 04:16, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

mjerilo
Is this Serbo-Croatian word that means "criterion" from Arabic? Dngweh2s (talk) 22:34, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Nope, it’s straightforwardly . — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 22:45, 15 May 2020 (UTC)

Bengali and Assamese vs Sanskrit
As Sanskrit is the ancestor language of Bengali and Assamese, can ALL Bengali and Assamese words which derived from Sanskrit be converted to use "inh" instead of "der" and "bor" ? This can be done by a bot. Another suggestion, Bengali-script substitution of Sanskrit in etymology section should be removed e.g. as the same norm like other languages. --Octahedron80 (talk) 23:30, 15 May 2020 (UTC)
 * No. They can be learned loanwords. See . --Vahag (talk) 09:51, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree that not all Bengali and Assamese words of Sanskrit origin are inherited. I also agree that we should display Sanskrit only in Devanagari, not in other scripts, in etymology sections. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:48, 16 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Well then, we must cleanup Sanskrit to show only in Devanagari. --Octahedron80 (talk) 01:36, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Technically it is not "Sanskrit", but rather "Prakrit", as the term "Sanskrit" (lit. 'refined, (well-)formed') is the literary (i.e. "artificial"!) language codified by the Indian grammarian Pāṇini: all linguistic features that were considered vulgar, illogical or barbaric (as encountered in the popular Prakrit language(s)) were excised from his "refined" grammar. Prakrit is a generic term for all the "natural" source language(s) of modern Indo-Aryan languages: "the most frequent meanings of the term "prakṛta", from which the word "prakrit" is derived, are "original, natural, normal" and the term is derived from prakṛti, "making or placing before or at first, the original or natural form or condition of anything, original or primary substance" (Monier Monier-Williams). In the end, Sanskrit was the highly artificial language (largely frozen in time and place) considered fit for the higher classes, whereas Prakrit became the somewhat dismissive term for the naturally evolving language spoken by the populace and the informal dialect spoken by the elite among themselves and with their servants.
 * While technically you may be correct, there's so little material in the vernacular language of the time that we follow the vast majority of reference works in using "Sanskrit" as a surrogate for "Old Indic contemporaneous with early Sanskrit". It's not perfect, but it's better than the alternative.
 * The same goes for using Devanagari for our Sanskrit entries. In reality, most of the early Sanskrit works were preserved in the memory of scholars and passed down orally from generation to generation, and then on a succession of perishable palm-leaf manuscripts, with each copied from a previous one before it was lost. Having entries in dozens of different scripts would make it difficult to see the language as a whole, so we chose to standardize on the native script that's used most in reference works. That's not to say that entries in other scripts are forbidden, but they should be in addition to, not instead of, Devanagari entries.
 * Then there's the matter of Sanskrit continuing to be used long after it had ceased to be a living language. Scholars continued to write new works patterned after the language of the old ones (some still do today).
 * Given how tricky this source material is, doing honest, reliable etymologies in the languages that have descended from "Sanskrit" or borrowed from it is very difficult, and shouldn't be attempted by non-scholars except to summarize the work of those who are qualified to do so. I took a year of Sanskrit at UCLA, but I know I'm not qualified- and I sincerely doubt you are, either. Chuck Entz (talk) 02:38, 3 June 2020 (UTC)

son of a gun
RFV of the etymology.

I was tempted to just remove this, since it was debunked by snopes.com almost two decades ago, but it's been in the entry since 2006. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:30, 16 May 2020 (UTC)

 * The just-so story is oft-told, but that doesn't make it any less of a just-so story. Merriam-Webster says, "a mild or euphemistic alternative to son of a bitch". Green's Dictionary of Slang has sonofagun as "a euph. for n." Etymology online doesn't have it as a headword, but at son of a bitch refers to "the toned-down form son-of-a-gun". While it's difficult to prove a negative, the Snopes article Chuck Entz links to at least shows that the supposed naval origin is dubious. Remove the son of a gun, I say, or at least tone it down and note that it's dubious. Cnilep (talk) 05:19, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * There's always the possibility that there's no story behind it at all. Just as there are minced oaths like son of a biscuit and jiminy cricket that substitute a word that sounds similar, it's entirely possible that this is just substitution of anything that rhymes, which doesn't have much to work with.

Anglo-Saxon descendant of *sek
Is an Anglo-Saxon descendant of *sek attested? --Njardarlogar (talk) 07:32, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Apparently not. According to A. Campbell's Old English Grammar, "It is a peculiarity of the, distinguishing them from Old High German, that the pronoun of the third person is also used as the reflexive and reciprocal pronoun of the third person, e.g. Old English ,  " (§ 704, p. 289). —Mahāgaja · talk 09:14, 17 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Some Bavarian Dialects know this, too, a a stackexchange answer reveals, with ihn used even for females.
 * S: could be short for both, naively speaking: the reflexive or the nominative (3rdPSgF, 3rdPPl, and more). So far I thought ihn (MHG 3rdPSgM accusative) for femals was a case of severe hypercorrection. Now I'm not sure, as it fits in line with two other "coincidents" (one being a, an). 109.41.2.71 17:29, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * we don't say where the -k is from, any idea? It's not in Kroonen's, which might mean it was not interesting enough. DWDS merely implies an original accusative. 109.41.2.71 17:40, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Interesting. I suppose the etymology for oneself could use some more information about when the formulation one's self started to be used, and what it competed with. Merriam-Webster states that the term was first attested in 1540. According to The Online Etymology Dictionary, himself has roots in Anglo-Saxon. --Njardarlogar (talk) 18:04, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * the -k is the same one as in and, which is apparently from . —Mahāgaja · talk 18:35, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

飞蓬
Is 飞蓬 fēipéng for a species of Erigeron a phonetic borrowing from English fleabane? Vox Sciurorum (talk) 00:11, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It is definitely not the latter.
 * --Frigoris (talk) 07:19, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Are we sure its not? This reminds me of 便盆 /biànpén/ for bedpan.  One thing that would help is to  see how old the first use of the word is  in Chinese.  — Soap — 15:53, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Did you even look at the comment right above yours? When you don't have anything concrete to add to a discussion, consider not commenting. —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 15:58, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The quotation is too old to for all senses of the word to be English borrowings, but is it using the same sense I was asking about? Vox Sciurorum (talk) 18:42, 22 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Some clarification here. I mean that the phrase 飛蓬 has much earlier attestation. In the absence of further evidence, a more likely explanation is that the sense of 飛蓬 as a specific taxonomy in botany may have been simply borrowed or inherited from classical literature. The majority of taxonomic identities of plant/animal/mineral names attested in the classics have always been murky, but meanwhile, it's not rare or inconceivable that later generations, when naming a plant or something, tend to borrow names (rather than taxonomic values, which have been unclear to begin with) from the classics. We don't necessarily know if the species listed under was the same plant as in Qu Yuan's Li Sao:  But it's quite conceivable that the word  as a name of "that specific plant, Asarum forbesii" was to some extent influenced by classical literature. --Frigoris (talk) 14:51, 23 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Some clarification here. I mean that the phrase 飛蓬 has much earlier attestation. In the absence of further evidence, a more likely explanation is that the sense of 飛蓬 as a specific taxonomy in botany may have been simply borrowed or inherited from classical literature. The majority of taxonomic identities of plant/animal/mineral names attested in the classics have always been murky, but meanwhile, it's not rare or inconceivable that later generations, when naming a plant or something, tend to borrow names (rather than taxonomic values, which have been unclear to begin with) from the classics. We don't necessarily know if the species listed under was the same plant as in Qu Yuan's Li Sao:  But it's quite conceivable that the word  as a name of "that specific plant, Asarum forbesii" was to some extent influenced by classical literature. --Frigoris (talk) 14:51, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

Proto-Indo-European:stnéh₂ti
This construction looks odd. Normally the PIE nasal infix is inserted after a consonant which becomes vocalic (weyḱ -> wineḱ). In the case of steh₂, this is not possible, and the resulting consonant cluster looks strange even for PIE. This would imply that this root cannot take the nasal infix. Is there any alternative explanation for alternations like stand/stood?
 * I'm not familiar with n-infix and I would have thought it's a participle *-ont(s), but if the page says it's infix, that's that.
 * Suppose *steh2- is a s-mobile form of *dheh1- "to do, put, place". There are no cases of *s- + voiced, the causative semantics fit (though that's stellen in German, also sit, set in English, po-sine in Latin, etc.), and a breathy consonant is not fully obstruent (cp. Engl. 'th'). So it makes sense, except for the last bit, that is most important here. There is '-n-' in PGem *dona (cf. do), as one might expect in this picture. Cp., where the '-n-' appears inovated under the given explanation, nevertheless, still in line with the sonorant requirement.
 * As long as the so-called s-mobile is poorly understood, it would be best not to expect a singular explanation. So I won't try. 109.41.2.71 18:46, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Nevermind that. Actually, we don't index a Germanic continuation for this word; consequently stand doesn't link it either. The Pre-Germanic forms found in the entries seem to be taken from Kroonen, who gives a bit more detail on *standan and *sten, which see:

 * "It follows that the verb largely arose by internally Germanic analogies, and did not start out as the nasal present it synchronically ap-pears to be, ..." (*standan pg. 473)
 * "[*sten] can only be reconciled ... by positing a Narten-present 3sg. *steh2-ti, *steh2-nti ... which has no extra-Gm. counterpart." (*sten pg. 477)
 * He adds an alternative that isn't complete either and requires *-aja- > long *-a-, then tentatively follows Seeboldt (viz. Vergleichendes und etymologisches Wörterbuch der germanischen starken Verben, 1970, pg. 464) in concluding
 * "... the view that it arose due to analogy with *gen 'to go'." (pg. 477).

 * Problem I see here is that one should try to poke holes into the derivation of go as well, as long as the origin of PGem *ga-from PIE *k'om- is not well understood. To my delight, Kroonen mentions something like that:
 * "OE gan on the other hand, can only have developed from *gai, which seems to imply an i-present ... We may also consider the possibility that the stem *gai arose from *ga-i, i.e. the perfective prefix *ga- plus *-i-, the continuant of PIE root *h1ei- "to go" (Kluge 1894, s.v. gehn; Kortlandt 1990)." (pg. 175). 109.41.2.190 23:22, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

Japanese イケてる
The slang term seems likely to be an elided form of いけている, but which verb is it from? 活ける/? 行ける/? Or perhaps none of these: I'm just guessing that is from the て-いる form of a verb.

This online slang dictionary says it's from, but I'm not sure that's reliable. Daijisen has the definition, but not the etymology. Cnilep (talk) 01:43, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

 * This is the contracted progressive verb form ～ている (~te iru) of verb . As we can see here in the KDJ entry at Kotobank, in section 2 sense 3:

なかなかいいものである. 多く、美しい、おいしい、すばらしいなどの意に用いる.
 * Cites are given for this sense since at least 1770, so it's not that recent.
 * The cool, attractive sense seems like a basic and minor shift from the KDJ sense, which in turn appears to be a relatively straightforward sense extension from the basic potential form of, especially when considered as the opposite of . I don't think  has anything to do derivationally with drugs or orgasms.
 * FWIW, unless has some lexical wrinkles independent of  and which currently aren't in evidence in either our entry or anything I've found online in my current (admittedly cursory) searches, I don't think  merits an entry, as a simple and obvious conjugation of .  ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 21:54, 18 May 2020 (UTC)

 * Couple of things: That the KDJ entry for 行く should include a definition, conjugation, etc. of 行く is, um, 当たり前. From there the conclusion that the slang sense of イケてる is an extended use of 行けている is a slight leap; it is small, and it's one that I entirely agree is likely, but a leap nonetheless.
 * Also, let us assume that the slang term is derived from the standard verb, that it's form is only slightly (and predictably) different, and that it's meaning is clearly related. It does not necessarily follow from that that the slang form is not a separate lexeme. The line between polysemy and homonymy is notoriously vague. Cnilep (talk) 01:34, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * , due to a site redesign / restyling a few months back, many Kotobank pages became harder to read, and that is one such example. You have to look closely and check the quotes to establish which reading each section is for.  That second section in the KDJ entry is for, not .  Though similarly not clearly marked, the third section is for , the fourth is for , etc.
 * Separately, I'm not flat-out saying "we shouldn't have this entry", but rather questioning whether we have enough justification for a separate entry. I'm not sure we do, but I'm open to being convinced.  Right now, I see very little semantic difference between  and .  There's the subtle difference in aspect by using the ～てる form, but again that's entirely expected and a regular (informal, abbreviated) conjugation form.  Are there other details of meaning or usage that make these two more lexically distinct?  ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 16:05, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, I think our understandings are very close here (and I think my comments make me sound like an ass, so sorry for that). Cnilep (talk) 05:37, 20 May 2020 (UTC)

umerus
Are Latin umerus and Russian рамя cognates?Dngweh2s (talk) 18:41, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * No, would be closer to 🇨🇬 as they are both ultimately from 🇨🇬.  Check out de Vaan p. 55. DJ K-Çel (talk) 03:54, 19 May 2020 (UTC)

унитаз
Thomas Twyford's 1883 model of the toilet was called Unitas. Popular in Russia.

inasmuch as, insofar as
These originated from spaced phrases equivalent (if perhaps spelled slightly differently, in Middle English) to "in as much as", "in so far as". Why were only the first three words run together, and not the whole phrase "inasmuchas", "insofaras"? Was it originally more common to use them without the "as", and if so, in what phrases? [[inasmuch]]'s only citation (on the citations page) is in fact of "inasmuch as", and insofar's only citation is for "in so far at least" with spaces. - -sche (discuss) 18:27, 19 May 2020 (UTC)
 * A date for the phrase would be neat.
 * 1. "insofar" was not in the OED first ed. (1933, archive.net), it's now at least in Collins, MW, etc. What does the 2nd OED say?
 * Insofar insofern exists in German as well, already in Grimm's DWB (glossed als), there would be farther precedent for the univerbation. But far and fern is a pair of false friends.
 * Although "in" chiefly reflects *h1en-, it is anyhow tempting to compare also, else and other, to begin with, the latter possibly from *h2en- (reminiscent of Ger. ansonsten), akin to *hent- and *henti which appear in various subordinating conjunctions with a tendency to univerbation, e.g. and so forth, and so on (for another univerbation, cf. Kloekhorst 2010, Hittite mān, maḫḫan, māḫḫan, māḫḫanda and mānḫanda). This is in line with the semantics licenced by far(ther), in the sense besides, in the odd case (which is how it is used in German legalese, by my estimate). The Balto-Slavic *no, possibly "well", is vexing, because we give competing accounts involving *h2en- but also the roots from "now" and "no" (cf. Latvian no, too, cp. near, *h2nek'-, co). Therefore it will be remembered that *h1e- ~ *i- may be morphemic on it's own. If it is man in the Hittite example that licenses the sense "when" in an univerbation that is ultimately concessive, it might also be of tangential interest.
 * Anyways, in extremo I might be completely off the rails, if in case and similar appear oh so transparent.
 * Still, you have to concede to several uncertainties, if, in the other hand, I have to compare any "some", Ger. ein- ~ in--either from "one", *oyn-, or "in", *h1en-, respectively, but underspecified in ein-; whereby any "all" again should be comparable to every, ever:

 * > "originally a phrase whose first element undoubtedly consists of Old English ā (“ever, always”) + in (“in”) + an element possibly from feorh (“life, existence”) (dative fēore)"

 * Nevermind that there's a little bit of uncertainty about some form of si in Latin, incase that it mattered.

 * 2. inasmuch is in etymonline, copied from the OED 1st ed. as about 14th C. from a northern lect's verbiage, "in als mikel". The added as appears around the same time. The first OED is often outdated on timestamps; For what it's worth, the quote's for "1. in so far as" are one from "a 1300" (approx. 13th?), "c 1380 Wyclif" (circa?), "1526 Tindale" with a gloss "[ags. Gosp. swa lange swa; Wyclif as long as]", and first univerbation "inasmuch as" from 1722; all with two as. Whereas "2. In that; in view of the fact that; [...]; since, because" has the same univerbation almost two centuries earlier, and likewise all instances with added 'as'. A third heading is given for the obsolete form "without as: In an equal or like degree, likewise. Obs.", quoting only one from the 18th, with univerbation. (link to the page) 109.41.1.189 11:06, 23 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Since my Ansatz was assuming a corresponding *inso- to also, consider at least Fr. ainsi. This is complicated. It's probably from Latin "in", as per the forms with "en-". But cf. en-:

 * > "[…] forms are from Proto-Indo-European *en (“in, into”). Intensive use of Old French en-, an- is due to confluence with Frankish *an- (intensive prefix), related to Old English on- (intensive prefix). More at in-, on-.

 * Further, ainsi is perhaps from OF ains instead, that is from *h2ent- indeed.

 * To put things in perspective, note that ainsi is linked from aussi. I can't explain succinctly why this is relevant and why a unique derivation from aluid sic is perhaps imprecise. Instead ...

 * Speaking of "instead": that's anstelle in German! Either way, they are precisely within the previously aluded to semantics, that I'm not quite sure are obvious in Engl. insofar. Speaking of "either": that's entweder in German. If the way is the goal, excuse when I disgress: I consulted aussi because of Ger. auch, because of auch noch, because of *h2nek'- (due to DWDS, where nach is seen with noch, which we must disagree with), and *h2eh2nok'- (cf. enough, ever so slightly uncertain), which, pending semantics, I read tentatively as "auchnoch" (sue me), only rather arbitrary because of the mentioned Latvian *no*. Ironicly, noch is collocated in "weder noch", "weder ... noch ..." (neither ... nor); the negative quality is rather apparent, therefore cp. further Norse ingen, not to be confused with Ger. irgend- "any". Also, if Frankish was already in the bigger picture, then "auch" might be a considerable comparison to aussi (notwithstanding autre, etc. if and only if Frankish influence could cause sound change), whereas aluid sic looks like a reasonable comarison to all so--that I can't explain at all, but note that *yos (in *h2el-yos) is somehow akin to *h1e-. What's more, a side of *h2ew- "away", (cf. auch), earlier "up" (cf. Cyril Brosch 2013) to be expected in e.g. away, awake (wake up, Ger. aufwachen, erwecken, cp. Dutch er from an old pronomial with -r, as long ad Ger. er- < uz- "out" cannot explain it, nor Gothic urinnan "arise" next to "go out", IIRC usrinnan is attested synchronicly), would be ... that would be ... getting ahead of myself. Hitting a wall.

 * I'm sure I can't read the TLFi properly (ainsi), but there are examples contrasting autre, there is a note that in the opinion of grammarians it's a poor substitute for 'semblable', and there is ainsi que as a collocation, which is notable not only where que matches as, but also because it might give a clue to your question:

 * > III.− [Empl. comme conj. de coordination, toujours en tête de prop.]
 * > A.− Sert à introduire un exemple. Par exemple :
 * >25. Les différentes proportions de ces matières font les différentes couleurs des cheveux. Ainsi les rouges ont beaucoup plus d'huile noir-verdâtre que les autres. H. de Balzac, César Birotteau,1837, p. 136.
 * >26. Il y a des cas où une chose est nécessaire du seul fait qu'elle est possible. Ainsi manger quand on a faim, donner à boire à un blessé mourant de soif, l'eau étant tout près. S. Weil, La Pesanteur et la grâce,1943, p. 52.

 * In these examples, the conjunctions que and quand are removed from the head (deeply embedded, subordinate, I'm no grammarian). If that were the same in English, though the examples don't really show it, there would have been reason to separate the morphemes.

 * Reading insofar as SoP would make it so unspecific so that many readings from ainsi appear possible. The grammar note indicates that it accrued semantic widening; IMHO, that's often symptomatic of conflation with other lexems, and possibly followed by semantic narrowing. The same could be said about in- versus an-. Thus, it seems hardly likely that the two phrases had an originally common source, but, if one had to calcify before erroding completely, then perhaps under pressure from adstrata. This could happen in insulated instances, in writing or higher registers, but not before the damage was done.
 * All in all, that's barely scratching the surface--like a cart free-wheeling in the mud. This question would be better placed at the Tea Room, IMHO. 109.41.1.189 15:37, 23 May 2020 (UTC)

నవంబర్
Wouldn't this just be from 🇨🇬? Same for all these Telugu months. Ultimateria (talk) 21:08, 21 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, they all ought to be fixed... —Μετάknowledge discuss/deeds 21:27, 21 May 2020 (UTC)
 * ✅. Ultimateria (talk) 18:59, 22 May 2020 (UTC)

Magainan etymological root
The Wikipedia article mentions that this was derived from the Hebrew word magain meaning shield.

cicio
This etymology needs to be expanded, as a number of older sources thought that English kick was from Celtic, rather than vice versa. The claims tend to be circular, with reference to Scottish Gaelic or Welsh terms that appear, in actually, to be borrowed from English.

But we ought to be clear, nevertheless. Tharthan (talk) 04:04, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

 * The Welsh etymology appears to check out. GPC derives both cic and cicio from 🇨🇬 and the English page doesn't seem to list any Celtic terms. DJ K-Çel (talk) 17:49, 25 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The Century Dictionary suggests Scottish Gaelic ceig, but it appears to me that that is also from the English. Tharthan (talk) 18:27, 25 May 2020 (UTC)

chungus, Internet slang
The IP user who created included etymology from  + either (translingual)  or. removed the anus bit, which I agree seems highly unlikely. This strikes me as likely from or perhaps something similar. I've marked it as unknown, perhaps with -us. Thoughts? Cnilep (talk) 06:55, 26 May 2020 (UTC)
 * If this is some kind of a contamination formation, the semantically best source for -gus might be from (an eye spelling of) . --Tropylium (talk) 17:37, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Development of
I just want to confirm this hypothesis of the seemingly irregular development of σύ

IIRC twe > se is regular in Greek. The nominative tu was then modified to su by analogy.

RubixLang (talk) 13:53, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

 * Beekes agrees in his entry σύ: “Initial σ- in IA [Ionic–Attic], etc. was introduced after σέ < *tue.” --Lambiam 19:11, 27 May 2020 (UTC)

farlie
The etymology for this word lists an Old English ferlish as the source. I'm no expert, but doesn't the spelling -ish rather than -isċ suggest that it's Middle English instead? I couldn't find anything useful with a quick Google search. OR AlexMC (talk) 00:26, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
 * : I moved this, since it's an etymological question.

 * It doesn't seem to be Middle English: the Middle English Dictionary has 44 quotes with 7 spellings- none of which are "ferlish" (though "ferlis" is close). Bosworth Toller has several variants in the first vowel, but everything ends in "", as expected. Following the link provided in the entry to a Webster 1913-based website, I notice that "OE ferlish" is contrasted with "AS fǣrlīc". Methinks that "OE" is really Early Modern English in this case, unless the Middle English spelling has been normalized. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:14, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
 * And just to mix things up some more, this seems to be also early Scots. I would note that the Middle English Dictionary has a link to an OED entry for "ferly", which seems to be a variant of modern Scots ferlie. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:30, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the reply and links to useful resources, I appreciate it. OR AlexMC (talk) 00:57, 29 May 2020 (UTC)

Permission to move PIE*h₁óngʷl̥ to *h₁óngʷōl?
the only other instance of an amphikinetic l-stem suffix is h₂ébōl, which does, in fact, have such a long o grade. The long o grade also matches up with the consensus on amphikinetic animate nominatives. The Armenian and Aryan reflexes show this too. I have edited the pages to reflect this but am waiting to move the page. Anatol Rath (talk) 11:56, 28 May 2020 (UTC)

jack
This is a term of highly diverse meanings. The evolution of the meanings is not always obvious. In addition some of the meanings are backformations, which we do not break out as separate etymologies. Etymology 1 shows meanings for the ENM etymon  which I cannot find in the Middle English Dictionary. Does anyone have the stomach to review the entry to clarify distinct etymologies and sense evolution? DCDuring (talk) 19:40, 28 May 2020 (UTC)
 * The entry in the MED can be found here [] Leasnam (talk) 04:55, 29 May 2020 (UTC)
 * "brass coin"? Also Middle English ? DCDuring (talk) 11:16, 29 May 2020 (UTC)
 * 1460 quote is in Old French, but the "Jackes" appears to be a Middle English term used as a loan in this passage (?) Leasnam (talk) 04:19, 1 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I shouldn’t have the stomach for that all but I have one specific hint at least: In a note on I stumbled upon the claim that plants of this genus – which is also considered synonymous to  – are called jacks.  and  for  syn., Australian English  and  for  syn. , two species mentioned on , but there are only two species ever accepted for Emex. Nothing of them is mentioned on . However I have not found any example of the whole genus Emex being called “jack”. (And such constellations are when I gloss “spp.” instead of “gen. et spp.” in vernacular plant names I create.) The namings of the two species are likely to be artificial botanists’ or weed controllers’ conventions however, especially since the natural ranges of both plants are far from each other, though both be invasive from tropical to temperate climates. Maybe the learned origin helps in discerning the phenomenal sense creation in this word. Fay Freak (talk) 13:20, 3 July 2020 (UTC)
 * Aarrgghh! But thanks. DCDuring (talk) 15:58, 3 July 2020 (UTC)
 * I have been able to expand the entry with plant meanings (which  has  since this the last post though, to note. So it means —of certain plants, which kind of?—, and particularly Jack-in-the-pulpit. Probably for the same reason of having a jack or spadix some other plants are also called like that, but I have not noted further usage. For some other specific-plant example, I have also copied the stuff into a separate gloss instead of making it derived terms, which is still less chaotic then just dropping them in the derived terms. Fay Freak (talk) 18:33, 30 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Are you sure it means spadix? The term "jack" looks like a shortening of Jack-in-the-pulpit that refers to the whole plant, not just the spadix, and "Jack in the Pulpit" itself looks more like a reference to a metaphorical human being standing in a metaphorical church pulpit. It just happens that the plant structure which plays the part in this species is a spadix. By the same token, the pulpit is a spathe- what's to stop someone from adding "spathe" as a sense at pulpit? Chuck Entz (talk) 02:30, 31 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Well if it literally said by one of the naturalists at hand to be “known better to botanists as the spadix”, and repeatedly “spadices (the Jacks)”, who was I to doubt? I am not sure. Looking at the particular plant, I have seen that there is a certain “male” part referred to by this term, which is also the basis for certain technical terms for levers and animal meanings “pike” and “rockfish”, but did not try to generalize this notion otherwise, especially since searching for this polysemous term did not seem promising and probably the meaning was not formal in the first place. Maybe they have even misunderstood something and the story got its own life—with impunity, because the usage hasn’t been documented well! Fay Freak (talk) 06:33, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

Southern Ndebele
Etymology of "le"

Le Means "this" and "there"

Non-Gothic examples of the verb prefix?
This prefix is clearly separated from others in Gothic, but in the other Germanic languages, it seems to have been conflated with and. I wonder if there are any clear examples of this prefix occurring semantically in other Germanic languages, cases that can't reflect the other two. —Rua (mew) 09:15, 29 May 2020 (UTC)
 * You'd have to comb through Bosworth-Toller for OE and Köbler for OHG to verify. I can't recall any specific examples off the top of my head. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 09:28, 29 May 2020 (UTC)
 * It seems to be an obscure prefix in old english, it was probably only distinct in adjectives and nouns, is the only 'clear' example I can find. --DerRudymeister (talk) 10:57, 29 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I don't have Köbler. Searching in Grimm for "ahd. firi" finds four results related to firiwizzan (e.g. Fürwitz next to Vorwitz) and one in verstehen. The later, he notes, has no cognate in Gothic, but compares to understand (this compared to inter), the former formally matches OE fyrwit and Gothic fairweitjan. Searching for "ahd. fir" finds 600 mostly unrelated results, that I didn't sift fir.
 * I can take a guess from the other entries in the Gothic category: vereinen (cp. durchmengen, not verkackeiern); vergreifen (cp. durchgreifen); verheißungsvoll (cp. perhaps umbenennen analog perimeter, Umkreis); verrinnen; verwirken. I thought I found confirmation in DWDS verwirken quoting "ahd. firwurken", but the same didn't work out for verrinnen quoting far-. I won't insinuate semantics either. So I stopped there.
 * Grimm notes several old variants next to firiwizan, too, so I'm sure the spelling alone is no reliable indicator anyhow--perhaps not even for the Gothic. Comparison to durch- (e.g. durchsteigen, durchblicken ~ verstehen) seems trife, and exploring polysemous ModHG ver- alone would be a tremendous effort to begin with. I could mention loads of tentative comparisons that I can't make myself. 109.41.1.116 19:40, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * You might be interested to learn that Köbler's dictionaries are all freely available on his own website: Gothic, Old English, Old High German, Old Norse, Old Saxon, Old Frisian. There's a bunch more if you explore the site. The Gothic one is quite complete, not sure about the others. — Mnemosientje (t · c) 10:07, 4 June 2020 (UTC)

Italian buffo and buffone
The etymologies of and  are circular. Does anyone know anything about these etymologies? ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  17:00, 30 May 2020 (UTC)
 * I always thought the common Romance etymology for these was something like 🇨🇬, "imitative of puffing out the cheeks," which I see linked in 🇨🇬, 🇨🇬, and probably all the terms over at bufar.  Etymonline entry DJ K-Çel (talk) 05:56, 31 May 2020 (UTC)

 * The original sense of the noun buffo is something like “a puff of air”. It is plausible that the noun buffone was derived from this. Perhaps the adjective, meaning “funny”, came from buffone and was carried over – probably as a shortening of  in the opera buffa genre – to a secondary noun sense (not listed under the L2 Italian, but also used there, as seen in the title of ’s book Anche il buffo nel suo piccolo). --Lambiam 14:31, 1 June 2020 (UTC)

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