Interesting etymologies

Esel · 03-08-2016 02:17AM

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

Knacker is a common pejorative term with a very interesting history.

Did you know it can be traced to the 1570s, where it relates to harness-makers, and describes people who helped farmers with horses (harness-making, castrating, disposing of carcasses)

It can be further traced back to the Old Norse word hnakkur, meaning a saddle. Saddles are fitted just behind the horse's neck, of course, and hnakkur is itself related to the Norse word hnakki, meaning the back of the neck.

Hence, the words neck and knacker are also related. For what can be an offensive term, it has a very long & interesting history. It's a shame that a word of such dignified history has been reduced to a slur.

(Please don't start talking about travellers here, that isn't the point of the thread)

What's your favourite piece of etymology?

Gaelic:

Each (pronounced 'ack') = horse

Eachair ('acker') = horseman, rider

An eachair ('on acker') = the horseman, rider

Na n-eachair ('Nah nacker') = the horsemen, riders

fatknacker · 03-08-2016 02:42AM

RobertKK wrote: »

In Ireland on a farm you may have a haggart.

The word comes from the Vikings, and it is a small piece of land close to the house where the hay was stored for the animals.
Next to my house is the haggart.

Related to Old Norse heygarthr, with hey = hay and garthr meaning yard, so a hay yard, but it is a small piece of land usually beside the farmhouse.
Mine currently stores bales of silage...

That's interesting. I wonder does it also have something to do with the origins of "hag" and "haggardly"?

Wibbs · 03-08-2016 03:21AM

maudgonner wrote: »

Some words of Irish origin:

Smithereens - from the Irish word smidirín - little fragment.
Slob - from sláb - mud.

Clock - bell in Irish.

03-08-2016 04:52PM

The word mortgage comes from two French words, the one for death - mort - and the one for pledge or promise - gage.

So a mortgage is a death-pledge.

The French 'mort' is also indicated in the origins of the words mortuary, mortality, and mortal.

liz lemoncello · 03-08-2016 05:04PM

Aongus Von Bismarck wrote: »

The word donnybrook was used to describe a fight at a sporting event in early US radio broadcasting, especially when a boxing bout would descend into late rounds of haphazard brawling. It is still used occasionally, but has become rather archaic....
.

It's still used in Canada to refer to a fight that has broken out at a hockey game.

RayM · 03-08-2016 05:20PM

Aongus Von Bismarck wrote: »

Its origin is in organised fights that used to take place in Donnybrook fair in Dublin in the mid 1800's.

I was recently charged €5.50 for a pathetically small chicken and sweet chilli wrap in Donnybrook Fair. Lucky there wasn't a fight there and then, let me tell you.

valoren · 03-08-2016 05:29PM

God Help Us!

God elp us!

Got elp is!

Telpis!

dinjo99 · 03-08-2016 05:35PM

Nylon is made up of the names of the 2 cities in which it was invented/developed.
New York and LONdon.

The word "posh" is an acronym for
Port Out, Starboard Home.

Well off people on Ships would order a cabin so they had the sun through the porthole on both legs of the journey.

03-08-2016 06:26PM

Esel wrote: »

Gaelic:

Each (pronounced 'ack') = horse

Eachair ('acker') = horseman, rider

An eachair ('on acker') = the horseman, rider

Na n-eachair ('Nah nacker') = the horsemen, riders

Hmm, eachair sounds a little dubious, and indeed formal. I wonder if there is any recording of the term in old Irish texts.

It might be an etymological co-incidence, a little bit like the word cunt, which clearly has its roots in the Common Germanic (kunto), but prior to that, there are equally valid arguments that it comes from a number of Greek, French and Persian sources. It's difficult to distinguish truth from co-incidence.

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater · 03-08-2016 06:40PM

The term 'Galore', used to describe 'a lot of' or 'plenty' came directly from the Irish term 'go leor' which describes the same.

Realt Dearg Sec · 03-08-2016 06:51PM

The word "coach" as it refers to a bus or a train comes from the Hungarian kócsi. The town of Kocs was where a type of wagon was invented, kóscsi means "from Kocs".

Not sure how interesting that is, but it's one of only a tiny handful of English words (or European words generally) that are derived from Hungarian, and it points to what an anomaly the language is right there in the middle of Europe.

Another example is biro, for a pen. Derived from the name of the inventor of the ballpoint pen, László Bíró (pronounced Beero).

PowerToWait · 03-08-2016 08:52PM

There is a theory that the the use of 'do you dig' to mean 'do you understand', is derived from the Gaelic 'an dtuigeann tu?'.

Apparently black slaves picked it up off Irish guys in the mines of Dakota.

03-08-2016 08:59PM

I posted it on a different thread before but it was satisfying to me to find out that the word "nappy" (ie. diaper) comes from the word napkin - seems obvious enough but I never realised it until I saw the words "napkin rash" on a tub of sudocrem!

03-08-2016 09:03PM

Deleted User wrote: »

I posted it on a different thread before but it was satisfying to me to find out that the word "nappy" (ie. diaper) comes from the word napkin - seems obvious enough but I never realised it until I saw the words "napkin rash" on a tub of sudocrem!

There was an interesting discussion about this on the radio recently.

Contrary to what most of us probably assumed, nappy was originally more of an American term, and diaper a British one (or rather, was popular in Britain, from medieval Greek: via Old French diapre, from medieval Latin diasprum, from medieval Greek diaspros (adjective), roughly meaning a white & diamond-shaped.

03-08-2016 09:11PM

The word 'picnic' was commonly believed to have it's origins in the good ole days when the whole family could go out to enjoy an auld lynching. A black person (a nic, supposedly a contraction of ni**er) would be 'pic'-ed for lynching and the family would enjoy a snack outdoors waiting for the festivities to happen. Utter rubbish.

Picnic is probably derived from the French 'Piquer' , meaning to peck or pick at.

PowerToWait · 03-08-2016 09:33PM

Candie wrote: »

Picnic is probably derived from the French 'Piquer' , meaning to peck or pick at.

I understand 'piquer' as to sting. Possibly prick.

This is where porcupine originates. C'est un 'porc qui pique' - a pig that pricks.

03-08-2016 09:42PM

This site (in French) substantiate's Candie's reference to 'piquer' (as in, 'pecking'), and it also says that 'nique' means 'small thing of little worth', hence to pique-nique was essentially to peck at morsels.

Niquer means f**k, nowadays; not quite clear what the connection is there, though.

Agricola · 03-08-2016 09:49PM

Discovered by the Germans in 1904, they named it San Diego, which of course in German means, a whale's vagina.

PowerToWait · 03-08-2016 09:51PM

I understand it as to sting as most French speakers would. Niquer is to '**** over' if that makes sense, not necessarily to fūck in the biblical sense.

Je me suis fait niquè - I got fücked.

03-08-2016 09:53PM

PowerToWait wrote: »

I understand it as to sting as most French speakers would. Niquer is to '**** over' if that makes sense, not necessarily to fūck in the biblical sense.

But what's that got to do with the interpretation of nique as 'small thing of little worth'?

I know what niquer means as a slang term, I just can't see an obvious connection to the archaic meaning 'a thing of little worth'. The link I posted kinda mentions it, but it doesn't really make sense.

dusty207 · 03-08-2016 10:12PM

He was out on the Batter, i.e getting jarred, was a pub crawl down Stoneybatter, home to many fine Dublin pubs!

PowerToWait · 03-08-2016 10:16PM

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

But what's that got to do with the interpretation of nique as 'small thing of little worth'.

Specifically, nothing, sorry. I hadn't known nique as a noun, only knew 'piquer' as to sting or prick and niquer as to do in.

OT; Chivalry is derived from chevalier, a knight.

The King of Moo · 03-08-2016 10:34PM

dinjo99 wrote: »

Nylon is made up of the names of the 2 cities in which it was invented/developed.
New York and LONdon.

The word "posh" is an acronym for
Port Out, Starboard Home.

Well off people on Ships would order a cabin so they had the sun through the porthole on both legs of the journey.

Sadly, as much as I'd like that to be true, there's no evidence to support that, and it's more likely to come from an early 20th-century slang for dandy, or an old Romani slang word for money.

brevity · 03-08-2016 10:40PM

Candie wrote: »

The word mortgage comes from two French words, the one for death - mort - and the one for pledge or promise - gage.

So a mortgage is a death-pledge.

The French 'mort' is also indicated in the origins of the words mortuary, mortality, and mortal.

In France, an orgasm is sometimes called "la petite mort"...

PowerToWait · 03-08-2016 10:56PM

Kibosh - as in to put the kibosh on something, to end it.

It has been said it has a Gaelic origin, from 'cap báis' - death cap. But this is disputed.

03-08-2016 11:07PM

The Clink prison in England was the site of some terrible tortures from the very start of it's existence in the 1100's.

That's why you don't want to end up in the clink!

steddyeddy · 03-08-2016 11:37PM

The word revolutionary is an interesting one. Revolution originally meant to revolve around an axis or some other fixed point. The later use of the word to mean something new or different has an astronomical origin. Copernicus, the Polish astronomer originally used the word, which derives from the Latin revolvere to describe the movement of the planets around the sun. His theory wasn't readily accepted and therefore his treatise was revolutionary.

The original theory described something fixed like the revolution of the planets but later astrologers used to connect the movement of the stars and planets with revolutionary events in the lives of man.

uch · 03-08-2016 11:59PM

Can anyone explain to me what an etymologies is?

steddyeddy · 04-08-2016 12:05AM

uch wrote: »

Can anyone explain to me what an etymologies is?

The study of the origin of words.

evolving_doors · 04-08-2016 12:24AM

brevity wrote: »

In France, an orgasm is sometimes called "la petite mort"...

naw, "la petite mort" comes after the orgasm.

Interesting etymologies

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