Talk:Folk etymology - Wikipedia

It seems that this article is devoted to introducing and explaining terms that no one uses. Pseudo-etymology, outdated etymology, fake etymology... The article should be modified to concentrate less on terms, and more on the concepts. Pfalstad 16:03, 14 November 2005 (UTC)Reply

Agreed. Your changes are a definite improvement. I don't suppose you would now like to attack the article Fake etymology, where the title of the article itself is a term nobody uses? Much of what it includes belongs elsewhere, or duplicates other articles. I've tinkered with it before, but it could use a new broom. --Doric Loon 21:14, 29 November 2005 (UTC)Reply

Sure I'd like to.. When i get time. Pfalstad 03:26, 30 November 2005 (UTC)Reply

Dbachmann, you wanted to delete the bit about the false derivation of Slav from Slave (or vice versa). I have done some checking, and my preliminary conclusions are 1. that these two words are NOT related, but 2. that the assumption that they are connected is possibly older and more widespread than just Nazi propaganda; which doesn't change the fact that they used this wickedly! The OED gives the information you cited, namely that Latin sclavus is derived from Slav (or some form of it). However the OED often has outdated etymologies. The only relevant up-to-date reference work I have to hand right now is the new (2002) edition of Kluge, but it gives the following etymology for German Sklave:

Entlehnt aus ml. sclavus, das über *scylavus zu gr. skyleúo, skyláo "ich mache Kriegsbeute" (zu gr. skylon n. "Kriegsbeute") gehört. Damit fiel die griechische Bezeichnung der Slaven, mgr. Sklabenoi, später zusammen, was zu verfehlten etymologischen Vermutungen Anlaß gab.

I'm inclined to believe this, as the semantic development Slav > slave just doesn't sound convincing. --Doric Loon 13:57, 1 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

The american heritage dictionary says they are connected. [1] This could be outdated too, I don't know. But the text should not say that this etymology is a false etymology concocted by the Nazis. It should say it's an outdated etymology (according to reference work X, preferably in English), or a controversial one, but still commonly found in reference works, and by the way it was exploited by the Nazis. Pfalstad 17:16, 1 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

OK! --Doric Loon 07:29, 2 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

I'll leave it to you, since you have access to the reference works; hopefully you can find an english one. Pfalstad 03:44, 4 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

As the OED (Concise 1999) states 'slave' comes from 'Slav' (rather than the reverse - there is a difference which this discussion ignores), it is not OK to simply dismiss it. I'm sure some of their etymologies are wrong, but that doesn't mean this one is! Apparently, the word was first applied to Slavic slaves in the late Roman Empire, the normal Latin word being 'servus' (cf. 'servant', 'serf'). From my understanding your German quote is saying that the derivation is from Greek 'spoils of war', but Slavic slaves would have been one of the main spoils of war captured by the Greek-speaking Eastern Empire at this time(By the way, I think 'Slav' comes from their word for 'word', meaning those who speak their language).--Jack Upland 01:16, 23 January 2006 (UTC)Reply

It is really not wise to use the Consise OED as a source for etymological discussions. It is not written with this kind of problem in mind, and the etymologies from the old edition are mostly not revised in newer printings. Go to sources which are specialised in etymologies. Kluge is klüger (sorry!), especially the brand new up-to-date edition, and Calvert Watkins (The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, 2nd edition, Boston & New York 2000) is often excellent, though it doesn't give any info on this problem. --Doric Loon 13:13, 23 January 2006 (UTC)Reply

Again, the issue is not whether the OED is correct but that this theory is still being advanced in such well-known sources. In a Wikipedia article you should not ignore this. To make matters worse, an apparently reasonable hypothesis is categorised as outdated racial stereotyping. And can you provide a translation of Kluge for those us who are unklug?--Jack Upland 19:36, 23 January 2006 (UTC)Reply

Well, if anyone said we shouldn't note alternative theories, it certainly wasn't me!--Doric Loon 11:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sorry, JU, the translaton. Of course there's no shame in not knowing German! This is Kluge's entry on German Sklave (slave). I translate: Borrowed from medieval Latin sclavus, which goes back via *scylavus to Greek skyleúo, skyláo "I plunder" (related to Greek skylon, spoils of war). This later became conflated with the Greek term for the Slavs, medieval Greek Sklabenoi, which led to erroneous etymological assumptions.--Doric Loon 11:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

'Slovo' does indeed come from our word for 'word, talk'. It can also mean 'letter' as in SerboCroatian 'slovo'. It appears in many toponyms within the Slavic world. I am rather perplexed by the conclusions drawn by Doric Loon. To claim that after doing "some checking" that 'slave' and 'slav' are not connected is incredibly presumptoius and is a slap in the face to the many linguists and philolgists across time and space. I for one will stick by the derivation of 'slave' found in Pokorny and Calvert Watkins, both of whom claim that slave<slav.

No, I don't think it's presumptious to prefer the most modern authorities, and it certainly is not a slap in the face to the great philologians to think that even they may have made claims which are susceptible to dating. Pokorny must have had a linguistic nimbus emanating from his forehead, but there have been 80 years of scholarship since then. BTW, there is no argument that Slav comes from the Slavic root you mention. The dispute is only about slave.--Doric Loon 11:32, 10 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

Based on this discussion I think it's fair to say that the etymology of slave from Slav is controversial, not clearly false.--Jack Upland 00:45, 11 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

In accordance with Duden - Das Herkunftswörterbuch (2. Auflage, Bibliographisches Institut & F.A. Brockhaus AG), the german terms "Sklave" and "Slawe" are identically. Both came from the greek "sklábos", which is identically whith "sklabēnós". In Latin, both forms ("slavus", "sclavus") became used. The germans first used "slave" and then "sclave". I think that the germans came to england between "slave" and "sclave".

I think the german analysis of the connection between slav/slav ist the most intensiv and the quoted informations are up-to-date. Because the nazi prapaganda this topic was frequently discussed and it had a great part of the public attention. --212.161.168.6 01:59, 11 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

>the semantic development Slav > slave just doesn't sound convincing.< True or not, I'm afraid it's not at all unconvincing. The Old English word for 'Welshman' (originally meaning Romanised foreigner) apparently had a similar meaning. I've edited the article to at least point out that the etymology did not originate with the Nazis (which was misleading) and that it's still accepted by many authorities, rightly or wrongly. garik 15:49, 31 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

But why isn't it convincing? Give reasons!--Jack Upland 02:44, 1 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I said it was convincing. It doesn't strike me as an unusual development. Though, of course, that doesn't mean it's true. garik 23:50, 1 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sorry - double-crossed by the double negative...--Jack Upland 02:31, 2 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I think the german analysis of the connection between slav/slav ist the most intensiv

-Fair enough. So let's not ignore the fact that DUDEN, the same edition as quoted above, states that Sklave "ist letztlich identisch mit dem Volksnamen der 'Slawen'. Die appellativische Bedeutung "Sklave" geht auf den Sklavenhandel im mittelalterlichen Orient zurueck, dessen Opfer vorwiegend Slawen waren."

Summarised in English: 'Sklave' (slave) is ultimately identical to the ethnic name Slav. This goes back to the mediaeval oriental slave-trade whose victims where overwhelmingly Slavic. garik 09:51, 8 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

One theory is that Slav comes from "slavo" meaning glory. It seems more likely that it comes from the same root, but in its meaning of "to talk": so Slavs were "speaking people" as opposed to nimyets, dumb people (in other words, Germans, whose language was incomprehensible to Slavs). --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 17:08, 19 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Original version of the word slav is slověninъ, so no. -Iopq 02:01, 5 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

slověninъ looks like a derived form; may be the usual form of the word in OCS or whatever, but since the element slav appears (if only in names) in all of the Slavic languages it's hard to believe that the longer word is "original". —Tamfang 05:09, 16 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

Once again, a confusion between Slav>slave and slave>Slav. Can we get over this???--Jack Upland 12:16, 20 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I merged a bunch of stuff from fake etymology into this article, as discussed here: Talk:fake_etymology#Deletion_or_redefining_of_scope?. Pfalstad 03:44, 4 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

Good. I agree with the merge. But now we have to have a look at that material. Is it all serious, referenced, and worthy of retention here? It feels very anecdotal to me, and a lot of it seems to have more to do with acronyms(backronyms) than with etymology. --Doric Loon 08:51, 5 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

Suggest merging this material with folk etymology -- Thoughts? DavidOaks (talk) 12:28, 9 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

Before launching on that, however, I have made some adjustments to False Etymology…

• Slight tweak on intro, explaining the reasoning for many false etymologies, etymology in general
• Got rid of the disputed “Slave” example, and the less-than-obviously relevant OE “Wealh” – given the wealth of examples, I suggest we should only use very clear ones.
• The section on “folk etymology” as it stands within the “false etymology” article was badly in need of examples. DavidOaks (talk) 13:29, 9 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

Hearing no objections, I replaced the page with a text combining the two articles, and requested that the less general term Folk etymology be moved here. DavidOaks (talk) 14:48, 13 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

This bit was in the "F.U.C.K." section:

acronyms were not widely used before the 20th century

Someone better add this important information to S.P.Q.R., R.I.P. and other articles. --Dante Alighieri | Talk 20:37, 17 January 2006 (UTC)Reply

But neither of these entered into the language as whole words like yuppie, nimbyism, radar etc. There's an important difference.--Jack Upland 01:39, 23 January 2006 (UTC)Reply

A comment on this bit: ""Fuck you/The finger" ...English longbow archers caught by the enemy at Agincourt supposedly had their bow fingers amputated, since at that time the longbow was a devastating weapon and would have given a great advantage to the English. The unaffected archers could taunt the enemy by raising their middle fingers to show they were still intact and the archers could still effectively "pluck yew.""

I guess this article was written by an American. In the UK, the equivalent of 'giving the finger' is to stick up the index finger and middle finger (in the same manner as Churchill's 'V for Victory'). I've read that 'giving the finger' is considered offensive because it's clearly a phallic gesture. The same cannot reasonably be said of the UK's two fingers. They were, however, the fingers with which a bow was drawn. Given that this was so, the explanation that it was a gesture of defiance by Medieval archers makes more sense.143.167.102.199 12:05, 13 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

I have heard it said that two fingers is dual penetration (of a woman), but I can't vouch for this.--Jack Upland 00:38, 15 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

"acronyms were not widely used before the 20th century." Someone better add this important information to S.P.Q.R., R.I.P. and other articles.

Those aren't acronyms; they're abbreviations. garik 14:23, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

And in Hebrew acronyms were used all the time, certainly since the Middle Ages and probably since Talmudic times, e.g. " 'akum", idolater (short for " 'oved kochavim u-mazzalot", worshipper of stars and constellations). Perhaps it should read "acronyms were not widely used in English before the 20th century". --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 15:10, 20 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

The Bible contains many people whose names which are explained with reference to circumstances of the birth. E.g. Genesis 29:32-35 [2] has four examples in succession. Without wishing to offend people's religious beliefs, these all seem like false or folk etymologies to me. Google offers some support. Any opinion from Biblical scholars? Joestynes 00:49, 13 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes, often these are attached to stories which explain the name. The technical term for these would be aetiological stories, though this term is not just used in etymology: any story invented to explain the way things are is aetiological. Don't worry too much about offending beliefs here - mainstream Christianity is quite happy with the idea that these need not be true stories. --Doric Loon 08:22, 13 February 2006 (UTC)Reply

The problem is that there is no consensus on the true etymology of those names. Some (Moses, Phinehas, Naphtali) are clearly Egyptian, and it is just possible that "Abraham" is related to "Brahma", but we would need scholars of Sumerian, Hittite, Hurrian etc, to fill in the gaps. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 10:46, 4 July 2006 (UTC)Reply

Why can't we say 'some scholars have suggested...'?--Jack Upland 23:28, 4 July 2006 (UTC)Reply

Because in some cases there is no alternative even suggested. It would be a bit feeble to say "The Bible explains 'Abraham' as meaning 'father of a multitude': this seems far-fetched, and the name doesn't actually sound Hebrew at all, but we don't know where it really comes from; some seventeenth and eighteenth century scholars have suggested a link to 'Brahma' but this theory is not widely held today." --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 11:06, 10 July 2006 (UTC)Reply

Someone may want to look into the Soap and Mount Sapo legend. --Sean Brunnock 10:29, 24 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

What is the value of "Certain feminists have interpreted this to mean that a man had been legally allowed to beat his wife with his fists but not with a weapon." This is vague, inflammetory and doesn't seem to add anything to this article... protohiro 15:21, 9 May 2006 (UTC)Reply

Ok, everyone had a chance, so I deleted this line. protohiro 19:34, 18 September 2006 (UTC)Reply

The RAE (Real Academia Española) states for gringo that its etymology is discussed (http://buscon.rae.es/draeI/SrvltGUIBusUsual?LEMA=gringo), and several examples from RAE's databank seem to indicate the term was used in the 19th from French and English people.

I've never heard anyone say the Caesar clan was named after the c-section, but only visa-versa. Caesar is said to have come from a word meaning hairy. Is there any veracity for the claim the caesarians being named after the way Caesar or a person of his clan was born? If so, then it's not a false etymology.

Yeh, someone has got this confused: this does not belong in the eponym section. There was a legend that Caesar was born by section. It WAS said in Caesar's own time or shortly afterwards (for example by Pliny) that he got this name because he was CUT (caesus) from his mother's womb. That was a false etymology. However when the modern operation was invented it was named after Caesar because of the legend. THAT is not a false etymology. (But remember that false etymology is not a technical term, and we need to be sensitive to different kinds of deviance from modern scientific etymology: a 1st-century name interpretation is not necessarily to be regarded as an error, so much as a way of playing with words to suggest deeper meaning.) See also the discussions at Julius Caesar#Early life and Caesarian section#Etymology (which need to be tidied up a little). --Doric Loon 09:21, 13 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

But just to clarify: the word caesarian contains a middle syllable -ar- which could not have come directly from the verb form caesus, so the suggestion that the Latin verb produced the name of the operation which was later associated with Caesar is impossible. The name of the operation MUST come from the name Caesar. At dispute is merely the dynamics of the legend. --Doric Loon 13:55, 13 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

Although this is an interesting point about the origin of 'the finger', does it really belong here? I don't think it comes under 'etymology', as it is a gesture, not a word.Ren hoek1981 12:11, 6 December 2006 (UTC)Reply

The text: "* deduced reckoning (for dead reckoning)" was removed from the list of examples. Ship's logs from the 1600s and 1700s do actually contain references to the "ship's position determined by ded. reckoning." See here for details. - Mugs 14:52, 7 January 2007 (UTC)Reply

One of the three references for the origin of cracker (http://www.word-detective.com/100699.html) appears to be a chat board and is therefore counts as a Questionable source. Xargque 18:10, 18 July 2007 (UTC)Reply

The last edit, by Xargque, turns the paragraph into something that is simply untrue. It is not a case of "Silly people think that average, in its arithmetical meaning, comes from a tax on goods. In fact, the real meaning of average is damage at sea, and it comes from Arabic". Rather, it is "It is undisputed that the arithmetical meaning comes from general average, in its marine sense, and that the original meaning of "average" is simply "loss". The question is the history before that. It was formerly thought that it comes from a tax on goods, that being one kind of loss. In fact it comes from the Arabic for damaged goods". --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 10:55, 19 July 2007 (UTC)Reply

• Nylon q.v. — DIV (128.250.204.118 07:41, 17 September 2007 (UTC))Reply

There really has been no succesful distinction between folk etymology and false etymology -- at most, it's a kind of venn-diagram thing, and going through Pyles and Algeo, Baugh & Cable, Millward, Partridge, McLaughlin and my own experience (I teach linguistics, but I know that's original research, so I don't put any weight on it) there is NO recognized, systematic distinction between these terms. Therefore, I propose (once again) merging the two topics (I'll cross post at the other). DavidOaks (talk) 14:38, 9 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

The combined text would look like this:

/merger proposal text

I've moved the combined text from here to its own page to avoid confusing this page. I also changed the section levels and removed the category and interwiki transclusions and removed one "for more examples see folk etymology" line. Having said which, I don't favour modifying the proposal text for style etc before the merge is decided. jnestorius^(talk) 15:34, 13 May 2008 (UTC)Reply

how exactly is this word not based on the damn hole you shove a button through

This is the same article as Folk etymology, except for this article's enormous introduction; they even contained the same folk etymology about 'lantern' being derived from 'lanthorn', although I have changed that in Folk etymology. Anyway I suggest either the demolition of one of these articles or a furious differentiation; my preference being the first, since I'm more familiar with the term 'folk etymology'.

ClockwerkMao (talk) 19:33, 3 December 2008 (UTC)Reply

Merged. Dcoetzee 19:27, 23 February 2009 (UTC)Reply

Summary of discussion:

Agradman sees the concepts as fully distinct, wishes to de-merge the articles.

rʨanaɢ sees the concepts as similar, suggests that we retitle the article to "False etymology and folk etymology", make both terms redirect to it, and have a section early on clarifying the nuanced difference.

garik suggests we retitle to "folk etymology" (and redirect false etymology to it). "First, this article mainly is about folk etymology anyway. Second, since false etymology is the fuel of folk-etymological change, it could be discussed in an article on folk etymology quite happily. Third, false etymology (as distinct from folk etymology) is a less obvious article to have in an encycolpedia in any case. Folk etymology is an interesting phenomenon in language change; false etymology is just a reflection of how people make mistakes. There's nothing wrong with having two articles, but I think the amount of material we have at the moment fits quite well in one article, and that article should be folk etymology."

Agradman provides some sources: [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16]

rʨanaɢ: Perhaps the distinction between folk etymology and false etymology is an idea that was proposed at one time but didn't hold up to scrutiny, or turned out to be far more fuzzy than originally expected.

Garik gives a theory:

It is a little confusing, but it's perhaps not quite as bad as people might be implying. Basically, the distinction is like this: false etymology means exactly what it sounds like—an etymology that is false. It might be proposed by a distinguished professor of linguistics based on serious research (it just happens to be wrong), or it might be something some bloke tells you in the pub. Folk etymology, on the other hand — in its basic sense — simply covers that set of apparently common-sense etymological assumptions that people make based on how some words look like other words: "asparagus must be derived from sparrow-grass", "island must be related to isle" etc. False etymologies based on real research are not strictly included here, except where they enter common (i.e. folk) consciousness, but the distinction's a little blurry in practice. Now, folk etymology is interesting to historical linguists because it can cause a change in the form or meaning of a word. Strictly speaking, folk etymology is the assumption that leads to the change in the word, but it's shifted to refer to the change itself. So this is folk etymology in the second sense (and the one perhaps most common in historical linguistics): a kind of change, based on a mistaken etymology.

One somewhat confusing point is that if we were being very literal about things, we should probably include under the first sense of "folk etymology" true etymologies that come about based on common-sense everyday assumptions with no real research (sometimes this just happens to lead to the right answer!). So, in principle, the form of a word could be changed based on a true etymology, and it would not be entirely unreasonable to refer to this change as an example of folk etymology too. But linguists tend not to do this in my experience (they probably should, as it's basically the same process).

But anyway, to sum up: false etymology is an etymology that isn't true (or, as the article lead coyly puts it—I suppose since our measure of truth isn't generally much more than current consensus—is inconsistent with scholarly consensus). Folk etymology in its basic first sense is the kind of etymology your average Joe does, based on common sense assumptions rather than real research; as this can cause change in the language, folk etymology is used in the second sense as a term for this kind of change. garik () 09:51, 14 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

So one might say that folk etymology in its basic sense is a subset of false etymology, and in its second sense is something that comes about as a result of that. (There's the complication that, in principle, folk etymology in its most basic sense could include etymological assumptions that are actually true but, again, perhaps we shouldn't go there!) garik (talk) 09:55, 14 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

Though (finally!) I should add that writers have not necessarily always been entirely careful in keeping all this clear and distinct. I also don't think much ink has ever been spilt on folk etymology in what I call its basic literal sense. It's only really interesting to historical linguists inasmuch as it influences language change, so that second derived sense is actually the primary usage in the field, and probably always has been. And the term false etymology has certainly been used from time to time where we might prefer folk etymology. The more I think about, the more I'm convinced this should all be one article. There is a useful distinction to be drawn between the two terms, but they've become so intertwined, and are in any case so closely related, that discussing them separately is not necessarily sensible. garik (talk) 10:08, 14 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

rʨanaɢ and Agradman are convinced that the terms belong in one article, including an explanation of the two different senses of "folk etymology", and the fact that it is the language change sense that is of most interest to historical linguists -- perhaps changing the title to "Folk Etymology," since that is the more interesting term, and I like that idea. Agradman (talk) 18:25, 14 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

garik: The only problem I can see is getting sources for what I've called the basic meaning of folk etymology. It's clear that this is somehow the underlying meaning that allowed the term to be used to describe a kind of language change, but introductory texts tend just to define the kind of change involved. garik (talk) 10:22, 15 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

I came by to comment, but User:Garik has said pretty much everything I planned to just above - I'd support renaming the article to folk etymology, too. Knepflerle (talk) 08:29, 17 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

Same here, concur with User:Garik to a large extent (except maybe with the caution that folk etymology not always requires a change to the name). The article ought to be renamed "folk etymology", but I don't think "false etymology" requires more than a clarification within the introduction. Trigaranus (talk) 21:15, 17 June 2009 (UTC)Reply

False etymologies are a consequence of the longstanding interest in putatively original, and therefore normative, meanings of words, a characteristic of logocentrism.

This sounds like somebody's opinion, no fact. 69.122.126.251 (talk) 17:00, 19 September 2009 (UTC)Reply

Well, in critical theory, logocentrism is never viewed positively, so there's a polemic quality here. But brushing away the rhetoric, the statement is factual in the sense that it's circular and banal, and it certainly doesn't get developed. It can go. DavidOaks (talk) 17:27, 19 September 2009 (UTC)Reply

Is "sir name" a false etymology with altered spelling for "surname" in the sense of "family name"? Who uses it, since when, is there a tangible difference with "family name" after all... RFST (talk) 06:28, 18 April 2010 (UTC)Reply

Folk Etymology is a real phenomenon recognized in the literature. The merger of Folk etymology was done in contradiction to the survey on the Folk etymology talk page. Opinion here supports a name change to folk etymology. I am going to request an admin do the change now.μηδείς (talk) 20:56, 16 October 2010 (UTC)Reply