Wiktionary:Etymology scriptorium/2020/February

οὐρανός
On Talk:οὐρανός, a user has questioned our etymology and asserted it's not in any of the references which are cited (not for the etymology, which is uncited) at the bottom of the article. I mention it here so it gets seen. - -sche (discuss) 18:45, 1 February 2020 (UTC) Alternatively, like e.g. ὄχανον : ἔχω, ξόανον : ξέω, it has been supposed that οὐρανός, as an agent noun, derives from a verbal root *uers- as seen in Skt. várṣati ‘to rain’; alternatively, that it derives from the iterative ▶︎ οὐρέω, in the way that Indo-Iranian nouns in -ana- are connected with verbs in -ayati (= Gr. -έω); it would then mean “rainmaker” or “moistener, impregnator”. However, the identity of the suffixes Gr. -ανο- and IIr. -ana- can only be accepted under the doubtful assumption of PIE *a. Specht KZ 66 (1939): 199ff., Fraenkel 1955 s.v. viršùs and others interpreted it as “der zur Hohe in Beziehung stehende”, from the root of Skt. varṣman- [m., n.] ‘height’, Lith. viršùs ‘upper, highest seat’, to which Ἔρρος・ ὁ Ζεύς (H.) has also been connected, so from IE *uers-; however, this is not to be preferred, neither semantically nor formally. The old identification with the theonym Skt. Váruṇa- is certainly wrong; see Mayrhofer EWAia s.v. It has also been suggested that the word is of foreign, i.e. Pre-Greek, origin (DELG); note that -αν- is difficult to account for if the word represents an old IE formation.
 * Beekes’ entry for has the following:
 * As the Aeolic variation ὠρ-, ὀρ- probably stands for geminated ὀρρ-, the basis is likely to have been *(ϝ)ορσανός, accented like ὀρφανός and perhaps an enlargement of a noun *uorsó- = Skt. varṣá- [n., m.] ‘rain’.
 * This partly agrees with, but also partly contradicts our current etymology section. I have copied this in extenso in the hope that someone can manage to condense this into something suitable for our etymology section. --Lambiam 09:52, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I have added Beekes as a reference and removed the bits that contradicted Beekes. --Lambiam 16:07, 1 April 2020 (UTC)

come off it
What is the etymological connotation here?

What is one supposed to be "coming off" of? Tharthan (talk) 22:20, 2 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Not 100% sure, but it evokes in my mind a soapbox one has established and stepped up on in order to advance an opinion or agenda Leasnam (talk) 03:57, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Or perhaps "come off your high horse". DCDuring (talk) 04:16, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * That’s how I interpreted it, but Partridge’s Dictionary of Catch Phrases tells us it comes from come off the grass!, said to be originally US idiom, so probably not related to the interdiction of UK college students’ walking on the grass. --Lambiam 10:08, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
 * So, hang on... this phrase, that is much more used in the UK than it is anywhere else, derives from an old American phrase (that is no longer used)? That's quite curious, to say the least.


 * This information definitely belongs in "come off it"'s etymology section.


 * I'm also wondering if we ought to include an additional "get real!" sense, which is slightly different from the current definition that we give. Tharthan (talk) 04:49, 12 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Also : the phrase "keep off (of) the grass" is seen on signs in the U.S., although it is something that seen mostly in parks. Tharthan (talk) 05:18, 12 February 2020 (UTC)
 * The longer phrase is, apparently, still in use:, , also in Australia . It is listed in Urban Dictionary – not a reliable source, but they tend to have current slang. --Lambiam 07:45, 12 February 2020 (UTC)
 * DARE has come off (imperative, both transitive and intransitive) "Quit! Stop! Cut it out!" with 2 print uses, one print mention, and a mention from one of their interviews, including come off it, from a rural upstate NY informant, elicited in response as a "expression to tell somebody to keep to himself and mind his own business". DCDuring (talk) 19:31, 12 February 2020 (UTC)

Chinese character 印|印(seal) needs an ethimology
Chinese character 印 (seal) seem to be having 又 (hand) and a tool which I can't identify, according to the Oracle bone script.--Alexceltare2 (talk) 13:37, 3 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It’s not a tool but a kneeling person, identical to the kneeling person in e.g., , . Neither component seems to be phonetic, so I’d guess it’s an ideogrammic compound, but it would be nice to get a scholarly source on this (or at least someone who knows more about Old Chinese than I do). — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 16:40, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
 * It's said in 《增訂殷墟書契考釋》(1915) by 羅振玉 that it's a hand suppressing a kneeling person, and that it's the original character for (to suppress).--QIU Ao (talk) 05:47, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I'll take your word for it. Alexceltare2 (talk) 11:02, 19 March 2020 (UTC)

χρυσός
There is a link in the related-term section of to  and vice versa. The corresponding ancient Greek entries on the other hand do not mention any such link. Are these terms really etymologically related? ←₰-→ Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk)  08:30, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * One should expect that Κροίσος is (a Hellenized version of) a Lydian name. As far as I could see, it has no known etymology. --Lambiam 11:01, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I think Crœsus was known in antiquity as the "golden king". (I believe I learned that in history class a few years back. I think it comes from Herodotus.) Probably wordplay or perhaps a folk etymology. But that's the relationship, as far as I'm aware. 2601:49:C301:D810:CDA9:2DB2:FC11:3267 17:34, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Perhaps the idea is that came from the name of the king,, due to the Lydians being the first to use gold currency? Not sure. Translation by A. D. Godley:
 * Herodotus 1.6 "Croesus was a Lydian by birth, son of Alyattes, and sovereign of all the nations west of the river Halys, which flows from the south between Syria and Paphlagonia and empties into the sea called Euxine."
 * Herodotus 1.94 "[The Lydians] were the first men whom we know who coined and used gold and silver currency; and they were the first to sell by retail." --Thrasymedes (talk) 18:52, 28 February 2020 (UTC)

Latin
Wiktionary's entry says it is not related to English it. I feel that in unfair/misleading, considering *hiz, *hit, is just PIE *ke ("this") + *is, *id (note the pronominal inflection)

RubixLang (talk) 19:04, 4 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes, in the same sense that you are taxonomically related to a goldfish. DCDuring (talk) 00:07, 5 February 2020 (UTC)
 * I've removed the claim that it is not a cognate of id. They aren't a perfect match, no, but they're not utterly unrelated either. —Mahāgaja · talk 10:03, 5 February 2020 (UTC)

Cognacy of Proto-Finnic and Hungarian
Can this link be made? Zaicz and Tótfalusi don't mention it.


 * I added the etymology to üsző. Also see . Panda10 (talk) 00:21, 6 February 2020 (UTC)
 * The Indo-Iranian etymology for is considered dubious or obsolete in most recent sources, e.g.  (and already "problematic" per ); Old Hungarian has isew (*isew > *iső) with no sign of initial *w. So the Finnic and Hung. words have nothing in common except *s ~ sz, and per Mordvin  even this is illusory: the Finnic word comes from earlier *wasa, not **waśa as would be required for the Hungarian connection. --Tropylium (talk) 21:31, 6 February 2020 (UTC)

.)

The other theory is that it comes from Tarahumara, although no actual etymon has been proposed. The only evidence for this seems to be that the Tarahumaras live in Chihuahua state, but the state was named after the city, and they do not live near the city.

I would suggest categorizing it as unknown until someone presents some actual evidence. --Lvovmauro (talk) 08:16, 26 February 2020 (UTC)


 * The entry now says the etymology is unknown, as you suggested. (If the spurious Nahuatl or other etymologies were particularly common in "pop" sources—or if they were ever found in other dictionaries, which does not appear to be the case—then it might be worthwhile to specifically debunk/refute them. I know we do this on some entries, although the only one I can think of at the moment is fuck.) - -sche (discuss) 05:58, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

summary
The etymology section currently says:
 * From ML., from la.

Lexico and the Online Etymology Dictionary support this for the adjective. I guess we need a separate section for the noun? We do not yet mention the Classical Latin, which is used by Seneca in Letter 39 to Lucilius, c. AD 65 (English translation). The Online Etymology Dictionary claims this as the source of the noun summary. I was wondering, since is classically attested, whether  came from  +  directly or whether  +  →  → ? For, the DMLBS says "CL as sb. n., LL as sb. m. = accountant" (I think "Classical Latin as substantive neuter, Late Latin as substantive masculine = accountant"?). --Thrasymedes (talk) 22:26, 27 February 2020 (UTC)

ピカチュウ
I stumbled upon the ピカチュウ page, and I'm wondering if the etymology's source should be cited? It apparently comes from this interview with Satoshi Tajiri.

But also, many have noted Pikachu's resemblance to the pika, and this is probably not just coincidence. At the very least it probably qualifies as a popular folk etymology (if a word this new can even have a folk etymology!). I mean, it's so widespread that I think most English-speaking fans have probably heard it before. So is it worth noting?

2601:49:C301:D810:CDA9:2DB2:FC11:3267 17:19, 28 February 2020 (UTC)


 * Our etymology gives the meaning of ピカ as “sparkle”, but in the interview Satoshi Tajiri states that it means “electric spark”. Electricity is part of the – they amass electricity and they can spark with it. According to main designer, the design was based on a squirrel. The Japanese term for the pika is , so the likeness with a pika is probably more a coincidence. , who finalized the , drew much of his inspiration from observing animals in aquariums and zoos. Therefore, it seems more likely that any influence went the other way, from the name to the (redesigned) appearance.  --Lambiam 10:47, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Pokemon is evidently influenced by English (pocket monster), and it would be entirely fallacious to insinuate main character names could not be so., strictly speaking: you don't reject pika, but make an even stronger, so precise claim. That is however not fit for inclusion. It still appears to me you had disagreed with including the word in the ety. This is confusing to me. But if there is a common assumption, that regularly warrants mention with careful wording: "Alleged to be inspired by", "Perhaps", or "Expected to be ..." (literally expected by those reading, who commonly believe the allegation, at least once they see the photo under pika), for example. I can understand if one does not care to have such imprecission in the dictionary.
 * While the topic is on, the word-play could be taken a step further with catch, even catch yoo in Pikachu.
 * pika is new to me, suppose it is not that well known. That alone would be reason enough to link, for discoverability's sake. It couldn't be named for the character, though, could it? "Not found in modern [Evenki] dictionaries." I am growing paranoid. 109.41.2.226 20:05, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Don't let the similarity in spelling fool you: the Japanese sounds sort of like "peek at you", but the animal sounds like "pike-a". If it were pronounced like the animal, it would be something like "パイカチュウ". Also, having seen a pika in person, I don't see the resemblance. For one thing, the ears are much smaller and rounder in the pika- they don't stick out at all. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:02, 4 March 2020 (UTC)
 * , re: Tajiri's mention of sparks, it's still covered by the root: electric discharge causes a flash of light.  We see the same conceptual relatedness in 🇨🇬 and.
 * FWIW, I'm not aware of any Japanese terms that contain the root and are specific to electricity.  An electric spark in Japanese would be translated as something like  in reference to the physical spark as a hot bit of plasma or burning material,  to refer to the flash of light from the discharge, or  as the borrowed term to lend possible overtones of modernness.  Note that Chinese-derived  is written with the  kanji, which is also the spelling for native Japanese term, and which includes a version of this same  root.  ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │Tala við mig 22:20, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Now I feel reminded of the Asterix comics. Footnote: Asterix is "usually the star of the story". 109.41.0.188 19:28, 22 March 2020 (UTC)

Toletum
RFV of the etymology: "From a word meaning 'hill' akin to ." I'm unaware of any Celtic word for 'hill' that looks like *tol. —Mahāgaja · talk 22:40, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
 * This etymology may come from the Toledo entry at the Online Etymology Dictionary. See also John Everett-Heath's The Concise Dictionary of World Place Names, which says the name is "from the Celtic tol 'elevation' or 'rise'."
 * is used by Livy (e.g., 35.7.8 and 35.22.7), who mentions Celtic tribes in the region ("the Vaccaei, the Vettones and the Celtiberi"). In 35.22.8, we have (of the Toletani), so I guess we also have the plural noun, 2nd declension masculine, for the name of the inhabitants. Perhaps a Celtic origin with the Latin  (place of) suffix might make sense historically? But that does not help us with the word itself.
 * Toledo is on a hill, so a word for 'hill' would make sense. The Irish (Foclóir Gaeilge–Béarla), which has a meaning of tall rock (for which we don't yet have an etymology), might perhaps be related? --Thrasymedes (talk) 14:43, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Both and  are loanwords from, so not Proto-Celtic. —Mahāgaja · talk 15:07, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
 * , According to Spenser's Welsh, Celtic  evolved from an earlier word meaning "hole" or "perforation," making it cognate with 🇨🇬, 🇨🇬, the surname O'Toole, etc; also cf. Matasovic p. 393-394 for this root. This possibly connects it to another Latin placename, modern 🇨🇬, which cites a paper in Spanish describing the word as well.  DJ K-Çel (talk) 16:41, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * I can't view the link to Spenser; does he explicitly derive from this root? —Mahāgaja · talk 17:50, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * See also Draper's 1919 article "Spenser's Linguistics in "The Present State of Ireland"" (pp. 482–483) for a discussion of tol. --Thrasymedes (talk) 18:12, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Yes! That's what I was trying to link to, in this case on page 123. Spenser doesn't mention  explicitly; the  <<  comes from Etymonline and Everett, and the rest comes from Spenser and Matasovic. I'd be happy to link to these sources on the entry. DJ K-Çel (talk) 19:26, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * Perhaps it would be good if we could find the sources Etymonline and Everett-Heath are using to claim that means hill, elevation? I guess Spencer's claim,, may be one of them. On the other hand, Draper seems to think poorly of Spencer's work: "Spencer's Welsh, on the whole, seems to be pretty thoroughly muddled … the author of The Present State of Ireland knew very little Welsh" (p. 123 / p. 483). Draper says that  "regularly signifies a hole or perforation" and the  entry in Matasović's Etymological Dictionary Of Proto-Celtic (2009) discussed above supports this, but neither source seems to support . Two relevant quotations from A View of the present State of Ireland (1596) seem to be "the Tooles are called of the old Brytish woord Tol, that is, an hilly Country" and "for Brin in the Britons language signifieth wooddy, and Toll hilly, which names, it semeth, they tooke of the country which they inhabited, which is all very mountaine and wooddy." --Thrasymedes (talk) 22:28, 2 March 2020 (UTC)
 * You're right,, thanks. That's very helpful. I've updated the entry with the references. DJ K-Çel (talk) 17:01, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
 * The name (O')Toole is almost certainly unrelated. The Irish form is which looks if anything like a derivative of . It certainly can't come from anything looking like *tol- or *toll- in Proto-Celtic. —Mahāgaja · talk 19:12, 3 March 2020 (UTC)

with
Given við in Old Norse, is it possible that the Old Norse word influenced the sense development of Old English wiþ (and/or its descendants)? Tharthan (talk) 23:33, 28 February 2020 (UTC)
 * They seem to have basically the same set of meanings in Old English and Old Norse. Can you be more explicit in what you see as which Old Norse sense having possibly influenced which Old English sense development? --Lambiam 09:09, 29 February 2020 (UTC)
 * Maybe you're right. But I was wondering if senses 1.3, 1.4, 1.5, 2.1, and 2.4 of Old Norse við could have contributed to the shift in focus in the English language cognate from the "against" sense to the current most usual sense. Do you think that there is any more likelihood than not with regard to that? Tharthan (talk) 00:53, 3 March 2020 (UTC)
 * avec traces Frankish (apud hocque) and lists Norman aveu. with had replaced mid (cognate meta, German mit, perhaps mittels "by use of; with"). An earlier influence than Middle English (i.e. b ~ v, p ~ b, or Celtic mb, m ~ b) thus seems out of the question, and to remote for Norse and Norman, too. But a common initial source, i.e. aveu, for Norse and English might be of interest. 109.41.2.226 20:32, 3 March 2020 (UTC)