WORDS OF POPULAR MANUFACTURE
In a sense, all nomenclature, apart from purely scientific language, is
popular. But real meanings are often so rapidly obscured that words
become mere labels, and cease to call up the image or the poetic idea
with which they were first associated. To take a simple instance, how
many people realise that the _daisy_ is the "day's eye"?--
"Wele by reson men it calle may
The _dayeseye_ or ellis the 'eye of day.'"
(CHAUCER, _Legend of Good Women_, Prol., l. 184.)
In studying that part of our vocabulary which especially illustrates the
tendencies shown in popular name-giving, one is struck by the keen
observation and imaginative power shown by our far-off ancestors, and
the lack of these qualities in later ages.
Perhaps in no part of the language does this appear so clearly as in the
names of plants and flowers. The most primitive way of naming a flower
is from some observed resemblance, and it is curious to notice the
parallelism of this process in various languages. Thus our _crowfoot_,
_crane's bill_, _larkspur_, _monkshood_, _snapdragon_, are in German
_Hahnenfuss_ (cock's foot), _Storchschnabel_ (stork's bill),
_Rittersporn_ (knight's spur), _Eisenhut_ (iron hat), _Löwenmaul_
(lion's mouth). I have purposely chosen instances in which the
correspondence is not absolute, because examples like _Löwenzahn_
(lion's tooth), _dandelion_ (Fr. _dent de lion_) may be suspected of
being mere translations. I give the names in most general use, but the
provincial variants are numerous, though usually of the same type. The
French names of the flowers mentioned are still more like the English.
The more learned words which sometimes replace the above are, though now
felt as mere symbols, of similar origin, e.g., _geranium_ and
_pelargonium_, used for the cultivated _crane's bill_, are derived from
the Greek for crane and stork respectively. So also in _chelidonium_,
whence our _celandine_ or _swallow-wort_, we have the Greek for swallow.
In the English names of plants we observe various tendencies of the
popular imagination. We have the crudeness of _cowslip_ for earlier
_cowslop_, cow-dung, and many old names of unquotable coarseness, the
quaintness of _Sweet William_, _lords and ladies_, _bachelors' buttons_,
_dead men's fingers_, and the exquisite poetry of _forget-me-not_,
_heart's ease_, _love in a mist_, _traveller's joy_. There is also a
special group named from medicinal properties, such as _feverfew_, a
doublet of _febrifuge_, and _tansy_, Fr. _tanaisie_, from Greco-Lat.
_athanasia_, immortality. We may compare the learned _saxifrage_,
stone-breaker, of which the Spanish doublet is _sassafras_. The German
name is _Steinbrech_.
There must have been a time when a simple instinct for poetry was
possessed by all nations, as it still is by uncivilised races and
children. Among European nations this instinct appears to be dead for
ever. We can name neither a mountain nor a flower. Our Mount Costigan,
Mount Perry, Mount William cut a sorry figure beside the peaks of the
Bernese Oberland, the Monk, the Maiden, the Storm Pike, the Dark Eagle
Pike.[24] Occasionally a race which is accidentally brought into closer
contact with nature may have a happy inspiration, such as the
_Drakensberg_ (dragon's mountain) or _Weenen_[25] (weeping) of the old
_voortrekkers_. But the Cliff of the Falling Flowers, the name of a
precipice over which the Korean queens cast themselves to escape
dishonour, represents an imaginative realm which is closed to us.[26]
The botanist who describes a new flower hastens to join the company of
Messrs _Dahl_, _Fuchs_, _Lobel_, _Magnol_ and _Wistar_, while fresh
varieties are used to immortalise a florist and his family.
[Page Heading: NAMES OF FRUITS]
The names of fruits, perhaps because they lend themselves less easily to
imaginative treatment, are even duller than modern names of flowers. The
only English names are the _apple_ and the _berry_. New fruits either
retained their foreign names (_cherry_, _peach_, _pear_, _quince_) or
were violently converted into _apples_ or _berries_, usually the former.
This practice is common to the European languages, the _apple_ being
regarded as the typical fruit. Thus the orange is usually called in
North Germany _Apfelsine_, apple of China, with which we may compare our
"China orange." In South Germany it was called _Pomeranze_ (now used
especially of the Seville orange), from Ital. _pomo_, apple, _arancia_,
orange. Fr. _orange_ is folk-etymology (_or_, gold) for _*arange_, from
Arab. _narandj_, whence Span. _naranja_. _Melon_ is simply the Greek for
"apple," and has also given us _marmalade_, which comes, through French,
from Port. _marmelada_, quince jam, a derivative of Greco-Lat.
_melimelum_, quince, lit. honey-apple. _Pine-apple_ meant "fir-cone" as
late as the 17th century, as Fr. _pomme de pin_ still does.[27] The
fruit was named from its shape, which closely resembles that of a
fir-cone. _Pomegranate_ means "apple with seeds." We also find the
apricot, lemon (_pomcitron_), peach, and quince all described as apples.
At least one fruit, the _greengage_, is named from a person, Sir William
Gage, a gentleman of Suffolk, who popularised its cultivation early in
the 18th century. It happens that the French name of the fruit,
_reine-claude_ (pronounced _glaude_), is also personal, from the wife of
Francis I.
Animal nomenclature shows some strange vagaries. The resemblance of the
_hippopotamus_, lit. river-horse, to the horse, hardly extends beyond
their common possession of four legs.[28] The lion would hardly
recognise himself in the _ant-lion_ or the _sea-lion_, still less in the
_chameleon_, lit. earth-lion, the first element of which occurs also in
_camomile_, earth-apple. The _guinea-pig_ is not a pig, nor does it come
from Guinea (see p. 51). _Porcupine_ means "spiny pig." It has an
extraordinary number of early variants, and Shakespeare wrote it
_porpentine_. One Mid. English form was _porkpoint_. The French name has
hesitated between _spine_ and _spike_. The modern form is _porc-épic_,
but Palsgrave has "_porkepyn_ a beest, _porc espin_." _Porpoise_ is from
Old Fr. _porpeis_, for _porc peis_ (Lat. _porcus piscis_), pig-fish. The
modern French name is _marsouin_, from Ger. _Meerschwein_, sea-pig;
_cf._ the name _sea-hog_, formerly used in English. Old Fr. _peis_
survives also in _grampus_, Anglo-Fr. _grampais_ for _grand peis_, big
fish, but the usual Old French word is _craspeis_ or _graspeis_, fat
fish.
The _caterpillar_ seems to have suggested in turn a cat and a dog. Our
word is corrupted by folk-etymology from Old Fr. _chatepeleuse_, "a
corne-devouring mite, or weevell" (Cotgrave). This probably means
"woolly cat," just as a common species is popularly called _woolly
bear_, but it was understood as being connected with the French verb
_peler_, "to _pill_, pare, barke, unrinde, unskin" (Cotgrave). The
modern French name for the caterpillar is _chenille_, a derivative of
_chien_, dog. It has also been applied to a fabric of a woolly nature;
_cf._ the botanical _catkin_, which is in French _chaton_, kitten.
[Page Heading: NICKNAMES OF ANIMALS]
Some animals bear nicknames. _Dotterel_ means "dotard," and _dodo_ is
from the Port. _doudo_, mad. _Ferret_ is from Fr. _furet_, a diminutive
from Lat. _fur_, thief. _Shark_ was used of a sharper or greedy parasite
before it was applied to the fish. This, in the records of the
Elizabethan voyagers, is more often called by its Spanish name
_tiburon_, whence Cape Tiburon, in Haiti. The origin of _shark_ is
unknown, but it appears to be identical with _shirk_, for which we find
earlier _sherk_. We find Ital. _scrocco_ (whence Fr. _escroc_), Ger.
_Schurke_, Du. _schurk_, rascal, all rendered "shark" in early
dictionaries, but the relationship of these words is not clear. The
_palmer_, _i.e._ pilgrim, worm is so called from his wandering habits.
_Ortolan_, the name given by Tudor cooks to the garden bunting, means
"gardener" (Lat. _hortus_, garden). It comes to us through French from
Ital. _ortolano_, "a gardener, an orchard keeper. Also a kinde of
daintie birde in Italie, some take it to be the linnet" (Florio). We may
compare Fr. _bouvreuil_, bull-finch, a diminutive of _bouvier_, ox-herd.
This is called in German _Dompfaffe_, a contemptuous name for a
cathedral canon. Fr. _moineau_, sparrow, is a diminutive of _moine_,
monk. The wagtail is called in French _lavandière_, laundress, from the
up and down motion of its tail suggesting the washerwoman's beetle, and
_bergeronnette_, little shepherdess, from its habit of following the
sheep. _Adjutant_, the nickname of the solemn Indian stork, is clearly
due to Mr Atkins, and the _secretary_ bird is so named because some of
his head feathers suggest a quill pen behind an ear.
The converse process of people being nicknamed from animals is also
common and the metaphor is usually pretty obvious. An interesting case
is _shrew_, a libel on a very inoffensive little animal, the
_shrew-mouse_, Anglo-Sax. _scr[=e]awa_. Cooper describes _mus araneus_
as "a kinde of mise called a _shrew_, which if he go over a beastes
backe he shall be lame in the chyne; if he byte it swelleth to the heart
and the beast dyeth." This "information" is derived from Pliny, but the
superstition is found in Greek. The epithet was, up to Shakespeare's
time, applied indifferently to both sexes. From _shrew_ is derived
_shrewd_, earlier _shrewed_,[29] the meaning of which has become much
milder than when Henry VIII. said to Cranmer--
"The common voice I see is verified
Of thee which says, 'Do my lord of Canterbury
A _shrewd_ turn, and he's your friend for ever.'"
(_Henry VIII._, v. 2.)
The title _Dauphin_, lit. dolphin, commemorates the absorption into the
French monarchy, in 1349, of the lordship of Dauphiné, the cognisance of
which was three dolphins.
The application of animals' names to diseases is a familiar phenomenon,
e.g., _cancer_ (and _canker_), crab, and _lupus_, wolf. To this class
belongs _mulligrubs_, for which we find in the 17th century also _mouldy
grubs_. Its oldest meaning is stomach-ache, still given in Hotten's
Slang Dictionary (1864). _Mully_ is still used in dialect for mouldy,
earthy, and _grub_ was once the regular word for worm. The Latin name
for the same discomfort was _verminatio_, from _vermis_, a worm. For the
later transition of meaning we may compare _megrims_, from Fr.
_migraine_, head-ache, Greco-Lat. _hemicrania_, lit. half-skull, because
supposed to affect one side only of the head.
A good many names of plants and animals have a religious origin.
_Hollyhock_ is for _holy hock_, from Anglo-Sax. _hoc_, mallow: for the
pronunciation cf. _holiday_. _Halibut_ means _holy butt_, the latter
word being an old name for flat fish; for this form of _holy_ cf.
_halidom_. _Lady_ in names of flowers such as _lady's bedstraw_, _lady's
garter_, _lady's slipper_, is for Our Lady. So also in _lady-bird_,
called in French _bête à bon Dieu_ and in German _Marienkäfer_, Mary's
beetle. Here may be mentioned _samphire_, from Old Fr. _herbe de Saint
Pierre_, "sampire, crestmarin" (Cotgrave). The _filbert_, earlier
_philibert_, is named from St Philibert, the nut being ripe by St
Philibert's day (22nd Aug.). We may compare Ger. _Lambertsnuss_,
filbert, originally "Lombard nut," but popularly associated with St
Lambert's day (17th Sept.).
[Page Heading: BAPTISMAL NAMES OF ANIMALS]
The application of baptismal names to animals is a very general
practice, though the reason for the selection of the particular name is
not always clear. The most famous of such names is _Renard_ the Fox. The
Old French for fox is _goupil_, a derivative of Lat. _vulpes_, fox. The
hero of the great beast epic of the Middle Ages is _Renard le goupil_,
and the fact that _renard_ now completely supplanted _goupil_ shows how
popular the Renard legends must have been. _Renard_ is from Old High
Ger. _regin-hart_, strong in counsel; _cf._ our names _Reginald_ and
_Reynold_, and Scot. _Ronald_, of Norse origin. From the same source
come _Chantecler_, lit. sing-clear, the cock, and _Partlet_, the hen,
while _Bruin_, the bear, lit. "brown," is from the Dutch version of the
epic. In the Low German version, _Reinke de Vos_, the ape's name is
_Moneke_, a diminutive corresponding to Ital. _monicchio_, "a pugge, a
_munkie_, an ape" (Florio), the earlier history of which is much
disputed. The cat was called _Tibert_ or _Theobald_--
MERCUTIO. "_Tybalt_, you rat-catcher, will you walk?"
TYBALT. "What wouldst thou have with me?"
MERCUTIO. "Good king of cats, nothing but one of your nine lives."
(_Romeo and Juliet_, iii. 1.)
The fact that the donkey was at one time regularly called _Cuddy_ made
_Cuthbert_ for a long period unpopular as a baptismal name. He is now
often called _Neddy_. The hare was called _Wat_ (_Walter_) in Tudor
times. In the _Roman de Renard_ he is _Couard_, whence _coward_, a
derivative of Old Fr. _coue_ (_queue_), tail, from Lat. _cauda_. The
idea is that of the tail between the legs, so that the name is
etymologically not very appropriate to the hare. _Parrot_, for earlier
_perrot_, means "little Peter." The extension _Poll parrot_ is thus a
kind of hermaphrodite. Fr. _pierrot_ is still used for the sparrow. The
family name _Perrot_ is sometimes a nickname, "the chatterer," but can
also mean literally "little Peter," just as _Emmot_ means "little Emma,"
and _Marriot_ "little Mary." _Petrel_ is of cognate origin, with an
allusion to St Peter's walking upon the sea; _cf._ its German name,
_Sankt Peters Vogel_. Sailors call the petrel _Mother Carey's chicken_,
probably a nautical corruption of some old Spanish or Italian name.
But, in spite of ingenious guesses, this lady's genealogy remains as
obscure as that of Davy Jones or the Jolly Roger.
[Page Heading: NAMES OF BIRDS]
_Robin_ has practically replaced _red-breast_. The _martin_ is in French
_martinet_, and the name may have been given in allusion to the
southward flight of this swallow about Martinmas; but the king-fisher,
not a migrant bird, is called _martin-pêcheur_, formerly also _martinet
pêcheur_ or _oiseau de Saint-Martin_, so that _martin_ may be due to
some other association. Sometimes the double name survives. We no longer
say _Philip sparrow_, but _Jack ass_, _Jack daw_, _Jenny wren_, _Tom
tit_ (see p. 123), and the inclusive _Dicky bird_, are still familiar.
With these we may compare _Hob_ (_i.e._ Robert) _goblin_. _Madge owl_,
or simply _Madge_, was once common. For _Mag pie_ we find also various
diminutives--
"Augurs, and understood relations, have
By _magot-pies_, and choughs, and rooks, brought forth
The secret'st man of blood."
(_Macbeth_, iii. 4.)
Cotgrave has _pie_, "a pye, pyannat, _meggatapie_." In Old French it was
also called _jaquette_, "a proper name for a woman; also, a piannat, or
_megatapie_" (Cotgrave).
The connection of this word, Fr. _pie_, Lat. _pica_, with the comestible
_pie_ is uncertain, but it seems likely that the magpie's habit of
collecting miscellaneous trifles caused its name to be given to a dish
of uncertain constituents. It is a curious coincidence that the obsolete
_chuet_ or _chewet_ meant both a round pie and a jackdaw.[30] It is
uncertain in which of the two senses Prince Hal applies the name to
Falstaff (1 _Henry IV._, v. 1). It comes from Fr. _chouette_,
screech-owl, which formerly meant also "a chough, daw, jack-daw"
(Cotgrave).
A _piebald_ horse is one _balled_ like a magpie. _Ball_ is a Celtic word
for a white mark, especially on the forehead; hence the tavern sign of
the _Baldfaced Stag_. Our adjective _bald_ is thus a past participle.
Things are often named from animals. _Crane_, _kite_, _donkey-engine_,
_monkey-wrench_, _pig-iron_, etc., are simple cases. The _crane_ picture
is so striking that we are not surprised to find it literally reproduced
in many other languages. The toy called a _kite_ is in French _cerf
volant_, flying stag, a name also applied to the stag-beetle, and in
Ger. _Drachen_, dragon. It is natural that terrifying names should have
been given to early fire-arms. Many of these, e.g., _basilisk_,
_serpent_, _falconet_, _saker_ (from Fr. _sacre_, a kind of hawk), are
obsolete--
"The cannon, blunderbuss, and _saker_,
He was th' inventor of and maker."
(_Hudibras_, i. 2.)
More familiar is _culverin_, Fr. _couleuvrine_, a derivative of
_couleuvre_, adder, Lat. _coluber_--
"And thou hast talk'd
Of sallies and retires, of trenches, tents,
Of palisadoes, frontiers, parapets,
Of basilisks, of cannon, _culverin_."
(1 _Henry IV._, ii. 3.)
One name for a hand-gun was _dragon_, whence our _dragoon_, originally
applied to a kind of mounted infantry or carbineers. _Musket_, like
_saker_ (v.s.), was the name of a hawk. Mistress Ford uses it playfully
to her page--
"How now, my eyas[31]-_musket_, what news with you?"
(_Merry Wives_, iii. 3.)
But the hawk was so nicknamed from its small size. Fr. _mousquet_, now
replaced in the hawk sense by _émouchet_, is from Ital. _moschetto_, a
diminutive from Lat. _musca_, fly. Thus _mosquito_ (Spanish) and
_musket_ are doublets.
_Porcelain_ comes, through French, from Ital. _porcellana_, "a kinde of
fine earth called _porcelane_, whereof they make fine china dishes,
called _porcellan_ dishes" (Florio). This is, however, a transferred
meaning, _porcellana_ being the name of a particularly glossy shell
called the "Venus shell." It is a derivative of Lat. _porcus_, pig.
_Easel_ comes, with many other painters' terms, from Holland. It is Du.
_ezel_, ass, which, like Ger. _Esel_, comes from Lat. _asinus_. For its
metaphorical application we may compare Fr. _chevalet_, easel, lit.
"little horse," and Eng. "clothes-_horse_."
[Page Heading: THINGS NAMED FROM PERSONS]
Objects often bear the names of individuals. Such are _albert_ chain,
_brougham_, _victoria_, _wellington_ boot. Some elderly people can
remember ladies wearing a red blouse called a _garibaldi_.[32] Sometimes
an inventor is immortalised, e.g., _mackintosh_ and _shrapnel_, both due
to 19th-century inventors. The more recent _maxim_ is named from one
who, according to the late Lord Salisbury, has saved many of his
fellow-men from dying of old age. Other benefactors are commemorated in
_derringer_, first recorded in Bret Harte, and _bowie_, which occurs in
Dickens' _American Notes_. _Sandwich_ and _spencer_ are coupled in an
old rime--
"Two noble earls, whom, if I quote,
Some folks might call me sinner;
The one invented half a coat,
The other half a dinner."
An Earl Spencer (1782-1845) made a short overcoat fashionable for some
time. An Earl of Sandwich (1718-1792) invented a form of light
refreshment which enabled him to take a meal without leaving the gaming
table. It does not appear that _Billy Cock_ is to be classed with the
above, or with _Chesterfield, Chippendale & Co._ The _New English
Dictionary_ quotes (from 1721) a description of the Oxford "blood" in
his "_bully-cocked_ hat," worn aggressively on one side. _Pinchbeck_ was
a London watchmaker (_fl. c._ 1700), and _doily_ is from _Doyley_, a
linen-draper of the same period. Etienne de _Silhouette_ was French
finance minister in 1759, but the application of his name to a black
profile portrait is variously explained. _Negus_ was first brewed in
Queen Anne's reign by Colonel Francis Negus.
The first _orrery_ was constructed by the Earl of Orrery (_c._ 1700).
_Galvani_ and _Volta_ were Italian scientists of the 18th century.
_Mesmer_ was a German physician of the same period. _Nicotine_ is named
from Jean Nicot, French ambassador at Lisbon, who sent some tobacco
plants to Catherine de Médicis in 1560. He also compiled the first Old
French dictionary. The gallows-shaped contrivance called a _derrick_
perpetuates the name of a famous hangman who officiated in London about
1600. It is a Dutch name, identical with _Dietrich_, _Theodoric_, and
_Dirk_ (Hatteraick). Conversely the Fr. _potence_, gallows, meant
originally a bracket or support, Lat. _potentia_, power. The origin of
_darbies_, handcuffs, is unknown, but the line--
"To bind such babes in father _Derbies_ bands,"
(GASCOIGNE, _The Steel Glass_, 1576.)
suggests connection with some eminent gaoler or thief-taker.
[Page Heading: TANTALISE--PAMPHLET]
Occasionally a verb is formed from a proper name. On the model of
_tantalise_, from the punishment of Tantalus, we have _bowdlerise_, from
_Bowdler_, who published an expurgated "family Shakespeare" in 1818; cf.
_macadamise_. _Burke_ and _boycott_ commemorate a scoundrel and a
victim. The latter word, from the treatment of Captain Boycott of Co.
Mayo in 1880, seems to have supplied a want, for Fr. _boycotter_ and
Ger. _boycottieren_ have become every-day words. Burke was hanged at
Edinburgh in 1829 for murdering people by suffocation in order to
dispose of their bodies to medical schools. We now use the verb only of
"stifling" discussion, but in the Ingoldsby Legends it still has the
original sense--
"But, when beat on his knees,
That confounded De Guise
Came behind with the 'fogle' that caused all this breeze,
Whipp'd it tight round his neck, and, when backward he'd jerk'd him,
The rest of the rascals jump'd on him and _Burk'd_ him."
(_The Tragedy._)
_Jarvey_, the slang name for a hackney coachman, especially in Ireland,
was in the 18th century _Jervis_ or _Jarvis_, but history is silent as
to this modern _Jehu_. A _pasquinade_ was originally an anonymous
lampoon affixed to a statue of a gladiator which still stands in Rome.
The statue is said to have been nicknamed from a scandal-loving cobbler
named Pasquino. Florio has _pasquino_, "a statue in Rome on whom all
libels, railings, detractions, and satirical invectives are fathered."
_Pamphlet_ is an extended use of Old Fr. _Pamphilet_, the name of a
Latin poem by one _Pamphilus_ which was popular in the Middle Ages. The
suffix _-et_ was often used in this way, _e.g._, the translation of
Æsop's fables by Marie de France was called _Ysopet_, and Cato's moral
maxims had the title _Catonet_, or Parvus Cato. Modern Fr. _pamphlet_,
borrowed back from English, has always the sense of polemical writing.
In Eng. _libel_, lit. "little book," we see a similar restriction of
meaning. A three-quarter portrait of fixed dimensions is called a
_kitcat_--
"It is not easy to see why he should have chosen to produce a
replica, or rather a _kitcat_."
(_Journal of Education_, Oct. 1911.)
The name comes from the portraits of members of the _Kitcat_ Club,
painted by Kneller. _Kit Kat_, Christopher Kat, was a pastrycook at
whose shop the club used to dine.
Implements and domestic objects sometimes bear christian names. We may
mention spinning-_jenny_, and the innumerable meanings of _jack_.
_Davit_, earlier _daviot_, is a diminutive of David. Fr. _davier_,
formerly _daviet_, is used of several mechanical contrivances, including
a pick-lock. A kind of davit is called in German _Jütte_, a diminutive
of Judith. The implement by which the burglar earns his daily bread is
now called a _jemmy_, but in the 17th century we also find _bess_ and
_betty_. The French name is _rossignol_, nightingale. The German burglar
calls it _Dietrich_, _Peterchen_, or _Klaus_, and the contracted forms
of the first name, _dyrk_ and _dirk_, have passed into Swedish and
Danish with the same meaning. In Italian a pick-lock is called
_grimaldello_, a diminutive of the name Grimaldo.
[Page Heading: GRIMALKIN--JUG]
A kitchen wench was once called a _malkin_--
"The kitchen _malkin_ pins
Her richest lockram[33] 'bout her reechy neck,
Clamb'ring the walls to eye him."
(_Coriolanus_, ii. 1.)
This is a diminutive of Matilda or Mary, possibly of both. _Grimalkin_,
applied to a fiend in the shape of a cat, is perhaps for _gray malkin_--
"I come, _Graymalkin_."
(_Macbeth_, i. 1.)
The name _malkin_ was transferred from the maid to the mop. Cotgrave has
_escouillon_ (_écouvillon_), "a wispe, or dish-clowt; a _maukin_, or
drag, to cleanse, or sweepe an oven." _Écouvillon_ is a derivative of
Lat. _scopa_, broom. Now another French word, which means both "kitchen
servant" and "dish-clout," is _souillon_, from _souiller_, to soil. What
share each of these words has in Eng. _scullion_ is hard to say. The
only thing certain is that _scullion_ is not originally related to
_scullery_, Old Fr. _escuelerie_, a collective from Old Fr. _escuelle_
(_écuelle_), dish, Lat. _scutella_.
A _doll_ was formerly called a _baby_ or _puppet_. It is the
abbreviation of _Dorothy_, for we find it called a _doroty_ in Scottish.
We may compare Fr. _marionnette_, a double diminutive of Mary, explained
by Cotgrave as "little Marian or Mal; also, a puppet." _Little Mary_, in
another sense, has been recently, but perhaps definitely, adopted into
our language. Another old name for doll is _mammet_. Capulet uses it
contemptuously to his daughter--
"And then to have a wretched puling fool,
A whining _mammet_, in her fortune's tender,
To answer: 'I'll not wed,'--'I cannot love.'"
(_Romeo and Juliet_, iii. 5.)
Its earlier form is _maumet_, meaning "idol," and it is a contraction of
Mahomet.
The derivation of _jug_ is not capable of proof, but a 17th-century
etymologist regards it as identical with the female name _Jug_,[34] for
Joan or Jane. This is supported by the fact that _jack_ was used in a
similar sense--
"That there's wrath and despair in the jolly black-_jack_,
And the seven deadly sins in a flagon of sack."
(_Lady of the Lake_, vi. 5.)
We may also compare _toby jug_ and _demi-john_. The latter word is in
French _dame-jeanne_, but both forms are possibly due to folk-etymology.
A coat of mail was called in English a _jack_ and in French _jaque_, "a
_jack_, or coat of maile" (Cotgrave); hence the diminutive _jacket_. The
German miners gave to an ore which they considered useless the name
_kobalt_, from _kobold_, a goblin, gnome. This has given Eng. _cobalt_.
Much later is the similarly formed _nickel_, a diminutive of Nicholas.
It comes to us from Sweden, but appears earliest in the German compound
_Kupfernickel_, copper nickel. Apparently _nickel_ here means something
like goblin; cf. _Old Nick_ and, probably, the _dickens_--
"I cannot tell what the _dickens_ his name is my husband had him
of.--What do you call your knight's name, sirrah?"
(_Merry Wives_, iii. 2.)
_Pantaloons_ come, _via_ France, from Venice. A great many Venetians
bore the name of _Pantaleone_, one of their favourite saints. Hence the
application of the name to the characteristic Venetian hose. The "lean
and slippered pantaloon" was originally one of the stock characters of
the old Italian comedy. Torriano has _pantalone_, "a _pantalone_, a
covetous and yet amorous old dotard, properly applyed in comedies unto a
Venetian." _Knickerbockers_ take their name from Diedrich
_Knickerbocker_, the pseudonym under which Washington Irving wrote his
History of Old New York, in which the early Dutch inhabitants are
depicted in baggy knee-breeches.
[Page Heading: NINNY--JACKANAPES]
Certain christian names are curiously associated with stupidity. In
modern English we speak of a _silly Johnny_, while the Germans say _ein
dummer Peter_, or _Michel_, and French uses _Colas_ (_Nicolas_),
_Nicodème_ and _Claude_, the reason for the selection of the name not
always being known. English has, or had, in the sense of "fool," the
words _ninny_, _nickum_, _noddy_, _zany_. _Ninny_ is for _Innocent_,
"Innocent, _Ninny_, a proper name for a man" (Cotgrave). With this we
may compare French _benêt_ (_i.e._ Benedict), "a simple, plaine, doltish
fellow; a noddy peake, a ninny hammer, a peagoose, a coxe, a silly
companion" (Cotgrave). _Nickum_ and _noddy_ are probably for Nicodemus
or Nicholas, both of which are used in French for a fool--
"'But there's another chance for you,' said Mr Boffin, smiling
still. 'Do you like the name of Nicodemus? Think it over. _Nick_ or
_Noddy_.'"
(_Our Mutual Friend_, Ch. 5.)
_Noddy-peak_, _ninny-hammer_, _nickumpoop_, now _nincompoop_, seem to be
arbitrary elaborations. _Zany_, formerly a conjuror's assistant, is
_zanni_ (see p. 143), an Italian diminutive of _Giovanni_, John. With
the degeneration of _Innocent_ and _Benedict_ we may compare Fr.
_crétin_, idiot, an Alpine patois form of _chrétien_, Christian, and
Eng. _silly_, which once meant blessed, a sense preserved by its German
cognate _selig_. _Dunce_ is a libel on the disciples of the great
medieval schoolman John Duns Scotus, born at Duns in Berwickshire.
_Dandy_ is Scottish for Andrew, _e.g._, Dandie Dinmont (_Guy
Mannering_). _Dago_, now usually applied to Italians, was used by the
Elizabethans, in its original form _Diego_, of the Spaniards. The
derivation of _guy_ and _bobby_ (peeler) is well known. _Jockey_ is a
diminutive of the north country _Jock_, for _Jack_. The history of
_jackanapes_ is obscure. The earliest record of the name is in a
satirical song on the unpopular William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk,
who was beheaded at sea in 1450. He is called _Jack Napes_, the allusion
being apparently to his badge, an ape's clog and chain. But there also
seems to be association with Naples; cf. _fustian-anapes_ for Naples
fustian. A poem of the 15th century mentions among our imports from
Italy--
"Apes and japes and marmusettes tayled."
_Jilt_ was once a stronger epithet than at present. It is for earlier
_jillet_, which is a diminutive of _Jill_, the companion of Jack.
_Jill_, again, is short for _Gillian_, i.e. _Juliana_, so that _jilt_ is
a doublet of Shakespeare's sweetest heroine. _Termagant_, like _shrew_
(p. 34), was formerly used of both sexes, _e.g._, by Sir John Falstaff--
"'Twas time to counterfeit, or that hot _termagant_ Scot (Douglas)
had paid me scot and lot too."
(1 _Henry IV._, v. 4.)
In its oldest sense of a Saracen god it regularly occurs with _Mahound_
(Mahomet)--
"Marsilies fait porter un livre avant:
La lei i fut Mahum e _Tervagan_."[35]
(_Chanson de Roland_, l. 610.)
Ariosto has _Trivigante_. Being introduced into the medieval drama, the
name became synonymous with a stage fury--
"I would have such a fellow whipped for o'erdoing _Termagant_."
(_Hamlet_, iii. 2.)
The origin of the word is unknown, but its sense development is
strangely different from that of Mahomet (p. 43).
FOOTNOTES:
[24] But _Finsteraarhorn_ is perhaps from the river _Aar_, not from
_Aar_, eagle.
[25] A place where a number of settlers were massacred by the Zulus.
[26] "Two mountains near Dublin, which we, keeping in the grocery line,
have called the Great and the Little Sugarloaf, are named in Irish the
Golden Spears."--(Trench, _On the Study of Words_.)
[27] The French name for the fruit is _ananas_, a Brazilian word. A
vegetarian friend of the writer, misled by the superficial likeness of
this word to _banana_, once petrified a Belgian waiter by ordering half
a dozen for his lunch.
[28] A reader calls my attention to the fact that, when the hippopotamus
is almost completely submerged, the pointed ears, prominent eyes, and
large nostrils are grotesquely suggestive of a horse's head. This I have
recently verified at the Zoo.
[29] For the rather illogical formation, cf. _dogged_ from _dog_.
[30] Connection has even been suggested between _haggis_ and Fr.
_agasse_, "a pie, piannet, or _magatapie_" (Cotgrave). _Haggis_, now
regarded as Scottish, was once a common word in English. Palsgrave has
_haggas_, a podyng, "caliette (caillette) de mouton," _i.e._, sheep's
stomach.
[31] For _eyas_ see p. 114.
[32] To the same period belongs the colour _magenta_, from the victory
of the French over the Austrians at Magenta in 1859.
[33] For _lockram_, see p. 48.
[34] _Jehannette_, "_Jug_, or Jinny" (Cotgrave). For strange perversions
of baptismal names see Chap. XII. It is possible that the rather
uncommon family name _Juggins_ is of the same origin.
[35] "Marsil has a book brought forward: the law of Mahomet and
Termagant was in it."