LL-L "Etymology" 2002.01.15 (02) [E]

Tue Jan 15 15:34:40 UTC 2002

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 L O W L A N D S - L * 15.JAN.2002 (02) * ISSN 189-5582 * LCSN 96-4226
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 A=Afrikaans Ap=Appalachian D=Dutch E=English F=Frisian L=Limburgish
 LS=Low Saxon (Low German) S=Scots Sh=Shetlandic Z=Zeelandic (Zeeuws)
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From: Muriel Norde <muriel.norde at hum.uva.nl>
Subject: Etymology

Dear Lowlanders,

Just before the holiday break I posted a query about the etymology of Dutch
<(mal)mok> (Fulmaris Glacialis) and a
possible relation between <malmok> and Inuit <malamuk>, both meaning 'fulmar'
(unfortunately I erroneously translated
this word in my original posting as 'sea-gull', but it is <mok> which means
seagull, not <malmok>). It had been suggested
to me that Dutch <malmok>, which derives from <malle mok> (litterally: 'silly
sea-gull') was a folk etymology derivation of
inuit <malamuk>. I got some useful responses, and since I also consulted
people off-list, I thought it might be useful to
summarize the replies. I would like to thank Reinhard Hahn, Holger Weigelt,
Henno Brandsma and Colin Wilson, who
replied to me on Lowlands, and Marlies Philippa and Hein van der Voort. My
original questions were the following:

1: What are the Lowlandic names for seagull and how are they related? In
particular, I am interested in cognates
of <mok> and <malmok>.

2: Does anyone have references to the alleged Inuit connection?

Browsing through my etymological dicstionaries, I had already found that many
names for seagull are onomatopoeic
in origin (e.g. Dutch <meeuw>, Swedish <mås>, Norwegian <måke>), deriving from
a Proto-Germanic root
*Mai(h)wa- (with an -s-suffix in Swedish and a -k-suffix in Norwegian).
According to De Vries' Dutch etymological
dictionary however, <mok> refers to the thick-set shape of the seagull. In
that case Dutch <mok> would not be
related to Norwegian <måke>.

Reinhard Hahn replied that an expected *<mallemok> is not found in Low Saxon,
but a cognate does exist in English:
<mollymawk>.
The Low Saxon word for 'seagull' is Meev'_ (~ _Meew_) [mE:Iv], _Meiv_ (~
_Meiw_) [ma:Iv] or _Mööv'_ (~ _Mööw_)
[m9:Iv], which is of course related to German _Möwe_, Dutch _meeuw_,
Westerlauwer Frisian _miuw_, English
_mew_ (< _mæw_), Danish _måge_, Norwegian _måke_, Icelandic _mávur_, etc. The
word <mal> 'silly' has a
Low Saxon cognate as well: <mall> (~ <mal>) [ma.l] 'silly', 'ridiculous',
etc., and there are derivations such as
mallerig_ ['ma.lerIC] 'silly', _mallen_ 'to behave in a silly way', 'to clown
around', _Mallaap_ [ma.l(?)Q:p] ("silly
ape/monkey" ~ _Maiaap_ ['ma.I(?)Q:p] "May ape/monkey") 'silly person',
'clown', 'fool', amd _Mallmöhl_
['ma.lm9:l] ("silly mill") 'merry-go-round'.

Holger Weigelt wrote that Eastern Friesland Low Saxon has the word "mÃ¤iew"
that denotes "seagull" in
general. "Koeb" means Larus argenteus and "mÃ¤iwkoeb" is Larus ridibundus.
The same words are reported from the extinct Frisian language of the island of
Wangerooge. There they read:
"meew", "kaab" and mÃ©Ã©wkaab". For Larus argenteus there is also reported
"sÃÃliichkaab" (seal-seagull)
from Wangerooge.
"MÃ¢l" denotes "silly" or "ridiculous" but also "bad", "ugly", "nasty",
"unpleasant". This word often occurs in
compound words where it is often shortened to mal~. [I apologize for the
gobbledegook; this is what the
diacritics looked like in my e-mail programme MN]
Henno Brandsma reports similar forms from Westerlauwer and Helgolandic
Frisian: <kob(be)> and <kub>
respectively, and suggests that this may be an ingvaeonic form. In addition,
Westerlauwer Frisian has the word
<miuw> / <meau>, cognate with the forms Reinhard mentioned above

The Scots relative of <meeuw> is <sea-maw>. According to Colin Wilson, the
"sea" part was probably added
because "maw" is also a children's word for "mother", similar to "mama".

Marlies Philippa kindly consulted Blok & Ter Stege's "De Nederlandse
vogelnamen en hun betekenis" for me,
who write that <mok> 'sea-gull' is essentially Frisian and Insular Frisian
("Waddeneilands"). They furthermore
note that the <malmok> owes its name to its silly gait and turning of the
head, and the fact that they were so
easy to catch.

Hein van der Voort, finally, turns out to have mentioned the very connection
between <malmok> and Inuit
<malamuk> (first suggested to him by Peter Bakker) in an article (Van der
Voort 1996). According to him, Inuit
<malamuk> was borrowed from Dutch, possibly via Danish <mallemuk>, but it may
also have been a direct loan
from Dutch whalers. The word is frequently mentioned in whalers' journals, and
in 18th and 19th century sources
on arctic birdlife it is explicitly mentioned as being coined by Dutch
whalers. It was probably used by the
Greenlanders as early as the second half of the 18th century. One of the
original West Greenlandic words for
'fulmar' was <qaqulluk>.

The result thus seems to be that <mallemok> does not derive from <malamuk> but
vice versa. Blok & Ter
Stege's explanation of the word makes sense, and it seems plausible that
English <mollymawk> is also derived
from the Dutch word. It should finally be noted that the word <malmok> is
nowadays hardly used to denote a
fulmar (if at all), for which the common name is <noordse stormvogel>. I
happened to come across a children's
book entitled "Malmok", but in this book Malmok is a pelican!

Reference:
Hein van der Voort , 1996,  "Eskimo pidgin in West Greenland", in: Ernst Håkon
Jahr & Ingvild Broch (eds.) Language
contact in the Arctic, Northern pidgins and contact languages, Trends in
Linguistics: Studies and Monographs; 88
(series editor Werner Winter), Berlin / New York: Mouton de Gruyter, pp.
155-258.

Muriel Norde

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
 Muriel Norde
 Skandinavistiek, Universiteit van Amsterdam
 Spuistraat 134
 1012 VB Amsterdam
 The Netherlands
 tel.: +31 20 5252450
 fax.: +31 20 5254625
 *~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Etymology

Thank you very much for the summary (above), Muriel.  I find it very useful.

Lowlanders, we ought to follow Muriel's example regarding both initiative and
style/format.  Yes, it is all right to do it in a language other than English.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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