LL-L 'Etymology' 2006.09.13 (03) [E]

Wed Sep 13 19:27:15 UTC 2006

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L O W L A N D S - L * 13 September 2006 * Volume 03
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From: 'jonny' [jonny.meibohm at arcor.de]
Subject: LL-L 'Etymology' 2006.09.13 (01) [E]

Thanks, David and Ron,

for explainig 'oven' vs 'stove' etc.

Ron explained some more about a special version of the G: 'Stoevchen':
> In some parts
> the same
> name is used for small, portable, foot-stool-like charcoal heaters onto
> which
> people used to place their feet, especially women, who would then drape
> their
> long skirts over them to achive the "_kotatsu_ effect."* (Imagine the
> smoke
> coming out from under skirts!) People would carry these (by handy handles
> fixed
> to them) to church, preheated, and this would make sitting through long
> sermons
> survivable on cold winters' days.
This device in our local dialect is called LS: _FÃ¼er-Kieker_ (hmmm- we should
check this, Ron: shouldn't it be a 'FÃ¼er-Kiepe[r]'??), and another expression I
know from my youth is G: _Gewitter-Ofen_.

Ron, you made some remarks upon the Japanese _kotatsu_, the heater comparable
with the above mentioned 'p.o.' (='personal oven' ;-)).
Did you ever hear about a (in the farest sense comparable thing) _hibachi_? Maybe
it's just the brand- it was a small charcoal-oven made of cast-iron. You could
grill your steaks on it and then close it for transport.
When my brother and I visited Canada in the 70s we had our own station wagon. For
preparing our meals we had bought such a _hibachi_.
One bad day we were involved in an uggly car-accident (nobody was severely hurt),
and all our equipment we had stowed in the rear flung into our necks- included
this little _hibachi_.
If that had been all, I wouldn't have mentioned it, but: the oven got opened
during his flight, and still glowing charcoals spread everywhere in our car! We
hadn't any time at all to feel a 'shock' but had to be very busy to extinguish
all the little fires amongst our clothes and other equipment... Thanks Heaven it
was raining that day, and everyone who ever experienced rain on Prince Edward
Island knows that the word (for the Northern hemisphere) has to be re-invented to
describe the amount of water falling down!

Greutens/Regards

Johannes "Jonny" Meibohm

----------

From: 'Elsie Zinsser' [ezinsser at icon.co.za]
Subject: LL-L 'Etymology' 2006.09.13 (01) [E]

Hi all,

Ron, what a wonderful warming device, the kotatsu.

Here in southern Africa people used what was called a 'konka' - mostly an
old paint or oil drum with holes poked in, filled with burning coal or
charcoal
and kept in a room or outside to heat an area.

Many tragic cases were reported of whole families who died from the carbon
monoxide fumes in unventilated huts. Did this not occur with the kotatsu
usage too?

Incidentally, and to give this a Lowlands spin, we have the idiomatic
expression in Afrikaans
"...kooltjies uit die vuur help krap", meaning to help someone to resolve a
problem that he brought on him/herself.

Cheerio,
Elsie Zinsser

----------

From: R. F. Hahn [sassisch at yahoo.com]
Subject: Etymology 

Oh, boy, Jonny!  That was a great demonstration of doing several non-nos.  I knew
a couple that got killed that way, by their unsecured luggage in the back of
their stationwagon.  And a hibachi was not involved, leave alone one with burning
coals ... Duh!

Yes, I do know what a hibachi is, not only from spending time in Japan but also
because those things are very popular in Australia and North America (though
usually people extinguish the fire before they load them into their cars).

Elsie, I'm pretty sure that some carbon monoxide poisoning did occur in Japan
also. However, it may have been less of a problem due to traditional Japanese
houses being very flimsily constructed and thus tend to be very drafty. They are
mostly constructed to help you survive the summer heat, which tends to be
horrendous, worse than the winter cold (except in Hokkaido). Bear in mind that
until not very long ago Japanese windows didn't have glas but paper. The
traditional kitchen and bath stove is accessible only from the outside of a house
and is separated from the house interior by means of stone or brick, so smoke and
gas does not enter the house.  This is also how floors are heated in Korea and in
Northern China the ç‚• _kang_ platform on which people sit and sleep in the winter
(probably having inspired the creation of the Russian stove on which you can sit
and sleep).

Example pictures:

Kotatsu:
http://www.city.itabashi.tokyo.jp/icief/life/house/image/kotatsu.jpg
http://www.chinesewhispers.info/nanaehome-kotatsu1-large.jpg
http://www.chinesewhispers.info/nanaehome-kotatsu2-large.jpg
http://www.housyoutei.com/web/img/room/kotatsu_aw.jpg
http://www.housyoutei.com/web/img/room/kotatsu_ss.jpg
http://karin-be-happy.a-thera.jp/image/PC210028.JPG

Kang: 
http://images.nmgnews.net.cn/articleimage/200311/1067913464063.jpg
http://www.premiumwanadoo.com/limousin-chine/pages/photos/2004chine/VU_EN_PASSANT/q_PICT2082.JPG
http://www.china.com.cn/images/18416.jpg

Elsie, the makeshift stoves made from oil drums are familiar to me.  They tend to
be used in the Australian outback and are also used by construction workers and
homeless people in some American cities.

Jonny, I know the name of the old-time portable heaters as _vuyer-kyk(e)_
(_FÃ¼erkiek(e)_, _FÃ¼Ã¼rkiek(e)_), feminine gender, usually semi-translated German
_Feuerkieke_ (> _fajerka_, _fojerka_, _fojera_, _fajerka_, _fojyrka_, etc. in
Polish and Czech dialects).  In some LS dialects it's called _staav'_ (<
*_stave_), probably related to "stove" and possibly loaned from Frisian.

I have no idea about the etymology of _kyk_ for a container, though I doubt its
derived from _kyp_.

Pictures:
http://www.bs-niebuell.de/schulen/bsn/fm/245a.htm
http://www.bergedorfmuseum.de/sammlung/1957,17.jpg

In Sater Frisian (the only remaining dialect of Eastern Frisian), this device is
called _StÃ¶Ã¤fken_ or _StÃ¶Ã¶fken_, the same as the tea pot warmer.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

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