Yurt, Baidar (1774); Angora (1784)

[Mark A Mandel]

On Thu, 6 Jun 2002 Bapopik at AOL.COM wrote:

#   This was in German in 1768, so the original manuscript is older.  OED has
#its first "suslik" from this book--the only citation used.

I just sent email to *our* first and only Suslik, in Paris. When our
daughter Susannah was born we wanted a good nickname to call her, and
anything like "Susie" was out of the question (personal esthetics). We
asked a Russian couple we knew for suggestions, and they suggested
"suslik", as the name of an animal that lives in burrows and makes a
whistling sound and is often thought of as cute. That has been her
nickname, with her mother and me, ever since.

-- Mark A. Mandel