intransitive "hail as" = 'be; count as'

[David Bowie]

From:    "Mark A. Mandel" <mamandel at LDC.UPENN.EDU>

: Over my morning coffee I was startled by this sentence:

: "She currently hails as chief librarian of the Moorland-Spingarn
: Research Center..."

: (_Rolling Out - Philadelphia_ v3n02, April 15, 2004., p. 8? (many
: pages not numbered)  Column:  Work in Progress. [focus on Jean Currie
: Church, Chief Librarian, Howard University])

: This use of "hail" was new to me. I took it as an extension, possibly
: erroneous, of "hail from" 'be from [a place]'.

<cue complete and utter speculation> If it goes back very far in time, might
it be related to the Modern German verb /heissen/ 'to be known as/named',
but just have floated along below the radar until now?

(I admittedly know nothing about the history of the more expected uses of
"hail" and can't look it up right now.)

<snip>

David Bowie                                         http://pmpkn.net/lx
    Jeanne's Two Laws of Chocolate: If there is no chocolate in the
    house, there is too little; some must be purchased. If there is
    chocolate in the house, there is too much; it must be consumed.