wheel barrels?

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:45 PM -0400 8/11/04, Dennis R. Preston wrote:
>Now let's not be rash here in throwing out the phonological evidence
>in favor of the folk-etymological explanation; there's room (I would
>say necessity) for both. I might go so far as to claim that the vast
>majority of folk etymologies are rooted in (or at least abetted by)
>phonological matters.
>
I'm happy to concede this point, and I bow (or ber) to the impressive
detail of dInIs's phonological tale, not reproduced here.  I just
wanted to testify that the folk-etymological component--the prior
existence of "barrel" in more or less the appropriate semantic class
and the psychological assimilation of the barrow to it--is a
necessary part of the story here.  Oh, and for those who are too
squeamish for my earlier "eel marrow" offering, I realized afterward
that there is the somewhat better attested (if, for some, equally
offensive) "veal marrow".  The latter has 256 google hits (mostly for
veal marrow bones).  Predictably, there are no hits whatsoever for
"veal marrel", although google did hint politely that perhaps I
really meant "veal marrow."  Anyway, the point is that in the absence
of an already existing "marrel", all the phonological motivation in
the world is unlikely to yield a reanalysis in this case along the
lines of "wheelbarrow">"wheelbarrel".

larry