Latin nominatives and animal names (cf. Bossie)

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Fri Apr 28 17:02:36 UTC 2006


At 1:22 PM -0200 4/28/06, Charles Doyle wrote:
>We do name our lions Leo, not Leon.  (At the moment, that's
>the only other stereo- or prototypical animal name I can
>think of that resembles the Latin common noun designating
>the species.)
>
>--Charlie
Well, there's Felix the Cat, which I assume is at least influenced by
fe:lis (since cats aren't notorious for being happy), although I
suppose that was more of a genus than a species name before it became
adapted into "felis catus"/"felis domesticus" for kitty-cats.

L

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org



More information about the Ads-l mailing list