"Cock," again

[Wilson Gray]

I can't say, unfortunately. I've seen only this abstract, to which I
was able to gain access from home, via the 'Net, only by pretending to
be my wife, a working librarian.

BTW, I enjoyed your "publican _erected_." :-)

-Wilson

On Mon, Jul 7, 2008 at 5:27 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: "Cock," again
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> I trust this article uses the illustration of the
> publican erected out of his own implements.
>
> Joel
>
> At 7/7/2008 04:35 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
>>Content-Disposition: inline
>>
>>Transactions of the Philological Society
>>Volume 106 Issue 1, Pages 71 - 91
>>Published Online: 6 Feb 2008
>>Journal compilation (c) 2008 The Philological Society
>>Get Sample Copy
>>
>>Published on behalf of the Philological Society
>>
>>Contribution to the study of a euphemism in the intimate lexis of
>>Slavonic and Germanic languages
>>
>>Brian Cooper
>>Department of Slavonic Studies, University of Cambridge
>>Correspondence to Department of Slavonic Studies
>>University of Cambridge
>>Sidgwick Avenue
>>Cambridge CB3 9DA
>>Email: bfc20 at cam.ac.uk
>>
>>ABSTRACT
>>
>>This paper studies the metaphorical origin of a well-known, vulgar
>>euphemistic name for the penis, especially in Germanic (e.g. English
>>cock and German hahn) and Slavonic (e.g. words with the stems
>>pet-/pit-, kur- and kog-/koh-/kok-), but also in some other languages.
>>Although it can be surmised that the vulgar sense of these words in
>>some languages may have arisen from the sense '(stop)cock', in view of
>>the urinary function of the penis, this view seems inaccurate not only
>>in the Slavonic but also in the Germanic languages. Judging by the
>>material presented, it is much more probable that the reasons
>>underlying the metaphor hahn/cock/petux'rooster' >
>>hahn/cock/petux'penis' are linked, first and foremost, with the
>>ancient association of the rooster with male characteristics,
>>primarily of the procreative type. It is from this metaphor that the
>>sense Hahn/cock/petux'spigot' arises (the penis is envisaged as a
>>tap). It is possible that this same metaphor gave rise to the concept
>>Hahn/cock/kurok'hammer of a firearm' (the cocking piece and the penis
>>can stick up like the neck and head of a crowing cock).
>>______________
>>
>>-Wilson
>>--
>>All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
>>come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>-----
>>  -Sam'l Clemens
>>
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
 -Sam'l Clemens

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