[Ads-l] antedating schnook

[Jonathan Lighter]

"Apparently from..." usually means, "Gee, it certainly seems possible, but
don't hold me to it."

JL



On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 11:15 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
wrote:

> For the uninitiated, there is in fact no etymological relation between
> “Chinook” (a variety of salmon named for the indigenous people once living
> along the Columbia River) and “schnook” (apparently from the Yiddish
> “shnuk”, an elephant’s trunk, whence(?) a sucker or dupe).  A phonological
> connection, yes, but semantic, not so much.
>
> LH
>
>
> > On Jan 16, 2024, at 8:18 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote:
> >
> > 1920: OED
> >
> > 1916 _Boston Herald_ (Apr. 26) 9: Al Keough and Joe Cohan gave a funny
> > sketch called "The Live One and the Schnook."
> >
> > Cf.
> > 1891 _Daily Independent_ (Helena, Mont.) (May 28) 5: Lake Superior trout,
> > white, black bass, pike, schnook, salmon.
> >
> > 1913 _Curtis [Neb.] Enterprise_ (March 21) 3: SALMON--Adams sells the
> best
> > schnook for 11c.
> >
> > 1916 _Kalamazoo Gazette_ (May 24) 4: Baked Fresh Caught Schnook* Salmon
> > --Menu Card / *Restaurant English for Chinook.
> >
> > If there's any connection, it could be via the once common "poor fish."
> >
> > In its ety. conjectures, OED fails to observe the existence of the
> surname
> > "Schnook."
> >
> > JL
> >
> > --
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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