LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.20 (01) [E/LS]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  20 May 2007 - Volume 01

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From: Paul Finlow-Bates <wolf_thunder51 at yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.18 (04) [E]

Re: The current thread on "Hooks" and related words; I have a couple of
flyers to fly:
1. The "Ecke" word doesn't seem to have an English relative, unlike "hoek"
etc;  By phonetic change I'd expect something like "etch", but that of
course means something else entirely. "Edge" might just seem to be related,
I'm not sure.
2. What about the Angles? Both the relatives of the Saxons, and the
corners?  I understand that the tribe (and thus ultimately the name of my
country and language) may relate to their original homeland in the "Angle",
the sharp coastline change along the Baltic at the Danish/German border
region. Others suggest a weapon, a barbed spear of some kind, in the way
that Saxons were named for their "seaxes" or knives and Fanks for the
"Fancisca," a throwing axe.
Of course, "angling", i.e. fishing with hooks as opposed to nets, is also
connected.  But are there any "angles" or related words in other Lowlands,
or indeed Germanic languages?

Paul Finlow-Bates

From: Elsie Zinsser <ezinsser at icon.co.za>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (01) [E]

Hi Jonny and Ron,

I'm taking a flyer but suspect that Huuk and Eck (meaning corner Afrikaans:
hoek) are

closely related but that huuk (crouch, Afrikaans hurk) comes from a
different root.

Now to find evidence.
----------

From: Kevin Caldwell <kevin.caldwell1963 at verizon.net >
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (01) [E]

> From: Jonny Meibohm <altkehdinger at freenet.de>
> Subject: LL-L "Grammar" 2007.05.18 (04) [E]
> Beste Ron,
>
> in your table here: lowlands-l.net/anniversary/jysk-info.php
>
> you translate 'corner' in LS as 'Eck', 'Huuk' ('Huke' here).
>
> This (your choice) is very interesting and I formerly had made some
thoughts about it.
>
> In our Lower-Elbe-dialect both words are in use, but I think the first
choice to describe
> the corner of a street or anything else comparable within a landscape
would be 'Hoyrn', 'Hörn'.
> So I always would do though I guess the very early, basic meaning was
something betokening a
> 'peak', as e.g. 'Cape Horn' shows.
>
> It would be interesting to find out whether the Scandinavian 'hörn',
'horn', 'hjørn' came as an
> LS loan into those languages or if they are pan-germanic.
Isn't this more a pan-IE thing? English has 'horn'(going back to OE) in
multiple senses, such as animal horns, a cape or promontory (the Horn of
Africa), as well as a musical instrument (originally made from animal
horns), while Latin 'cornu' gives us, through French, 'corner' and
derivatives such as 'unicorn', 'tricorn (hat)', 'cornet', and 'cornucopia'
(horn of plenty).

Kevin Caldwell

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From: Jonny Meibohm <altkehdinger at freenet.de>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (01) [E]

He, Ron,

going on with LS 'Huuk'/'Huke'/'Hoek'.

This afternoon I had a meeting with some of my native neighbours, and I told
them about our/this thread.

Very interesting!

We came to the agreement that 'Huuk'/'Huke' denotes the *inner* side of an
'edge', of always an artificial/geometrical angle, e.g. of any kind of
building (so as in my formerly mentioned: 'dike').

And- the word LS: 'Oken' (which I'm sure you're familiar with) could be
derived from it. 'Oken' means G: 'Abseite', 'hinterste Ecke', also
'Dachschräge'; E: (according to http://www.dict.cc/?s=Abseite ) 'nave
aisle'. 'Kiek inns in dennen achtersten *Oken* van 't Schapp. Door steiht
noch 'n Pakken Zolt.' E:'Just have a look into the aftmost edge of the
cupboard. You'll find a pack of salt there.'

[Wow- 'aftmost'! Never seen before. What a nice and archaic word I'll never
forget again which I got from dict.cc!]

Houl Dii hattig!

Jonny Meibohm

----------

From: R. F. Hahn < sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Etymology

And watch them go feasting on another scrap of etymology!

Elsie:

> Now to find evidence.

Hmmmm ... indeed.  And here's a little beauty coming your way, "guys."

Ek (Eck < OS eggia , German Ecke) 'corner', though apparently not related to
the "horn" ~ "corner" (< IE * ker(ə)-, " horn") and "hook" (< IE *keg-
"pointed stick") groups, in fact belongs to the Indo-European group of *ak-̑ ~ *
ok̑-, which denotes "sharp" as in "sharp angle".

And there's the Low Saxon word Oken (~ Öken) Jonny and his Oldkehdinger Olen
were talking about (and I have come across as Aken as well)!  Apparently,
its earliest meaning is 'underside of a roof top', 'attic', namely where the
two angles of a pointed roof meet.  Its secondary meaning is 'far end of an
inside space', such as the far inside wall of an armoir.

So, yes, Jonny.  I tentatively go along with the notion that that
Huukdenotes the
inside of a corner (as in "The teacher made me stand in the corner," as
opposed to "The teacher was walking around the corner" as in " outsidecorner").

So I go as far as postulating that a huke was an inside corner and a
hoyrnwas an outside corner in Saxon, while
ek can now denote either of them.

Kevin:

> It would be interesting to find out whether the Scandinavian 'hörn',
'horn', 'hjørn' came as an
> LS loan into those languages or if they are pan-germanic.

My hunch is that it's pan-Germanic.

Reinhard/Ron
̑
----------

From: R. F. Hahn < sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Etymology

Paul,

"Edge" is indeed related to Ecke etc.  I know it but failed to mention it.
Great hunch on your part!  Thanks.

Reinhard/Ron

----------

From: Mark Dreyer <mrdreyer at lantic.net>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.18 (04) [E]

 Beste Elsie

Onderwerp: LL-L "Etymology"

 From Elsie

I'm taking a flyer but suspect that Huuk and Eck (meaning corner Afrikaans:
hoek) are

closely related but that huuk (crouch, Afrikaans hurk) comes from a
different root.

Now to find evidence.

From Mark

Let us not forget the posture 'hurk' - (to squat or crouch)

Groete,

Mark

----------

From: Jonny Meibohm <altkehdinger at freenet.de>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (06) [E]

Kevin, Ron,

you wrote about E 'nook', probably deriving from Archaic English 'nock'.

I didn't know this word before, but it reminds my at the German word
family 'Nock', 'Nocke' or 'Nocken' (the Austrian 'Nockerl' also could be
part of it).
It has got several meanings:

*1. Nock, die (fem.):*
*LEO* translates it as 'peak', and that might be its basic meaning, but I
know it as part of a ship's bridge, 'small nooks, edges, corners on both
sides of the bridge from where you can watch the sides of your ship during
docking manoeuvres etc.'. Wait- there is another and better *nock*, too: the
peak of a yard, G: 'Rah' on sailing vessels, and *DUDEN *declares it to
be from LS-origin (but also concedes that there is the same word denoting a
'mountain' in 'Oberdeutsch'/'Upper German',  spoken in the more Southern
regions of Germany).

*2. Nocke, die (fem.) / Nocken, der (masc.):*
mainly used in technical matters, should be translated as 'cam' like in
'camshaft'. So- it's a kind of 'peak' also, isn't it?

 *3. Nockerl:*
probably is  diminutive of *Nocke*, better known as *'Salzburger
Nockerln'*(Ron, don't look here- too sweet for you! ;-):
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salzburger_Nockerln
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:125-2529.JPG )
Do you see the 'peaks' again?

 So, Kevin, I think that since a long time there have been both 'hook' and
'nook/nock', though obviously related.

Just some additional thoughts of a penny worth.
My relatives from the Lunenburg area of Germany once told me about a ghost
named 'Nöck'. It must be a kind of malicious nymph living in creeks and
lakes which/who often tortures people passing by. A little Poseidon with a
trident/three-*'pike'*? Or is it derived from LS 'Nück', original meaning E:
'snare', 'springe' but today mainly used in the transcribed meaning of
'defiantness', 'waywardness'?
And- (rhmmr...) the LS verb 'nöken/noyken', meaning 'to fuck', though I'm
not sure if it's really an expression of the category which in dictionaries
you find enlisted as *vulgar*. It has to do with something like a 'peak'
too, hasn't it?

Allerbest!

Jonny Meibohm

-----------

From: A Victorie <victorie.a at home.nl>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (06) [E]

Moi Reinhard,

Wij hadden hier in Drenthe op de webstee van Drentse taol al ies een vraog
waor as de name "Nikstarte" van of-eleid is.

En daor bint wij toen niet uut ekomen. Kan 't weden, dat 't Ëngelse woord
"Nook" daor wat mit maken hef?

Een "Nikstarte" is een wiendhoos.

Goodgaon,

Arend Victorie
----------

From: Mark Dreyer <mrdreyer at lantic.net>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2007.05.19 (06) [E]
Dear Ron, Kevin, Jonny:

Subject: LL-L "Etymology"

From: Ron
< Archaic English "nock" 'small hook' (usually on a spindle) appears to be
derived from Scandinavian *hnokki* or its Danish/Norwegian derivative
nokkeor Swedish derivative
nock.

Mark:
Afrikaans uses the word 'nok' for the roof-tree, or the ridge of a roof, &
by extension, similar sorts of ridge, even that of a cam. I think the
English 'nok' as used by toxophilists to refer to the notch in the back of
an arrow is a simple borrowing from the Plantagenet Flemish plantations, the
nearest English contact to the native Welsh to whom the longbow was their
native weapon.

Surely the ME word 'notch' is cognate to the (then) Flemish 'nok'?

Might I contribute that questionable activity between - consenting - boys &
girls in this country, 'noekie' or 'nookie' depending on your language
group? Folk etymology hath it that it is so called because it is typically
pursued in a 'nook' or 'noekie' ('n hoekie). Of course one doesn't confess
to having had a bit of that - 'n bietjie noekie.

Groete,
Mark
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