LL-L "Etymology" 2009.04.28 (03) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 28 April 2009 - Volume 03
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From: Diederik Masure <didimasure at hotmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2009.04.28 (01) [E]

Thanks a lot! I'll try to interpret this list as well as possible and pick
the most useful forms/spellings (altho that's a little bit corrupt, isn't
it?)
Greets,
Diederik

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From: heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk <heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk>
 Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2009.04.28 (01) [E]

from Heather Rendall heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk

re Diederik's etymologies

Ron gave the following:

weinig ('little/few') wenig [weynig] (id.)

I've just looked up English 'weeny' in the OED and it gives:

WEENY  (colloquial, dialect) very small XVIII (Grose)  f  wee + -ny  cf
TINY  TEENY

I am now wondering whether the OED is right. Maybe it derives from 'wenig/
weinig?

What do you think?

Heather
Worcester UK

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

Interesting, Pat!

I always assumed that "weeny" was related to "wee", but apparently they
aren't related.

Now I believe that there is a connection between *wenig* (in most Low
Saxon dialects
with a diphthong: *weynig*) is related to Old English *hwōn *~ *wan* 'little
(amount)' and it's umlauted derivative *hwœ́ne *'a little'.

This jives phonologically. Old English long "a" (*á* > Modern English [ou])
very often corresponds to Old Saxon long "e" (> Low Saxon [ei] ~ [ai]) and
also to Scots long "e" ([e:]); e.g.

OE  =  ModE  =  Sc  =  OS  =  LS
*stán = stone = stane = st**ên = steyn *(Steen ~ Stein)
*bán = bone = bane = b**ên = beyn** *(Been ~ Bein)*
**án = one = ane =  **ên = eyn**** *(een ~ ein)

So at least theoretically ** *hwōn *~ *wan* could be related to *weyn(ig*).

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
Seattle, USA

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