prat(t) (but not Siouan)

[Alan H. Hartley]

ROOD DAVID S wrote:

> 	Along these lines, my father used to insist that the correct
> spelling for the expression "under way", as in "let's get this project
> under way", was really "under weigh", as in weighing anchor.  Does anyone
> know anything more about that?  I've been laughed at more than once for
> perpetuating his idea.

Good example of a Du loan (which is, despite what I said earlier, from
the _eighteenth_ century): onderweg (also -wegen) 'on the way, under
way,' < onder 'under, in the course of,' etc. + weg (dat. pl. wegen)
'way'. "Under weigh" is apparently a technical folk-etymology (if I may
coin an oxymoron) arising from anchor-weighing. The "correct" spelling
is recorded from 1743 and the folk-etymologic from 1777.

Alan