The Romance of Words Part 7

A very large number of wares are named from the places from which they come. This is especially common in the case of woven fabrics, and the origin is often obvious, e.g., _arras_, _cashmere_ (by folk-etymology, _kerseymere_), _damask_, _holland_. The following are perhaps not all so evident--_frieze_ from _Friesland_[36]; _fustian_, Old Fr. _fustaine_ (_futaine_), from _Fustat_, a suburb of Cairo; _muslin_, Fr.

_mousseline_, from _Mosul_ in Kurdistan; _shalloon_ from _Chalons_-sur-Marne; _lawn_ from _Laon_; _jean_, formerly _jane_, from _Genoa_ (French _Genes_[37]); _cambric_ from _Kamerijk_, the Dutch name of Cambrai (_cf._ the obsolete _dornick_, from the Dutch name of _Tournay_); _tartan_ from the _Tartars_ (properly _Tatars_), used vaguely for Orientals; _sarcenet_ from the Saracens; _sendal_, ultimately from _India_ (_cf._ Greco-Lat. _sindon_, Indian cloth); _tabby_, Old Fr. _atabis_, from the name of a suburb of Bagdad, formerly used of a kind of silk, but now of a cat marked something like the material in question.

Brittany used to be famous for hempen fabrics, and the villages of _Locrenan_ and _Daoulas_ gave their names to _lockram_ (see quotation from _Coriola.n.u.s_, p. 42) and _dowlas_--

_Hostess._ You owe me money, Sir John; and now you pick a quarrel to beguile me of it: I bought you a dozen of shirts to your back.

_Falstaff._ _Dowlas_, filthy _dowlas_; I have given them away to bakers' wives, and they have made bolters of them.

(1 _Henry IV._, iii. 3.)

_Duffel_ is a place near Antwerp--

"And let it be of _duffil_ gray, As warm a cloak as man can sell."

(WORDSWORTH, _Alice Fell_.)

and _Worstead_ is in Norfolk. Of other commodities _majolica_ comes from _Majorca_, called in Spanish _Mallorca_, and in medieval Latin _Majolica_; _bronze_ from _Brundusium_ (Brindisi), _delf_ from _Delft_, the _magnet_ from _Magnesia_, the _shallot_, Fr. _echalote_, in Old French also _escalogne_, whence archaic Eng. _scallion_, from _Ascalon_; the _sardine_ from _Sardinia_. A _milliner_, formerly _milaner_, dealt in goods from _Milan_. _Cravat_ dates from the Thirty Years' War, in which the _Croats_, earlier _Cravats_, played a part. _Ermine_ is in medieval Latin _mus Armenius_, Armenian mouse, but the name perhaps comes, through Fr. _hermine_, from Old High Ger. _harmo_, weasel.

_Buncombe_, more usually _bunk.u.m_, is the name of a county in North Carolina. To make a speech "for Buncombe" means, in American politics, to show your const.i.tuents that you are doing your best for your 400 a year or its American equivalent. Cf. _Billingsgate_ and _Limehouse_.

The adjective _spruce_ was formerly _pruce_ and meant Prussia. Todd quotes from Holinshed--

"Sir Edward Howard then admirall, and with him Sir Thomas Parre in doubletts of crimsin velvett, etc., were apparelled after the fashion of Prussia or _Spruce_."

Of similar origin are _spruce-leather_, _spruce-beer_, and the _spruce-fir_, of which Evelyn says--

"Those from Prussia (which we call _spruce_) and Norway are the best."

[Page Heading: BEZANT--MAZURKA]

Among coins the _bezant_ comes from _Byzantium_, the _florin_ from _Florence_, and Shylock's _ducat_, chiefly a Venetian coin, from the _ducato_ d'Apuglia, the Duchy of Apulia, where it was first coined in the 12th century. The _dollar_ is the Low Ger. _daler_, for Ger.

_Taler_, originally called a _Joachimstaler_, from the silver-mine of Joachimstal, "Joachim's dale," in Bohemia. Cotgrave registers a curious Old French perversion _jocondale_, "a _daller_, a piece of money worth about 3s. sterl." Some fruits may also be mentioned, _e.g._, the _damson_ from _Damascus_, through Old Fr. _damaisine_, "a damascene or _damsen_ plum" (Cotgrave); the _currant_ from _Corinth_, and the _peach_, Fr. _peche_, from Vulgar Lat. _pessica_, for _Persica_.

A _polony_ was originally a _Bolonian_ sausage, from _Bologna_.

_Parchment_, Fr. _parchemin_, is the adjective _pergamenus_, from _Pergamus_, in Asia Minor. _Spaniel_ is the Old Fr. _espagneul_ (_epagneul_), lit. Spanish. We have the adjective _Moorish_ in _morris_, or _morrice_, _pike_--

"He that sets up his rest to do more exploits with his mace than a _morris pike_."

(_Comedy of Errors_, iv. 3.)

In _morris dance_, Fr. _danse mauresque_, the same adjective is used with something of the vagueness to be noticed in connection with India and Turkey (p. 52). Shakespeare uses the Spanish form--

"I have seen him Caper upright, like to a wild _morisco_, Shaking the b.l.o.o.d.y darts as he his bells."

(2 _Henry VI._, iii. 1.)

Other "local" dances are the _polka_, which means Polish woman, _mazurka_, woman of Mazuria, and the obsolete _polonaise_, lit. Polish, _cracovienne_, from Cracow, and _varsovienne_, from Warsaw. The _tarantella_, like the _tarantula_ spider, takes its name from Taranto, in Italy. The tune of the dance is said to have been originally employed as a cure for the lethargy caused by the bite of the spider. Florio has _tarantola_, "a serpent called an eft or an evet. Some take it to be a flye whose sting is perillous and deadly, and nothing but divers sounds of musicke can cure the patient."

The town of _Troyes_ has given its name to _troy_ weight. The armourers of _Bilbao_, in Spain, made swords of such perfect temper that they could be bent point to hilt. Hence Falstaff describes himself in the buck-basket as--

"Compa.s.sed, like a good _bilbo_, in the circ.u.mference of a peck, hilt to point, heel to head."

(_Merry Wives_, iii. 5.)

The _Andrea Ferrara_, or Scottish broadsword, carried by Fergus M'Ivor, bears, according to some authorities, the name of an armourer of Ferrara, in Italy. According to others, _Andrea dei Ferrari_ was a sword-maker at Belluno. I have heard it affirmed by a Scottish drill-sergeant that the real name of this genius was _Andrew Ferrars_,[38] and that he belonged to the same nationality as other great men.

[Page Heading: LATEEN--GUINEA-PIG]

An _argosy_, formerly also _ragusye_, was named from the Adriatic port of _Ragusa_, and a _lateen_ sail is a _Latin_, _i.e._ Mediterranean, sail; _gamboge_ is the Fr. _Cambodge_, Cambodia, and _indigo_ is from Span. _indico_, Indian. Of wines, _malmsey_, chiefly remembered in connection with George of Clarence, and _malvoisie_ are doublets, from _Monemvasia_ in the Morea. _Port_ is named from _Oporto_, i.e. _o porto_, the harbour (cf. _le Havre_), and _sherry_ (see p. 116) from _Xeres_, Lat. _Caesaris_ (urbs); cf. _Saragossa_, from _Caesarea Augusta_.

But it is possible to be mistaken in connecting countries with products.

_Brazil_ wood is not named from the country, but _vice-versa_. It was known as a dye-wood as early as the 12th century, and the name is found in many of the European languages. The Portuguese navigators found large quant.i.ties of it in South America and named the country accordingly.

They christened an island _Madeira_, timber, Lat. _materia_, for a similar reason. The _canary_ comes from the Canary Islands, but its name is good Latin. The largest of these islands, _Canaria_, was so called by the Romans from the dogs found there. The _guinea_-fowl and _guinea_ gold came first from the west coast of Africa, but the _guinea-pig_ is a native of Brazil. The name probably came from the _Guinea-men_, or slave-ships, which regularly followed a triangular course. They sailed outward to the west coast of Africa with English goods. These they exchanged for slaves, whom they transported to the West Indies, the horrible "middle pa.s.sage," and finally they sailed homeward with New World produce, including, no doubt, _guinea-pigs_ brought home by sailors. The turkey is also called _guinea-fowl_ in the 17th century, probably to be explained in the same way. The German name for guinea-pig, _Meerschweinchen_, seems to mean little pig from over the sea.

Guinea was a vague geographical expression in the 17th century, but not so vague as India or Turkey. _Indian ink_ comes from China (Fr. _encre de Chine_), and _Indian corn_ from America. The names given to the _turkey_ are extraordinary. We are not surprised that, as an American bird, it should be naturally connected with India; _cf._ West Indies, Red Indian, etc. _Turk_ was in the 16th and 17th centuries a vague term for non-Christians--

"Jews, _Turks_, infidels, and hereticks."

(Collect for Good Friday.)

and we find also _Turkey wheat_ for maize. The following names for the turkey, given in a _Nomenclator_ in eight languages, published in Germany in 1602, do not exhaust the list:--

German.--_Indianisch_ oder _Kalekuttisch_[39] oder _Welsch_[40] Hun.

Dutch.--_Calcoensche_ oft _Turckische_ Henne.

French.--Geline ou poulle d'_Inde_, ou d'_Africque_.

Italian.--Gallina d'_India_.

Spanish.--Pavon (peac.o.c.k) de las _Indias_.

English.--c.o.k off Inde!

No doubt the turkey was confused with other birds, for we find Fr.

_geline d'Inde_ before the discovery of America. _D'Inde_ has become _dinde_, whence a new masculine _dindon_ has been formed.

[Page Heading: HANSOM]

The early etymologists were fond of identifying foreign wares with place-names. They connected _diaper_ with Ypres, _gingham_ with Guingamp (in Brittany), _drugget_ with Drogheda, and the _sedan_ chair with Sedan. Such guesses are almost always wrong. The origin of _diaper_ is doubtful, that of _drugget_ quite unknown, and _gingham_ is Malay. As far as we know at present, the _sedan_ came from Italy in the 16th century, and it is there, among derivatives of Lat. _sedere_, to sit, that its origin must be sought, unless indeed the original _Sedan_ was some mute, inglorious _Hansom_.[41]

FOOTNOTES:

[36] Whence also _cheval de frise_, a contrivance used by the Frieslanders against cavalry. The German name is _die spanischen Reiter_, explained by Ludwig as "a bar with iron-spikes; _cheval de frise_, a warlick instrument, to keep off the horse."

[37] The form _jeans_ appears to be usual in America--"His hands were thrust carelessly into the side pockets of a gray _jeans_ coat."

(Meredith Nicholson, _War of the Carolinas_, Ch. 15.)

[38] A Scotch reviewer (_Glasgow Herald_, 13th April 1912) corrects me here--"His name was certainly not Ferrars, but Ferrier. He was probably an Arbroath man." Some readers may remember that, after General _Todleben's_ brilliant defence of Sebastopol (1854-5), _Punch_ discovered a respectable ancestry for him also. In some lines commencing--

"I ken him weel, the chield was born in Fife, The bairn of Andrew Drummond and his wife,"

it was shown that the apparently foreign name had been conferred on the gifted child because of the agility with which he used to "_toddle ben_ the hoose."

[39] Calicut, not Calcutta.

[40] See _walnut_ (p. 151).