Part 8 (2/2)
_Fahne_). Eng. _pilgrim_ and Fr. _pelerin_, from Lat. _peregrinus_, ill.u.s.trate the change from _r_ to _l_, while the word _frail_, an osier basket for figs, is due to a change from _l_ to _r_, which goes back to Roman times. A grammarian of imperial Rome named Probus compiled, about the 3rd or 4th century, A.D., a list of cautions as to misp.r.o.nunciation.
In this list we find ”_flagellum_, non _fragellum_.” In the sense of switch, twig, _fragellum_ gave Old Fr. _freel_, basket made of twigs, whence Eng. _frail_; while the correct _flagellum_ gave Old Fr. _fleel_ (_fleau_), whence Eng. _flail_. A Vulgar Lat. _*mora_, mulberry, from Lat. _morus_, mulberry tree, has given Fr. _mure_. The _r_ of _berry_ has brought about dissimilation in Eng. _mulberry_ and Ger. _Maulbeere_.
_Colonel_ has the spelling of Fr. _colonel_, but its p.r.o.nunciation points rather to the dissimilated Spanish form _coronel_ which is common in Elizabethan English. Cotgrave has _colonel_, ”a _colonell_, or _coronell_; the commander of a regiment.”
The female name _Annabel_ is a dissimilation of _Amabel_, whence _Mabel_. By confusion with the popular medieval name _Orable_, Lat.
_orabilis_, _Annabel_ has become _Arabel_ or _Arabella_. Our _level_ is Old Fr. _livel_, Vulgar Lat. _*libellum_, for _libella_, a plummet, diminutive of _libra_, scales. Old Fr. _livel_ became by dissimilation _nivel_, now _niveau_. Many conjectures have been made as to the etymology of _oriel_. It is from Old Fr. _oriol_, a recess, or sanctum, which first occurs in an Anglo-Norman poem of the 12th century on Becket. This is from a Late Latin diminutive _aulaeolum_, a small chapel or shrine, which was dissimilated into _auraeolum_.
Sometimes dissimilation leads to the disappearance of a consonant, _e.g._, Eng. _feeble_, Fr. _faible_, represents Lat. _flebilis_, lamentable, from _flere_, to weep. _Fugleman_ was once _flugelman_, from Ger. _Flugelmann_, wing man, _i.e._, a tall soldier on the wing who exaggerated the movements of musketry drill for the guidance of the rest.
[Page Heading: METATHESIS]
Metathesis is the transposition of two sounds. A simple case is our _trouble_, Fr. _troubler_, from Lat. _turbulare_. _Maggot_ is for Mid.
Eng. _maddok_, a diminutive of Anglo-Sax. _maa_; _cf._ Ger. _Made_, maggot. _Kittle_, in the phrase ”kittle cattle,” is identical with _tickle_; _cf._ Ger. _kitzeln_, to tickle. One theory for the origin of _tankard_ is that it stands for _*cantar_, from Lat. _cantharus_, with which it corresponds exactly in meaning; e.g., _cantharus_, ”a pot, a jugge, a _tankerd_” (Cooper); _cantharo_, a ”_tankard_ or jug that houldeth much” (Florio); _canthare_, ”a great jugge, or _tankard_”
(Cotgrave). The metathesis may be due to a.s.sociation with the name Tankard (Tancred).
_Wattle_ and _wallet_ are used indifferently in Mid. English for a little bag. Shakespeare no doubt had in mind the _wattles_ of a c.o.c.k or turkey when he made Gonzalo speak of mountaineers--
”Dew-lapp'd like bulls, whose throats had hanging at them _Wallets_ of flesh.”
(_Tempest_, iii. 3.)
Fr. _moustique_ is for earlier _mousquite_, from Span. _mosquito_, a diminutive from Lat. _musca_, a fly. _Tinsel_ is Fr. _etincelle_, spark, earlier _estincele_, which supposes a Lat. _*stincilla_ for _scintilla_.
The old word _anlace_, dagger, common in Mid. English and revived by Byron and Scott--
”His harp in silken scarf was slung, And by his side an _anlace_ hung.”
(_Rokeby_, v. 15.)
has provoked many guesses. Its oldest form, _anelas_, is a metathesis of the common Old Fr. _alenas_, dagger. This is formed from _alene_, of Germanic origin, cognate with _awl_; cf. _cutla.s.s_, Fr. _coutelas_ (p.
126). _Beverage_ is from Old Fr. _bevrage_, or _beuvrage_, now _breuvage_, Vulgar Lat. _*biberatic.u.m_, from _bibere_, to drink. Here, as in the case of _level_ (p. 58), and _search_ (p. 57), English preserves the older form. In _Martello_ tower, from a fort taken by the British (1794) in _Mortella_, _i.e._, Myrtle, Bay, Corsica, we have vowel metathesis.
It goes without saying that such linguistic phenomena are often observed in the case of children and uneducated people. Not long ago the writer was urged by a gardener to embellish his garden with a _ruskit_ arch.
When metathesis extends beyond one word we have what is known as a _Spoonerism_, the original type of which is said to be--
”_Kinquerings congs_ their t.i.tles take.”
We have seen (p. 57) that the letters _l_, _n_, _r_ are particularly subject to dissimilation and metathesis. But we sometimes find them alternating without apparent reason. Thus _banister_ is a modern form for the correct _bal.u.s.ter_.[44] This was not at first applied to the rail, but to the bulging colonnettes on which it rests. Fr. _bal.u.s.tre_ comes, through Italian, from Greco-Lat. _balaustium_, a pomegranate flower, the shape of which resembles the supports of a bal.u.s.trade.
Cotgrave explains _bal.u.s.tres_ as ”_ballisters_; little, round and short pillars, ranked on the outside of cloisters, terraces, galleries, etc.”
_Glamour_ is a doublet of _grammar_ (see p. 145), and _flounce_ was formerly _frounce_, from Fr. _froncer_, now only used of ”knitting” the brows--
”Till civil-suited morn appear, Not trickt and _frounc't_ as she was wont With the Attic boy to hunt.”
(_Penseroso_, l. 123.)
Fr. _flibustier_, whence our _filibuster_, was earlier _fribustier_, a corruption of Du. _vrijbuiter_, whence directly the Eng.
_freebooter_.[45]
[Page Heading: SHRINKAGE OF WORDS]
<script>