Why God Hates German Words
techno-anthropology.blogspot.com
techno-anthropology.blogspot.com
A peculiarity perhaps unique to a handful of languages, English included, is that the nouns for meats are commonly different from, and unrelated to, those for the animals from which they are produced, the animal commonly having a Germanic name and the meat having a French-derived one.
Examples include: deer and venison; cow and beef; swine/pig and pork; and sheep/lamb and mutton. This is assumed to be a result of the aftermath of the Norman conquest of England, where an Anglo-Norman-speaking elite were the consumers of the meat, produced by lower classes, which happened to be largely Anglo-Saxon[citation needed], though this same duality can also be seen in other languages like French, which did not undergo such linguistic upheaval (e.g. boeuf "beef" vs. vache "cow").
With the exception of beef and pork, the distinction today is gradually becoming less and less pronounced (venison is commonly referred to simply as deer meat, mutton is lamb, and chicken is both the animal and the meat over the more traditional term poultry. (Use of the term mutton, however, remains, especially when referring to the meat of an older sheep, distinct from lamb; and poultry remains when referring to the meat of birds and fowls in general. Use of the term swineflesh for pork, is also widespread, especially in religious contexts)
http://books.google.com/books?id=zzQJAAAAQAAJ&dq=ivanhoe...
"Truly," said Wamba, without stirring from the spot, "I have consulted my legs upon this matter, and they are altogether of opinion, that to carry my gay garments through these sloughs, would be an act of unfriendship to my sovereign person and royal wardrobe; wherefore, Gurth, I advise thee to call off Fangs, and leave the herd to their destiny, which, whether they meet with bands of travelling soldiers, or of outlaws, or of wandering pilgrims, can be little else than to be converted into Normans before morning, to thy no small ease and comfort."
"The swine turned Normans to my comfort!" quoth Gurth; "expound that to me, Wamba, for my brain is too dull, and my mind too vexed, to read riddles."
"Why, how call you those grunting brutes running about on their four legs?" demanded Wamba.
"Swine, fool, swine," said the herd, "every fool knows that."
"And swine is good Saxon," said the Jester; "but how call you the sow when she is flayed, and drawn, and quartered, and hung up by the heels, like a traitor?"
"Pork," answered the swine-herd.
"I am very glad every fool knows that too," said Wamba, "and pork, I think, is good Norman-French; and so when the brute lives, and is in the charge of a Saxon slave, she goes by her Saxon name; but becomes a Norman, and is called pork, when she is carried to the Castle-hall to feast among the nobles; what dost thou think of this, friend Gurth, ha?"
"It is but too true doctrine, friend Wamba, however it got into thy fool's pate."
"Nay, I can tell you more," said Wamba, in the same tone; "there is old Alderman Ox continues to hold his Saxon epithet, while he is under the charge of serfs and bondsmen such as thou, but becomes Beef, a fiery French gallant, when he arrives before the worshipful jaws that are destined to consume him. Mynheer Calf, too, becomes Monsieur de Veau in the like manner; he is Saxon when he requires tendance, and takes a Norman name when he becomes matter of enjoyment."
"By St Dunstan," answered Gurth, "thou speakest but sad truths; little is left to us but the air we breathe, and that appears to have been reserved with much hesitation, solely for the purpose of enabling us to endure the tasks they lay upon our shoulders. The finest and the fattest is for their board; the loveliest is for their couch; the best and bravest supply their foreign masters with soldiers, and whiten distant lands with their bones, leaving few here who have either will or the power to protect the unfortunate Saxon. God's blessing on our master Cedric, he hath done the work of a man in standing in the gap; but Reginald Front-de-Boeuf is coming down to this country in person, and we shall soon see how little Cedric's trouble will avail him.—Here, here," he exclaimed again, raising his voice, "So ho! so ho! well done, Fangs! thou hast them all before thee now, and bring'st them on bravely, lad."
Venison is still venison, (who's ever heard of buying "dear meat"?) Chicken was always chicken as a meat, "poultry" refers to the livestock as a collective noun.
I beg you to go to your local butcher (or butcher's counter in your supermarket if you don't have a butcher) and order a kilo of "swine flesh" and see how widespread that usage is!
Whoever wrote the section of the wikipedia article you quoted clearly doesn't speak English as a native language, or was having a joke at your expense.
Mutton has been a normal food in many times and places. It happens to be out of fashion in most of the English-speaking world right now.
I grew up around sheep and often ate mutton as a child. To me, calling young mutton “lamb” has unpleasant connotations. It would be like calling the meat of a relatively young pig “piglet”, or the meat of a relatively young chicken “chick”.
The reason for this is that mutton is supposed to smell a bit funny, and lamb doesn't.
In any case, you can get some really tasty lamb dishes down under (e.g. my Mum's slow roasted lamb shanks).
burp
You mean, it would be like calling something what it is, rather than using a euphemism to shield yourself from what you're doing?
Regardless of your opinion on eating meat, I don’t think this is a failure of euphemism so much as an accidental dysphemism.
"Venison's dear, isn't it?" - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vPDbAJB6JY
Also, while he said "swine flesh" was widespread, he also said it was widespread in a religious context -- that is, pejoratively -- so that would explain the reaction you'll get at the butchers'. I confess that I heard "swine" quite a lot in church, when I was a churchgoer.
This is incorrect. We eat and ride du cheval (horse), cajole and eat agneaux (lambs), chase and eat poulets (chicken), smile at, and eat, lapins (rabbits), to say nothing of escargots (snails) or grenouilles (frogs), and all kinds of fish, and sea food.
In "farmers' markets" everywhere in France (we just call them "markets") whole animals can be found, with just the skin removed but with the head still attached. It would be weird to call a dead animal that is still very much recognizable, a different name than the live one.
The overarching story is good but to respectfully nitpick, in terms of linguistics, Germanic and German don't mean the same thing. At least, only a little more than Java and JavaScript do.
The English were not speaking German prior to 1066 but Old English or Anglo Saxon, a mish-mash of ancient Britannic languages, Latin, Old Norse, and some West Germanic languages.
Also, it wasn't "French" that was brought over to England. At least, not in any codified, official sense of the term that we now accept. The Duchy of Normandy was still separate from the Kingdom of France (although Norman was one of the oïl languages) until the 13th century and Norman, as a language, had more Norse influence than other oïl languages due to prior invasions.
BTW, I definitely wasn't trying to imply you didn't understand the background since you seemed to know what you were talking about but it bristles me to think other people with no linguistic background could be reading "German" and thinking.. ooh, German! Maybe that's just the personality disorder talking though ;-)
I disagree.
The Old English was a Germanic Language. The Term "Anglo Saxon" itself refers to the people that influxed into Britain from Angeln (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angeln), Lower Saxony (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lower_Saxony) and Jutland (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jutland). As West-Germanic as it gets.
Of course languages get influenced from its neigbours. But twisting it into "a mish-mash of ... [a lot of important stuff] and some West Germanic languages" is exactly what proves the point of the story: Languages are tied to races and depending on point of view, are viewed as inferior.
In Europe it has always been problematic for linguists to prove to their own society that their language is a descendant of the arch-enemy's language (therefor "inferior").
E.G. the country of Luxembourg has been pushing legislature within the EU to recognize Luxembourgish as an official language, while linguists consider it part of a greater German dialect family. This illustrates the political implications, that arise out of "esteeming" languages. Luxembourg on the one hand tries to secure it's heritage. On the other Hand: Making it an official language may give a Luxembuorgish "Führer" of a horrible future leverage to claim those lands in Germany where this dialect is spoken too (or even the greater dialect family).
The Netherlands did exactly that after WWII, claiming chunks of northern Germany on behalf of linguistic similarities of the spoken dialect there (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_annexation_of_German_terr...). And speaking of a "Führer" one could understand why it was controversial in the Netherlands to tie the Dutch language to the German language, while "Dutch" stands for what the English heard how the Dutch called themselves: "Deutsch", German.
Also "Old Norse" was a Germanic language too. Northern Germanic: North, Norse, Norsemen, Normans. The English also never spoke German, but they speak a Germanic language. And this is what the Germans do too. Why linguists under imaginable pressure in the past still call it 'Germanic', I don't know but I rather just go with it. And attaching feelings to stuff like that again proves the point of the story.
"Also, it wasn't "French" that was brought over to England." As English is a Germanic language, the similarities do not apply to e.g. the english clause syntax. But for a non-English-native-speaker the impact of french words in English vocabulary is overwhelming as is the way English words are written "frenchy". Just consider this HTML-Tag and attributes <titLE ... vertical-al IGN: middLE; Since in Germany we're taught British English in schools, the CSS-Attribute "colOUR" drove me nuts.
French was the lingua-franca (well, where does this term derive from?) in all of western europe, since it was the modern Latin, the language of rulers, intellectuals and clerics. It does not mean, that those who spoke it in Germany, England or Russia were of french descent. But speaking anything else was indeed seen as being inferior. As it is seen inferior in non-English speaking countries nowadays, if you don't use English words in specialized industries.
The eliteness of french is the root of the conflict that keeps Belgium from forming a government for 4 years now (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flemish_movement#History), as Flemish was seen inferior back in the days.
It's what made Martin Luther successful with reaching the masses, since he un-elited Christianity by making the bible available in German for the first time ever.
It's what made Pushkin THE national poet, since he un-elited literature by writing in Russian for the first time, instead of french. The russian rulers didn't even understood the people they ruled upon!
I wonder if Hitler knew, that the first German words ever written down in his thousand-year old Reich, were written in Hebrew letters, since Yiddish is Germanic and Jews (as anyone not-speaking elitish) were inferior people, but yet capable of writing.
I don't mean that at all times and at any place people spoke French to foreigners. It has been Latin before French, it is English ever since. And the term lingua franca just happened to come into existence while french/frankish was the no 1 language or the "Franks" the no 1 nation in western europe.
Sabir was a pidgin language, but calling it the lingua franca would not satisfy me. Since surely no one sailing from helsinki to stockholm back then, spoke even a dime turkish. Lingua Franca, at least for me, refers to what original language non-native speakers are driven to to speak in. Thus creating pidgin languages.
E.G.: Back then Danes or Swedes did have no intention to use arabic even when meeting an arab trader in some port, since it was easier to try it with some frenche verbes.
For one thing LEOs don't say "individual" because they're romance language kowtowers but rather because it's an instance of the largest valid superclass of man/child/woman/girl/boy/teenager/infant/...
Similarly, it's not "Sir, please get out of the Porsche 911" but "Sir, please get out of the vehicle". "Vehicle" is factually correct whatever the beliefs of the other party ("this is not just a car!").
Perhaps I'm not smart enough to catch all of the nuances in the article. For example the very first sentence's "grandmother" is splendidly etymologically ambiguous (grossmutter/grandmere), is this intentional?
Similarly "smart" (allegedly dumb German word) is derived via German smerzan, Latin mordere, Greek smerdnos (according to my dictionary).
You're right about "smart." There are other minor inaccuracies that other people pointed out. The origin of "fuck" isn't clear. Were the anglo-saxons actually enslaved? (I'd say yes. Serfdom/slavery, what's the differece?) I didn't write this thing like a researcher. I wrote it like a daytime applied linguist with a secret passion for his crazy-ass blog. I'll do a rigorous one if people actually want that.
I like the hypothesis, I'm sure there must be some research on this.
There is a writing style guide written by a well-known English author, Victorian era, that suggests using saxon over romance words for clarity. I feel this is valid (also more concise, more punchy (more consonants)). I thought it was Kipling but perhaps not... somebody help me out?
"For example, the word "photograph" (from Greek light+writing) would become "sun-print" (from Saxon). Other terms include "wortlore" (botany), "welkinfire" (meteor) and "nipperlings" (forceps)."
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Saxon_linguistic_purism
There's cases where Swiss French (counting), Quebecois French (conjugation of many verbs) etc is more logical or more consistent, but the changes are rejected as foreign by the Académie.
Edit: Oops Jacques beat me too it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_and_the_English_Langua...
Rule 5 states: Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm
"Bad writers, and especially scientific, political, and sociological writers, are nearly always haunted by the notion that Latin or Greek words are grander than Saxon ones..."
the sort of guy
These sound like nice simple Anglo Saxon words, but:
"sort" – 1200–50; (noun) Middle English < Middle French sorte
"guy" – 1300–50; Middle English gye < Old French guie, a guide, derivative of guier to guide
You played with these words in several parts of the post, which made it all the more entertaining a read.
As for the specific policeman example, you are probably right to say that "individual" is used because it is a useful non-offensive abstraction for the various sub-classes of human, but policeman-speak is still well-known for being unnecessarily verbose (from our biased anti-latin perspective as English speakers). Perhaps a better example would be choosing to use verbs like "locate" rather than "find".
> "locate" rather than "find"
As it happens... I disagree this example is any better. To locate is to "discover the position" of something; to find is to "meet with or discover by chance" (that's my emphasis, but both are primary definitions from Collins English).
Could be it's just hard to meaningfully extrapolate those class-based connotations forwards 1000 years in an enjoyable pop-sci article.
Policeman-speak is closer to lawyer-speak because police spend a lot of time writing reports that are subject to cross examination in court. Police and lawyers must communicate clearly (in legal-speak) despite any difference in class.
What exactly do you mean when you say "derived via German smerzan"? Smerzan and smart have the same origin in common West Germanic, whereas the other two have their origin in common PIE (along with Slavic 'Sm(e)rt' meaning 'death').
If what you meant to say is that the word is derived from Greek smerdnos (via Latin and German), then you're reading your dictionary wrong because those are simply etymologically related words.
"Old english smeortan; related to Old High German smerzan, Latin mordere to bite, Greek smerdnos terrible"
Thank you for the correction.
A lot of comedy comes from using the "wrong" register for a given situation, and a lot of amusement for English speakers learning German comes from the fact that Germanic languages gave us our informal-register vocabulary (our formal vocabulary came from Greek and Latin by way of French).
(thus, for example, a science student giggles a bit at the seemingly-informal "Wasserstoff", sounding as it does like "water stuff", but doesn't bat an eye at "hydrogen", even though the Greek root words mean essentially the same thing)
"Oh hi there, Hacker News. Someone apparently submitted this and it's doing pretty well. Some sort of HN or reddit flare-up happens with more of my posts than not, and it always has me wanting to find a way to capitalize on it and become some professional writer-philosopher. One with muscles and a serious artist face. Hey, a boy has got to dream. Anyways, I can write stuff. I'm a little bit smart. You should totally hire me or something. kenmyers@gmail.com. Or what if I wrote a book? Would that work? If I've got, like, 140 RSS subscribers, but 50,000 hits a month through sites like HN and reddit, do you think that's enough of a following to get me somewhere? Talk to me."
That's how you capitalize on success.
> Policemen, charged with high office but often born of a commoner
> strain, struggle with sloppy mismatches, calling a suspect
> "the individual," in utter subconscious terror of being labeled
> the sort of guy who uses the word "man."
Now if you'll excuse me, I need to utilize the commode.
Actually, the scalar component of velocity, making it distance per unit of time.
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Rate says "Rate of speed (velocity), in physics"
and then https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Rate_of_speed redirects to https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Velocity
"Oh, thou City, thou hypocritical City ! Thou blindfold, drowsy England, that sleeps and snorts in the bed of covetousness, awake, awake ! The enemy is upon thy back, he is ready to scale the walls and enter possession, and wilt thou not look out?
By, then, of course, it was too late.
http://www.amazon.com/Light-History-English-Language-Expande...?
i think in ancient times, mentioning Hell, Helheim, trolls was also only for brave men, and Germanic grandmothers were against it