Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Author: Simon
I am a linguist, web developer and musician. I live in Bangor in Wales and run Omniglot - the online encyclopedia of writing systems and languages, as well as making the Radio Omniglot Podcast.
Grockles and Emmets
In Devon, and other parts of the UK, visitors, holidaymakers and recent migrants are sometimes referred to as grockles, and in Cornwall they’re known as emmets. These words tend to be mildly derogatory, and partly affectionate.
A friend asked me about the origins of these words, and whether there are equivalents in French, so I thought I’d look into it.
Grockle apparently comes from a cartoon strip about a boy called Jimmy and his pet grockle (a dragon-like creature), which first appeared as Jimmy Johnson’s Grockle in The Rover comic in the 1932, then as Jimmy and his Grockle in the The Dandy in 1937 then as My Grockle and Me in Sparky in 1966.
One story is that Arthur Rivers, who ran the boating-lake at Goodrington in the 1950s, started using the term, which he got from The Dandy. His assistant, Freddie Fly, told Peter Draper, the scriptwriter for The System about it while working at a bar in Torquay.
Another story is that a local man started using grockle to refer to an elderly lady who regularly swan at the swimming pool where he was working one summer. Then other summer workers began to refer to visitors as grockles.
It was popularised by its use in the 1964 film The System, which is set in Torquay in Devon. This is an example of how the word is used in the film:
Most holidaymakers are grockles. But the real ones you can spot a mile off. Usually they wear shorts, woollen socks and black leather shoes, with their shirt undone all the way down the front so you can see the full extent of their manly chests.
Related words include:
- grockle art = pictures for selling to grockles
- grockle bait = cheap arcades or souvenirs
- grockle box / grockle shell = caravan
- grockle coop = hotel
- grockle can = a tourist bus
- grockle catcher = an easy to reach beach or beauty spot which acts to stop tourists finding other local spots
- grockle fodder = fish and chips
- grockle nest = a holiday home, second home or campsite
- grockle-ridden = full of grockles
In Cornwall the equivalent is emmet (tourist, ant), from the Middle English emete / ampte (ant), from the Old English word æmette (ant), from the Proto-Germanic ēmaitijǭ (ant), from *maitijǭ (cutter, slicer, biter) [source].
A favourite destination in Cornwall for emmets is apparently Porthemmet (which may or may not exist).
Possible equivalents in French include:
- excursionniste = (day) tripper
- estivant = summer visitor
- Juillettiste = July visiter
- aoûtien = August visiter
- villégiateur = vacationer
Are any of these derogatory?
Are there similar words in other languages?
Sources: Wiktionary, Lexico, Wiktionary, UK Comics Wiki, We Are South Devon
Job Tracks
In English you might talk about career paths, meaning “the way that you progress in your work, either in one job or in a series of jobs” [source].
In Dutch there is one word – baan [baːn] – that means both job and path. So you might think that a career path in Dutch would be a baanbaan, but it is in fact a carrière, carrièrepad or loopbaan [source].
A baan is a road, way or path; a track or lane; a job or professional occupation, or a sports field or court.
It comes from the Middle Dutch bane (open field, battlefield; lane, track; road, way, path), from the Old Dutch *bana, from the Proto-Germanic *bano (battlefield, clearing, open space, cleared way, path, track), from the Proto-Indo-European *gʷʰen- (to strike, kill) [source].
The English words defend and offend actually come from the same root, via the Latin *fendō (I hit, thrust) [source].
Related words in Dutch include:
- banen = to make way, clear
- baanbrekend = revolutionary, earthshaking (“path-breaking”)
- bijbaan = side job, sideline, job on the side
- busbaan = bus lane
- droombaan = dream job, perfect job
- hondenbaan = a really bad job, dog’s work
- landingsbaan = runway, airstrip
- loopbaan = career, career path
- rijbaan = lane, carriageway
- enkelbaans = one-way (road)
- tweebaans = two-way (road)
Related words in other Germanic languages include the German Bahn (route, trail, rail(way), train, tram, lane, orbit), the Danish bane (track, trajectory), and the Swedish bana (path, race, track, railway, career, life) {source].
Carrière comes from the French carrière (career, riding arena, racecourse), from the Italian carriera (career, the fastest gait), from the Latin Latin carrāria (a wide road for vehicles, a path for carts) from the Latin carrus (wagon, cart, cartload, wagonload), from the Gaulish *karros (wagon), from the Proto-Celtic *karros (wagon) [source].
Language Quiz
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Bed litter
What links litter and beds?
Well, back in about 1300 a litter was a bed. Later on it came to mean a bed-like vehicle carried on the shoulders. By the the 15th it also referred to straw used for bedding, particularly for animals, and then the offspring of an animal born at the same time.
By the 18th century litter could also be “scattered oddments” or “disorderly debris”, and by the 19th century litter was straw bedding for animals and the animal waste in it.
The verb to litter originally meant to provide with bedding, and later came to mean to give birth to, to strew with objects, and to scatter in a disorderly way.
Litter comes from the Anglo-Norman litere (portable bed), from the Old French litiere (litter, stretcher, bier, straw, bedding), from the Medieval Latin lectaria (litter), from the Latin lectus (bed, lounge, sofa, dining-couch), from the Proto-Indo-European *legh- (to lie down, lay).
From the same PIE root we also get such words as the English lie, lay, low, law and lair, the Irish luigh (to lie down) and luí (bed), and the Welsh gwely (bed) and lle (place, location).
Sources: Online Etymology Dictionary, Wiktionary
Flowing Pencils
Today while looking into the origins of the Dutch word for pencil – potlood [pɔt.loːt] – I found some interesting connections to words other languages.
Potlood also means crayon, and comes from pot (jar, pot) & lood (lead, plumb bob). Apparently it was originally a name for graphite, and was used for glazing pots, but was misidentified as a form of lead [source].
Other words featuring pot include:
- potloodetui = pencil case
- potloodslijper = pencil sharpener
- bloempot = flower pot, planter
- doofpot = cover-up (“deaf pot”)
- potdoof = stone deaf, completely deaf
- fooienpot = tip jar, stock pot
- kookpot = cooking pot, saucepan, cauldron
- stamppot= stew, mash, stamppot (a traditional Dutch dish made of potatoes mashed with one or several vegetables)
Lood comes from the Middle Dutch lôot (lead), from Old Dutch *lōt, from Proto-Germanic *laudą (lead), from the Proto-Celtic *loudom (lead), ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European *plewd- (to fly, flow, run) [source].
For the same Proto-Celtic root we get luaidhe, which is lead in Irish and Scottish Gaelic, leoaie (lead) in Manx, the English word lead, and related words in other Germanic languages [source].
Words for lead in Welsh (plwm), Cornish (plomm / plobm) and Breton (plom), come from the Latin plumbum (lead (metal), lead pipe, pencil), which is also the root of the English words plumb, plumber and plumbing [source].
A plumber in Dutch is a loodgieter [ˈloːtˌxi.tər] and plumbing is loodgieterswerk – a gieter [ˈɣi.tər] is a person who pours, e.g. a caster, or a watering can, so a loodgieter is someone who pours lead or a lead caster [source].
Language Quiz
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?
Dune Town Gardens
In Dutch a garden or yard is a tuin [tœy̯n]. When I learnt this yesterday I wondered whether it was related to the English word town.
Tuin comes from the Middle Dutch tuun (hedge), from the Old Dutch tūn (an enclosed piece of ground), from the Proto-Germanic *tūną (fence, enclosure), from the Proto-Celtic *dūnom (stronghold, rampart) [source].
Related words include:
- achtertuin = backyard, back garden
- betuinen = to enclose, fence, hedge
- dierentuin = zoo
- kindertuin = kindergarten
- kruidentuin = herb garden
- moestuin = vegetable / kitchen garden
- speeltuin = children’s playground
- tuinen = to practice agriculture or horticulture
- tuinier = gardener
- tuinieren = gardening
- tuincentrum = garden centre
- tuinslang = garden hose (“garden snake”)
- voortuin = front yard
From the Proto-Germanic word *tūną we also get such words as town, the German Zaun (fence), the Icelandic tún (hayfield), the Faroese tún (forecourt, way between houses, street in a Faroese village), and the Norwegian tun (courtyard, front yard, farmstead) [source].
The Russian word тын (fence, especially one made of twigs) comes from the same root [source].
Words for dune in Germanic language possibly come from the same root as well [source].
Directly from the Proto-Celtic word *dūnom we get such words as the Irish dún (fort, fortress, haven), the Scottish Gaelic dùn (fortress, heap, hill), the Manx doon (fort, fortress, stronghold), the Welsh dyn (hill, height, fortification) and dinas (city, town), and the Cornish din (fort) [source]. More about this on Celtiadur
Artists’ Donkeys
Yesterday while preparing the latest episode of the Radio Omniglot podcast, which is about Dutch, I found that there are quite a few words of Dutch origin in English.
Some come directly from Dutch, some via other languages, such as French, and some come via Dutch from other languages.
- avast – from the Dutch hou vast (hold tight)
- bluff – probably from the Dutch bluffen (to brag)
- booze – from the Middle Dutch busen (to drink to excess)
- brandy – from the Dutch brandewijn (“burnt wine”).
- cookie – from the Dutch koekje (little cake)
- easel – from the Dutch (schilders)ezel (“painter’s donkey”)
- iceburg – from the Dutch ijsberg (“ice mountain”)
- knapsack – from the Middle Dutch knapzak (“snack bag”)
- bamboo – from the Dutch bamboe, from the Portuguese bambu, from the Malay bambu, from the Kannada ಬಮ್ಬು (bambu)
- cricket (the insect) – from the Middle English creket/crykett/crykette, from the Old French crequet/criquet (locust) from criquer (to make a cracking sound; creak), from the Middle Dutch kricken (to creak, crack)
- cricket (the game) – perhaps from a Flemish dialect of Dutch met de krik ketsen (to chase a ball with a curved stick)
I particularly like schildersezel, or “painter’s donkey”, for an easel. It’s perhaps a relative of the clothes horse, which is also known as a drying horse or garment donkey, apparently.
The word ezel means donkey, ass, mule, fool, idiot, easel, (work)bench or trestle. Related words include:
- ezelin = jenny, she-ass
- ezelsveulen = foal of a donkey; utter idiot, hopeless fool
- ezelachtig = asinine
- ezeldrijver = donkey-driver
- ezelsbruggetje = memory aid, mnemonic (“little donkey bridge”)
- ezelsoor = dog-ear (turned down part of a page – “donkey’s ear”)
Here’s a tune I wrote called The Dancing Donkeys / Asynnod sy’n Dawnsio:
Language Quiz
Here’s a recording in a mystery language.
Can you identify the language, and do you know where it’s spoken?