{"id":21660,"date":"2021-11-26T20:03:11","date_gmt":"2021-11-26T20:03:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=21660"},"modified":"2021-11-26T20:03:13","modified_gmt":"2021-11-26T20:03:13","slug":"hairy-cats-and-little-dogs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=21660","title":{"rendered":"Hairy Cats and Little Dogs"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>When you see a <strong>caterpillar<\/strong>, does it make you think of a cat or a dog?<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/rachel_s\/2818180719\/in\/photolist-5i2UWK-7huqVg-ny46ai-v4TRuz-oytWW5-duywTm-76dchb-NELw2w-sq7DM-J43yCo-u5EB5-a5Cq1A-34yDoy-oNXhAH-pH1iqB-poSdJ-S2gaMx-dhNQNm-dhNQKV-Na63z-8NDqUu-aVBMSX-8KwQt6-rCH3NT-23Na6xU-7bpX6L-4MaupA-xoDbEp-ritqCt-2qXt2u-25pG779-bF6a4g-q4ZSh-67LLZV-6tUbL9-finrP-herd4-8f2L9d-TXQP6R-RHj2Th-7wXXxk-2Ycy5h-QGV1Hg-UN3uhf-bEXN9P-gXYPUZ-acsgFH-pDPK6-MBLzVL-4xYkY\" title=\"Caterpillar\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/3012\/2818180719_0b6c56dd48_z.jpg\" alt=\"Caterpillar\" width=\"640\" height=\"394\"><\/a><script async=\"\" src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Why do I ask? Well, the word <strong>caterpillar<\/strong> comes from the Late Latin words <em>catta<\/em> (cat) and <em>pil\u014dsa<\/em>, a form of <em>pil\u014dsus<\/em> (hairy, shaggy), via the Old Northern French word <em>catepeluse<\/em> (caterpillar). So a caterpillar is a &#8220;hairy cat&#8221; [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/caterpillar\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>In French the word for <strong>caterpillar<\/strong> is <strong>chenille<\/strong> [\u0283\u0259.nij], which comes from the Latin <em>can\u012bcula<\/em> (little dog) because apparently the head of a caterpillar looks like a dog [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/caterpillar\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>In Welsh a caterpillar is a <strong>deilbryf<\/strong> (&#8220;insect\/lava\/maggot of leaves&#8221;), <strong>ymlusgyn<\/strong> (&#8220;little creeper&#8221;), <strong>teiliwr (blewog)<\/strong> (&#8220;(hairy) tailor&#8221;) or <strong>teiliwr cantroed<\/strong> (&#8220;tailor with hundred feet&#8221;) [<a href=\"https:\/\/welsh-dictionary.ac.uk\/gpc\/gpc.html\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>In Irish a caterpillar is a <strong>cruimh chab\u00e1iste<\/strong> (&#8220;cabbage maggot&#8221;) or a <strong>p\u00e9ist ch\u00e1il<\/strong> (&#8220;cabbage\/kale beast&#8221;) [<a href=\"https:\/\/welsh-dictionary.ac.uk\/gpc\/gpc.html\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Are there interesting words for caterpillars in other languages?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When you see a caterpillar, does it make you think of a cat or a dog? Why do I ask? Well, the word caterpillar comes from the Late Latin words catta (cat) and pil\u014dsa, a form of pil\u014dsus (hairy, shaggy), via the Old Northern French word catepeluse (caterpillar). So a caterpillar is a &#8220;hairy cat&#8221; [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,107,10,15,34,77,78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-etymology","category-language","category-latin","category-old-french","category-welsh","category-words-and-phrases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21660"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21673,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21660\/revisions\/21673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}