Re: The hunting of the Xoc [was: Re: India first]

On 2008-01-23 09:12, P&G wrote:

>>> and even xok [shok] "shark" – English shark
>> Kurath's Middle English Dictionary ...resets the etymology of <shark> back
>> to "unknown".
>
> I thought the words was well known.
>
> Skeat's etymological dictionary:
> "The name of the fish is from the Tudor verb to shark = to prowl. Probably
> from North Fr (Picard) cherquier equivalent to OFr cercher later altered to
> mod.F chercher. If this be right to shark is a variant of to search..."
>
> If correct, this means shark is related to search and circus.

It's just one of several guesses about its origin (the earliest
attestation is at any rate pre-Tudor). The "xoc" etymology was proposed
by Tom Jones (1983) and has become enormously popular since, though the
Beckington quotation clearly falsifies it. Here are some more ideas:

http://www.languagehat.com/archives/002843.php

Of course it would be easy to invent a nice, plausible-looking Germanic
etymology based on *sker- 'cut'. The problem is the late attestation and
the absence of the word from languages other than English.

Piotr