Re: Strawberries [was: [tied] IE *p and *b]

I don't know. Piotr tells us that straw and strew are
from the same root. And I have no reason to doubt
him. School teachers commonly give the folk etymology
"star-berry".
But American "wild strawberries", --the little red
round berries you find in your yard-- I'm told, aren't
true strawberries and I have no idea what European
wild strawberries look like.
In any case, I'm wondering if "strew-berry" might not
also be a folk etymology


--- Andrew Jarrette <anjarrette@...> wrote:

> Isn't the "straw" of "strawberry" related to the
> verb "strew", i.e. the berries that are "strewn"
> around on the ground (as strawberries are found in
> the wild)?
>
> Andrew
>
> Rick McCallister <gabaroo6958@...> wrote:
> Well put.
> I'd try to see if one could posit straw(berry) as a
> folk-etymology based on Gmc *srah-. German,
> unfortunately, has Erdbeere, right? Are there any
> dialect forms or other Germanic forms cognate with
> strawberry?
> And I'd also posit that *star-berry, a chestnut
> popular with HS teachers (red flesh with yellow seed
> stars, get it?), is also a folk etymology.
>
> --- Piotr Gasiorowski <gpiotr@...> wrote:
>
> > On 2007-12-10 00:22, Rick McCallister wrote:
> >
> > > I was thinking of straw-berry as related to
> German
> > > Stroh "straw" --but the Latin form,
> unfortunately
> > has
> > > /g/ not /k/. But I imagine the English form is a
> > folk
> > > etymology.
> >
> > Ger. Stroh has no etymological velar at the end.
> The
> > <h> is just a
> > length-marker. The OHG word was <stro:> = OE
> > stre:aw. Even if you assume
> > that <strawberry> has nothing to do with 'straw'
> and
> > derives from
> > something with initial *sr-, not *str-, Germanic
> > *-aw- doesn't match
> > Lat. -ag-.
> >
> > Piotr
> >
> >
>
>

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