From: fournet.arnaud
Message: 51832
Date: 2008-01-23
----- Original Message -----
From: "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...>
To: <cybalist@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Wednesday, January 23, 2008 9:36 AM
Subject: Re: [tied] 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
> =======
What about herring ?
and Uralic *kol "fish"
Arnaud
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