From: Rick McCallister
Message: 59077
Date: 2008-06-06
> At 2:57:58 PM on Thursday, June 5, 2008, RickI understood him as not denying that Greek is the
> McCallister
> wrote:
>
> > --- "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> >> At 8:51:55 AM on Thursday, June 5, 2008, Carl
> Hult
> >> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >>> The first word, butter, may be a close call
> since the
> >>> greeks actually had a word called boutyron, lit.
> >>> "cowcheese" but I still feel that this is
> wishful
> >>> thinking on the linguist's part. The greeks
> didn't use
> >>> butter in the same way other people in Europe
> did and if
> >>> ever, the greeks got this word from elsewhere,
> not
> >>> giving it away to other languages. It may even
> be a folk
> >>> etymology word in Greece, adapted to fit the
> notion of
> >>> "cow cheese"
>
> >> The chain from Gk. <boúturon> to Lat. <butyrum>
> to
> >> e.g. OE <butere> looks pretty straightforward.
>
> > He's not denying that.
>
> Yes, he is.
>
> > He saying that boúteron is a folk-etymology in
> Greek.
>
> In the last sentence he suggests that that is a
> possibility;
> before that he denies that the Gk. word is the
> source of
> Engl. <butter>.
>
> Brian
>