--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott" <BMScott@...> wrote:
>
> At 8:21:14 PM on Monday, November 3, 2008, Andrew Jarrette
> wrote:
>
> > --- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "tgpedersen"
> > <tgpedersen@> wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> >> BTW, in case you still want to maintain the especially
> >> close relationship between Frisian and English, here is a
> >> Frisian gloss:
>
> >> feefokker "rancher"
>
> > Literally "cattle-breeder" (the English profanity
> > apparently meant simply "to breed")
>
> I don't know of any evidence that it ever had that meaning
> in English.
>
> Brian
>
Yes, I was extrapolating from Dutch to English: I just remember
reading somewhere that <fokken> in Dutch, or some variety of Dutch,
means "to breed (cattle)", and that the English word comes from the
Dutch word in this sense. <Fuck> (hope this is not too vulgar for
Cybalist, I am citing it objectively) is not in the Oxford English
Dictionary, 1971 edition (I was quite surprised to find this), but
Webster's relates it to Middle Dutch <fokken> "to strike, copulate"
and dialectal Swedish <fock> "penis". So although I don't know
anything about the word's history in English, from these two cognates
I would guess (now that I know about the MDu and SW dial. words) it
always had the meaning "copulate" in English.
Andrew