> SUGGESTION:
>
> All of these facts point to a possible convergence of several sources.
>
> One of these sources, rather than the Latin pulso~are, may have
been: poach (1) "to push, poke," from M.Fr. pocher "to thrust, poke,"
from O.Fr. pochier "poke out, gouge," from a Gmc. source (cf. M.H.G.
puchen "to pound, beat, knock") related to poke (v.)
>
Good theory, except that because of the initial p- the word can't be
Germanic (because in Germanic, such a p- would be from PIE b-, and
those are very rare, so the word is most likely a loan; this was one
of the criteria Kuhn used to separate suspected Nordwestblock words
from the rest of the vocabulary of Germanic).
As you can see from my examples in an earlier mail, the word (or
rather several seemingly related words) occurs in several languages of
northern Europe and Asia. It can't be Finno-Ugric, since there is no
way, seemingly, to derive the three relevant roots derivationally
within FU (and here comes yet another one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puukko
I don't know why I forgot that one, the notion that Finns easily
resort to knifes is the textbook example in Denmark of previous
schoolbook ethnic stereotyping);
it can't be Celtic, since of those languages only the p-Celtic
subgroup has initial p-, from original kW-, and there is no
corresponding word in kW-, so it must be either a loan from a
substrate or adstrate, or a wanderwort, cf. the general usefulness,
but also the symbolic significance of the puukko.
Perhaps the original forms were
*pug-
*pug-l- > *puG-l- > *pul-
*pug-sk- > *puG-sk- > *pusk-
The -l- and -sk- suffixes exist in NWBlock too.
It seems the Jysk
http://www.jyskordbog.dk/ordbog/index.cgi?opslag=ankerflen
(the dictionary hasn't reached p- yet) and Dutch words have too do
specifically with catching eels; the area where that is considered a
delicacy is still very local, most Norteamericanos won't touch
'snakes' with a barge pole; in Maine they use them as bait in lobster
fishing, they could get good money for them in N. Europe).
Torsten