The virtual linguist

Hogmanay

The Scots call today, the last day of the year (and particularly the last evening), Hogmanay. The origins of this word are obscure. The Oxford English Dictionary suggests it comes from the Old French aiguillanneuf, and, certainly, France and Scotland were very closely allied at one time (to the 16th century) against the common enemy England, so the Scots may have borrowed this French word. An neuf means 'new year', but no-one is quite sure what the first part of the word refers to, although at one time it was widely believed to refer to mistletoe (gui in French), an idea now discounted by French scholars. Another suggestion mentioned in the OED is that it is a corruption of the Latin calendae, in English 'calends', defined in the dictionary as 'The first day of any month in the Roman calendar', the term being in use until the 17th century, the same century the word Hogmanay was first recorded.

The 16th-century writer Rabelais uses the phrase aller à l'aguillaneuf le premier trou de l'an in Gargantua and Pantagruel (French text here - see page 37). That is translated in the Gutenberg edition as 'to go a-handsel-getting on the first day of the new year' (see here). Handsel is an old word meaning a gift given for the new year, which is designed to bring good luck to the recipient.

A very happy new year to all readers!

German words in the British press

Yesterday's post was about English words in German; today's is about the same phenomenon the other way round - German words in English. In an article in the Financial Times, it was pointed out that usage of the word Schadenfreude (a word hard to translate succinctly; it means 'deriving pleasure from the misery of others') in British news media had increased by 29% over the past year (30% in US media).

Just to test the assertion, I had a look at some recent news reports. Sure enough, Schadenfreude appears in today's Times in an article about the Cuban press enjoying the US's current financial woes. In this article, schadenfreude was not italicised and was spelt with a lower-case s, unlike in the FT article. It also appeared (unitalicised and with a small s) in a BBC report, Schadenfreude being the emotion that David Cameron, leader of the Opposition, probably feels, according to the report, when he looks at Gordon Brown. 

Schadenfreude is not the only German word to occur frequently in British news reports, according to the FT article. Angst appears less often than it used to, but the word über is ubiquitous (or uberiquitous!), particularly in showbiz articles: uber-agent, uber-publicist, in politics: uber-strategists, the uber-issue, and in finance: uber-investor, uber-bears.

The Germans themselves are enjoying a bit of Schadenfreude over this über-inundation of English, since they have got sick and tired of the English word 'super' being used widely in German, as a replacement for über.

Too many English words in German

A book came out in Germany last year called Speak German! Warum Deutsch Manchmal Besser Ist (which translates 'why German is sometimes better'). The author, Wolf Schneider, complains that there are too many English words in German, like service point, customer relationship, brainstorming, fast food and countdown. Apart from anything else, 60% of Germans can't understand the English, and advertisers, who are some of the worst culprits when it comes to using English, are writing clever slogans that are completely wasted on the vast majority of the population.

Mitsubishi used the English slogan 'Drive alive' in their adverts, but it turned out that Germans misinterpreted this as 'Survive the journey'. 'Come in and find out' was thought to mean 'Come in and find the exit' and 'We are drivers too' was misinterpreted as 'We are two drivers'.

Schneider has started a campaign entitled Lebendiges Deutsch (Living German) (website here), where he asks for suggestions for new German words to replace the anglicisms peppering the language. Readers suggested alternatives for Champions League (Meisterliga and Koenigsklasse were suggestions) and consultant (Berater). He tells one success story; a coffee-shop owner in Schleswig-Holstein had his paper cups printed with the German Geh-Kaffee (literally 'Go-coffee') instead of the ubiquitous 'coffee to go'.

80% of us use advertising slogans in everyday conversation

According to a recent survey, 80% of us use advertising slogans without thinking when we speak, and if a product has a catchy slogan in its ad, 37% of us would be more likely to buy it (article here). These are the top ten slogans in people's conversations:

1. Good things come to those who wait (Guinness)

2. Every little helps (Tesco)

3. It does exactly what it says on the tin (Ronseal)

4. I'm loving it (McDonalds)

5. Wassssuuuupppp? (Budweiser)

6. Just do it (Nike)

7. It's good to talk (BT)

8. They're grrrreat (Kellogg's Frosties)

9. The future's bright, the future's Orange (Orange)

10. Probably the best lager in the world (Carlsberg)

Admittedly, many of the above are cliches, but I don't think that you can credit advertising agencies with coming up with all these memorable lines. The winning slogan is surely based on the French proverb "Tout vient à point à qui sait attendre" written by Clement Marot, a 16th-century French poet. And Tesco certainly didn't come up with "Every little helps". That phrase is in several citations for the word 'little' in the Oxford English Dictionary, including this one from 1791: "It isn't much, but every little helps" (from Wild Oats, J O'Keeffe).

Most frequent word in news bulletins 2008

I was listening to BBC Radio 4's Sunday morning magazine programme Broadcasting House over breakfast this morning. Someone had analysed every news bulletin within the programme over the year to see which were the most frequently occurring words. Function words, ie little words such as the, an, and, that etc, were excluded. These were the top six words:

1. police

2. government

3. England

4. British

5. political

6. president

Little Britain and Ukraine

No, not the television comedy sketch show Little Britain, but An Bhreatain Bheag, which is Irish for 'Wales' but which literally translates as 'Little Britain'. When I came across the translation in an English-Irish dictionary, I immediately thought of present-day Ukraine, which before the 20th century was called 'Little Russia' (Malorossiya in Russian) - or, at least, the western part of Ukraine was. It would no doubt be insulting these days to refer to Ukraine as Little Russia, but even Ukrainians seem to have used it in previous centuries. The novelist Gogol, who was Ukrainian but wrote in Russian, uses the term Little Russia in the very first sentence of his Evenings on a Farm near Dikanka (Russian text here).

I suppose what Wales and Ukraine have, or had, in common was a big, powerful neighbour that didn't brook any nationalist aspirations in its borderlands, hence the epithet 'Little'. Ukraine, a name in use since the 12th or 13th centuries to refer to various bits of territory around Kiev, literally means borderland (krai is edge or border). Wales derives from an old Saxon word meaning foreigner, Roman or Celt. The Welsh word for Wales, Cymru, derives from Old Welsh and probably means compatriot, according to the OED.

Boxing Day

Today is Boxing Day in the United Kingdom, a public holiday. Boxing Day is often assumed to be synonymous with St Stephen's Day, the 26 December, but this isn't so. Boxing Day in the UK is a movable holiday, since it is, strictly speaking, not the day after Christmas, as commonly assumed, but the first working day after Christmas. Indeed, Boxing Day 2009 will be on 28 December, a Monday, as Christmas Day will be on a Friday (see the UK trade ministry timetable of holidays here). The first recorded use of the term Boxing Day was in 1833.

The expression Boxing Day derives from Christmas box which, in the 17th century, referred to an earthenware box carried round by servants and apprentices as they solicited donations on the day after Christmas. The contents were then shared between them all. The term Christmas box is still in occasional use today; it means money given as a Christmas present to those who deliver post, milk, newspapers etc to the house.

The Magi or Three Wise Men

A Merry Christmas to everyone who is reading this post on Christmas Day. I am having the day off, and wrote this post in advance.

The Magi probably were wise men, but the word magi suggests they were magicians or priests from the Persian empire, as the word magus has an old Persian origin. The OED has the definition: "a member of an ancient Persian priestly caste which became influential in the development of Zoroastrianism. Hence: a person skilled in eastern magic and astrology; a magician or sorcerer". Remember that in the Christmas story the Wise Men did indeed follow a star, so there we have the astrological connection.

A fascinating BBC radio programme on the subject of the Three Wise Men introduced by Ian Hislop (if you are in the UK you can listen again here until Saturday) investigated the Three Kings. Nowhere in the Bible does it say there were three Wise Men, nor that they were kings and although the kings are usually named Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar in the nativity plays that are taking place this week, these names were attached to the biblical figures only in the 8th century.

The -mas of Christmas

The ending -mas on Christmas and some other festivals, eg Michaelmas and Martinmas, comes from the word 'mass', meaning church service or festival, and the OED's definition is: 'Forming nouns denoting ecclesiastical festivals, of which the initial element is usually the name of the person or persons in whose honour the festival is held'.

Words ending -mas date back to the Old English period, but, until about the 15th century, they were still spelt with two Ss. There have been many spellings of Christmas over the centuries: Cristesmesse (the 'es' being a genitive form), Cristmasse, Crystmasse, Crysmas, Cristmas with the spelling finally settling down in the 17th century.

The first half of words ending -mas is usually a person's name (Lukesmas and Georgemas are also in the OED), but not always - there's Lammas and Candlemas, for instance.

A Merry Christmas to readers on this Christmas Eve.

Santa Claus and Hobson-Jobson

Most people know that Santa Claus is based on St Nicholas, who was a fourth-century bishop in what is now Turkey. The name Santa Claus comes from the Dutch dialect name Sante Klaas. The first mention of Santa Claus in the OED is a 1773 citation from the New York Gazette, where he is spelt St A Claus.

The expression Santa Claus is an example of a Hobson-Jobsonism (see this post) ie a word that has entered English from another language, but whose spelling and pronunciation have been amended in order to look and sound more English.

In Britain we are more likely to say Father Christmas than Santa Claus. And in Ireland he's known affectionately as Santy.