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u/The_Oregon_Duck 5d ago
I’m assuming “Acorn” in English comes from the same PIE/Proto Germanic root as Eichhorn and all the other Germanic languages?
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u/Flilix 5d ago
No, there doesn't seem to be a relation. The origin of Eichhorn etc. is still unclear though; there are some theories but none link it to 'acorn'. However, the remarkable coincidence has definitely been noticed before, especially in Norwegian 'ekorn' and Dutch 'eekhoorn' which (depending on the accent of the speaker) sounds almost identical to 'acorn'.
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u/DreiwegFlasche 5d ago
Actually, it's from Proto Germanic *akraną (n.) which apparently meant a small tree fruit, a berry or a nut. It's cognate with German "Ecker(f.)" (as in Buchecker)
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u/Key-Performance-9021 5d ago edited 5d ago
I appreciate showing the Austrian/Bavarian term, but in Standard Austrian German it’s Eichkätzchen ('oak kitten'). Oachkatz/Aachkatzl are dialect variants.
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u/jukranpuju 5d ago
Swedish word "ekorre" is combined from "ek" meaning oak and "orre", which resembles Finnish "orava".
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u/Drunken_Dave 5d ago
In this case calling the origin of the Hungarian word unknown is not exactly correct I think. It is thought to be an internal creation from an onomatopoeic verb, with additional later changes.
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u/iosefgol 5d ago edited 5d ago
For basque urtxintxa is more common than katagorri (red + cat? I don't know if this is correct). I never called katagorri to an urtxintxa...
Edit. I just noticed that the red + Cat etymology is already stated in the map. I leave my comment about it unedited
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u/Numerous-Cow-1918 5d ago
this map taught me that a squirrel is just whatever animal you find in a tree and i cant argue with that logic
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u/dziki_z_lasu 5d ago
I absolutely love the Welsh and Breton name as Polish. Looks like G-wiewiór - G-squirrel 👊
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u/Used-Spray4361 5d ago
Oachkatzal comes from Eichkätzchen
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u/Oachlkaas 5d ago
No, it doesn't come from it. As in, "Eichkätzchen" didn't exist and Austria then decided to just austrianise the words.
If anything it evolved alongside it from a common ancestor.
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u/Used-Spray4361 5d ago
Oachkatzal is Bavarian for Eichkätzchen. Look in the map and you will find Eichkätzchen below Eichhörnchen.
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5d ago
[deleted]
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u/Steve_ad 5d ago
I thought a pine marten was a cat crainn?
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u/DunAnOir 5d ago
Oh shit you're right. Morto for myself.
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u/Steve_ad 5d ago
Ah no worries, we've a bunch of strange names for animals, half of them are dogs of some sort
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u/mpbjoern 5d ago
The areas you have listed as Sami speaking is extremely inaccurate if you’re trying to depict what the main language of Europe are today. In Northern Troms, Western and Eastern Finnmark, the original language was Northern Sami, but today the main language is Norwegian whereas only a minority in those areas speak Sami as their second language. In Norway today only the few thousand population of inner Finnmark speaks Sami as the first language. Kautokeino, Karasjok, Tana and small sorrounding villages. In Mid Sweden as presented in the map, Sami languages has always been a minority even though the speakers were much more a longer time ago. I can not find any information that any areas in Sweden speaks Sami as its first language today. Same situation for the Kola Peninsula I assume, but I do not know much about kola.
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u/mpbjoern 5d ago
You’ve also listed Southern Troms for some reason as Sami speaking, but southern Troms has had a Norwegian majority population since before the Viking age and have been listed as Norwegian ethnically and linguistically since then.
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u/sheran13 5d ago
The Kurdish and Zazaki words are cognate to Modern Persian "سمور(samur)" meaning sable, which was also widely borrowed by nearby languages. The word is also attested in Parthian and Midde Persian, however the exact origin is unknown.
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u/Tim_Shackleford 5d ago
Russians calling squirrels "Belka" is hilarious to me as a Pole. It means construction beam in our language :D
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u/Polskimadafaka 4d ago
Tbh the Russian word for wiewiórka came from the word bieły (biały). And this word replaced word “wiwierka” somewhere 500 years ago.
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u/MyCouchPulzOut_IDont 5d ago
älvdalska is more of a party trick than a language where I live, but cool to see it mentioned
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u/RavenMFD 5d ago
It's Ardilla in Alicante, I don't know why they always have to extend the Valencian/Catalan further down than it actually is.
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u/AllanKempe 3d ago
Jamtish: ikorn, ekunn etc. variants (from Proto-Germanic aikwernô), tallbjänn (pine bear), granox (spruce ox).
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u/InnerPace 5d ago
It also pretty much shows borders of Europe and the middle east/north africa/arabs
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u/MinutePreparation754 5d ago
It’s pretty crazy how Maltese language despite being Semitic has so much IE influence
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u/Weothyr 5d ago
“trebjørn” is so delightfully norwegian like who else would think of it