Pedants' Paradise

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

... but you're happy with the River Avon?

Or Lake Windermere.

[Pabmusic]

Or Pendle Hill?

[pen (Celtic = hill), dael/dell (OE = hill), hill (ME = hill)]

[Nick Armstrong]

... but you're happy with the River Avon?

Hang on, hang on... Wherefore was vinblanc banging on about the River Avon????

[Pabmusic]

Hang on, hang on... Wherefore was vinblanc banging on about the River Avon????

River (ME = river) Avon (Celtic = river)

[Nick Armstrong]

(ME = river)

Still don't get it !

[jean]

Middle English

[Pabmusic]

Still don't get it !

This started (I assume) with SA's post 2190 about tautologies. So some of us seem to have begun a 'tautology by misunderstanding' sub-thread.

ME = middle English; OE = old English, or Anglo-Saxon.

[Nick Armstrong]

Wow... thanks... I'm way out of my league here!

[JFLL]

Or Pendle Hill?

[pen (Celtic = hill), dael/dell (OE = hill), hill (ME = hill)]

I think that should read '… hyll (OE = hill) …'.

These names are traditionally known as 'tautological hybrids' – 'hybrid' because the elements are alleged to be from two different languages, 'tautological' because the meaning of the elements in the two languages is alleged to be identical. However, the term is a misnomer, because the names as they've come down to us and as we use them are in only one language, English. Penn did not mean 'hill' in English (or even in British, either, apparently, where it means/meant 'head, top, end' – but that's another complicated and much-debated question), so name 'Pendle' (Penn + hyll) wasn't tautological to the speakers who coined the name.

There's also a recent theory that 'Avon' even in British was not a common noun meaning 'river' but an original name-formation, from the Celtic root ab- 'water' + a name-forming suffix -onā. (That formation doesn't occur in Celtic outside Brittonic, e.g. in Irish, which raises suspicions.). According to this theory the name Abonā, as attached to various rivers, was later generalized in British/Welsh (afon) as the ordinary name for 'river'.

And, as FF said, these are names, which follow different conventions from common nouns, which are more firmly embedded in the language. A name can, within limits, mean whatever we choose it to mean. ('Dartmouth', said Mill, would still be an acceptable name even if the Dart estuary disappeared.)

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Hang on, hang on... Wherefore was vinblanc banging on about the River Avon????

Back in #2141, Cali, Alpie pointed out the trautology of having a Personal Identity Number number - in response to which, vinty commented on the similar tautology of having a watercourse with a name that meant "River" in two different languages - ("Avon" is a Celtic word meaning "River", so "River Avon" "means" "River River"). This all happened a fortnight ago, so people may have forgotten the discussion - as a comparison of #2145 with #2192 might suggest.

Cross-posted with JFLL, who gives greater detail.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I used to live in a place called Marple (now sucked into Big Brother Stockport). The name was derived from "Mere Pool" pretty much the same.

[Pabmusic]

I think that should read '… hyll (OE = hill) …'.

These names are traditionally known as 'tautological hybrids' – 'hybrid' because the elements are alleged to be from two different languages, 'tautological' because the meaning of the elements in the two languages is alleged to be identical. However, the term is a misnomer, because the names as they've come down to us and as we use them are in only one language, English. Penn did not mean 'hill' in English (or even in British, either, apparently, where it means/meant 'head, top, end' – but that's another complicated and much-debated question), so name 'Pendle' (Penn + hyll) wasn't tautological to the speakers who coined the name.

There's also a recent theory that 'Avon' even in British was not a common noun meaning 'river' but an original name-formation, from the Celtic root ab- 'water' + a name-forming suffix -onā. (That formation doesn't occur in Celtic outside Brittonic, e.g. in Irish, which raises suspicions.). According to this theory the name Abonā, as attached to various rivers, was later generalized in British/Welsh (afon) as the ordinary name for 'river'.

And, as FF said, these are names, which follow different conventions from common nouns, which are more firmly embedded in the language. A name can, within limits, mean whatever we choose it to mean. ('Dartmouth', said Mill, would still be an acceptable name even if the Dart estuary disappeared.)

Fascinating stuff. Little is ever as straightforward as we may think.

[Serial_Apologist]

This started (I assume) with SA's post 2190 about tautologies.

Which it appears to have sidelined...

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

This started (I assume) with SA's post 2190 about tautologies.

Before then - back to #2142, from a fortnight ago! (Now that's what I call "sidelined"! )

[clive heath]

two things;
I've been cogitating on the "w" sound as in

William, Gwillem, Guilliame and variants;

Wales, Gwalia;

oui, ouest, cornouaille ( cornwall;)

( off topic...apparently Langue d'Oc is where they say oc for oui (OK?))

guard, ward and garderobe, wardrobe (clothes placed in toilets as the urine vapour kept the bugs away).

no doubt there are others to tease us.

and secondly, watching excavations on TV in the west-country, a ledger is a stone slab over a grave or tomb. who knew? not me and I've been doing crosswords for decades!