Comments on: What Did The Vikings Do Before They Began to Play Football?

By: OUPblog » Blog Archive » From Week To Weak

OUPblog » Blog Archive » From Week To Weak — Wed, 02 Jun 2010 12:04:12 +0000

[...] the meaning “week,” referred to the change of shifts in rowing. In my post on the etymology of Viking, I supported the idea that Vikings were called this from taking turns at the oars. Such was hardly [...]

By: Ellen Cameron

Ellen Cameron — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 14:44:12 +0000

Near where I live, there is a 50- or 60-year-old, *very* nice neighborhood of spacious homes on wide lots, with many trees and beautifully landscaped yards. The people who live there, in a not-quite-gated community, are extremely proud of their neighborhood and don’t allow any hoi-polloi around. I giggle every time I drive by, because the name of the place is “Garthwick,” or “Barnyard Bay.”

By: J P Maher

J P Maher — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 13:52:30 +0000

There was no British Empire in 1066.

OED2: “Briton n. 2. A native or inhabitant of Britain or of the British Empire. Knight omits:
– “Not in general use in this sense until the early 18th cent., esp. following the union of England and Scotland.”

By: J P Maher

J P Maher — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 00:53:07 +0000

correction: meadow, not harbor

By: J P Maher

J P Maher — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 00:52:19 +0000

VIK is attested in the name of Ireland’s County Wicklow ‘Viking harbor’. Another thing the Vikings did was to eat lox in Co. Kildare, where the lox (Lachs) leap — at Leixlip. This is ca. 10 miles west of Dublin. Norsemen caught salmon there on the river Rye — Abhann na Rí — King’s Stream. Abhann = Avon and is akin to Hindi Punj-Ab ‘Five Waters’. And Rí is cognate with Latin Rex and Sanskrit Raja. — Leixlip is now home to, besides salmon, Guinness, Intel, Hewlett Packard — or was till the Celtic Tiger was shot by Wall Street geniuses.

By: NEJC

NEJC — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 21:38:14 +0000

@Knight

OED2: Briton n. 2. A native or inhabitant of Britain or of the British Empire.

By: J P Maher

J P Maher — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 15:03:48 +0000

Aha, Shift work! Ingenious update. Variants of the German verb weichen include die Weichen ‘switches’ on US railroads/ on UK railways ‘points’. When US sailors weigh anchor, the band plays Anchors Aweigh.

By: Knight

Knight — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 15:44:20 +0000

“. . .And William the Conqueror, the Bastard, defeated the Britons in the battle of Hastings at the head of a Norman army. . .”

I hate to nitpick but ‘Britons’ would be the wrong application of the word given the period. ‘English’ or ‘Anglo-Saxons’ is what it should be for historical accuracy. Let us give some credit to the people who held sway on that island for over six hundred years and who founded the tongue we currently speak.