EXCURSUS ON THE NAMES OF SWALLOWS 369 



Hames of Swallows 



There are two common English names of birds of this family, 

 " Swallow " and " Martin " or " Marten ", the derivation of 

 neither of which is obvious. The latter of these, " Martin ", is 

 undoubtedly the same as the name of certain quadrupeds of 

 the family Mustelidce, which runs through many languages in 

 various forms, and which has occasioned much discussion. A 

 criticism of this subject will be found in my "Fur-bearing 

 Animals ", pp. 23, 24, translated from von Martens. Stcallow 

 appears, with no more than the usual variation as to either 

 consonants or vowels, in many North European languages, as 

 the Anglo-Saxon swaleive, swealire, sicalwe, the Danish svale^ 

 Swedish svala, Dutch zwaluw, modern German schivalbe — 

 some earlier forms of the latter being identical with the Anglo- 

 Saxon. We may seek to establish a connection between 

 swalewe and the Anglo-Saxon verb swcelan, which signifies to 

 ascend, to fly upward, the flight of Swallows being a notorious 

 characteristic of these birds. There is another relation which 

 may be suggested, and which seems plausible at least, be- 

 tween sicalewe and tbe Anglo-Saxon verb swelgan, to swallow 

 (take into the throat) ; this, if substantiable, would show that 

 there is really a connection between swalloic, the name of the 

 bird, and the verb to swallow — words now literally identical in 

 English, though seemingly without the slightest connection.* 



Such relation of the words will appear less strained, and in 

 fact strengthened, if not confirmed, on examination of the 

 entirely different set of words which mean Swallow in the 

 South European languages: Greek, /ekcou» ,- Latin, hirundo ; 

 Italian, rondin ; Spanish, golondrina ; Portuguese, ando- 

 rinha ; French, hirondelle. It is admitted by the highest 

 authorities, as for example Curtius, that the Latin hirundo is 

 the same as the Greek x^^^^<^v, an earlier Greek form /ipevdov 

 being supposed to render more evident the relation between 

 Mr-undo and x^X-cdwv. In carrying out the etymology of these 

 two words, Corssen refers them to the Sanscrit root har, ghar, 

 to talce, whence comes the Greek ;f£i/?, the hand, considered as 

 a thing that takes, and the archaic Latin Mr, hand. On this 

 supposition, y^Xidcuv, hirundo, hirondelle, and the other similar 

 names of the Swallow, signify a bird that takes insects ; and 

 the act of seizing is with them followed by deglutition. It is 

 plausible, then, that the two sets of names by which these 



* Benseu, Vocab. Ang. Sax. Oxonise, 170L 

 24 B 



