Names of Animals. 



5861 



the " red-roan steed " is abundantly sufficient to account for the name, 

 yet it is very possible, as Mr. Talbot suggests, that it may have ori- 

 ginally had reference to the celebrated breed of Roite/i horses. In 

 like manner Sheltie will preserve a geographical fact which may be- 

 come curious in some future generation, should this breed ever become 

 extinct in its original birth-place, the Shetland Isles. 



Ass is the Latin asinus ; French, due, which is corrupted from asne. 

 The root seems to be identical with that of ear^ which is the Gothic 

 auso ; Greek, ol^, and, in the Laconian dialect, a^j ; Hebrew, ozen. 

 There is a common word connected with this root, which would be 

 the very last in which we should be likely to suspect any reference to 

 an animal : a painter's easel is the German esel (ass), which is identi- 

 cal with the Latin asellus, a diminutive form of asinus. We ourselves 

 speak of a clothes'-horse, &c., and so the Germans also use bock (buck), 

 and the Greeks ovo; (ass), while the Greek word for easel is mKklpag, 

 which is compounded of x/aao^, an old word for ass. In Greek we find 

 the verb oyKaoixai^ to bray. Comparing this with our donkey^ it seems 

 probable that both words originate from the same idea, viz. imitation 

 of the animal's voice. 



Mule is the Latin mulus ; French, mulet ; and may be connected 

 with molior, I labour; in Greek with ixcoXog, labour, and ixoXm, to go ; 

 in our own language with the old word moil, and, indeed, the primi- 

 tive orthography of the word was moyle or moil. In the Cornish 

 dialect this latter word signifies barren, and, to say the least of it, 

 this is a very remarkable coincidence, and it is quite possible that our 

 word may partake of the double parentage ; although it is equally pos- 

 sible that the stubborn mulish ness of the animal, coupled with its 

 sterility, may have suggested the name for a hard and barren soil. 



Pig is the Danish bigghe, vigghe. These two forms strongly remind 

 us of the nursery name, " piggy-\viggy," and suggest the idea that the 

 name of pig is derived from its squeaking cries, just as hog and sow 

 are taken from its more sonorous grunting. This idea is confirmed 

 by the words which Shakespeare puts into Aaron's mouth, when he 

 murders the nurse : 



" Weke! weke! — So cries a pig prepared for the spii." 



Titus Andronicus, Act iv. Scene 2. 



The pig is still the especial food of our labouring poor, and, as many 

 wTiters have remarked, a study of words shows this to have been the 

 case for centuries past. The animals which supply our food, so long 

 as they are alive, are known by their old Saxon names, as ox, calf. 



