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scy

#German animal names are really something.

sloth: Faultier (“lazy animal”)
seal: Seehund (“sea dog”)
turtle: Schildkröte (“shield toad”)
skunk: Stinktier (“stink animal”)
squid: Tintenfisch (“ink fish”)
slug: Nacktschnecke (“nude snail”)
hippo: Nilpferd (“nile horse”)
armadillo: Gürteltier (“belt animal”)

Murmeltier, (marmot, “mumble animal”) has nothing to do with mumbling, by the way. It’s from “murmenti”, based on Latin “mus montis”, “mouse of the mountain”.

#etymology

30 Jun 2022 at 14:10 | Open on chaos.social
23 comments
Stephan Matthiesen
scy
Christian Tietze

@scy @StephanMatthiesen Never understood why the Marvel character of that name was so ripped

30 Jun 2022 at 15:36 | Open on mastodon.social
Uli Kusterer

@ctietze @scy @StephanMatthiesen probably why he was the first character to keep the English name. Not even Die Spinne or Der Dämon (DareDevil) or Das X-Team got that back then.

30 Jun 2022 at 15:56 | Open on mastodon.technology
Uli Kusterer

@ctietze @scy @StephanMatthiesen Wait, second. Der Unglaubliche Hulk never got his name translated either.

30 Jun 2022 at 15:57 | Open on mastodon.technology
Uli Kusterer

@ctietze @scy @StephanMatthiesen X-Team even got germanified even more as Die Gruppe X in the 80ies.

30 Jun 2022 at 16:00 | Open on mastodon.technology
Ryuno-Ki

@scy
Wasn't it related to Fjällfras (mountain cat or something)?
@StephanMatthiesen

30 Jun 2022 at 18:19 | Open on layer8.space
scy

@RyunoKi @StephanMatthiesen Yep, fjeldfross or fjellfräs, “mountain cat”. Wiktionary says:

Respelled based on the folk-etymological belief that it had the same derivation as Vielfraß (“gluttonous person”).

30 Jun 2022 at 20:18 | Open on chaos.social
Mehrkorn

@scy I'd like to suggest "marble animal" for marmot/Murmeltier.

30 Jun 2022 at 14:14 | Open on fem.social
scy

@mehdorn Ah, yes, because it’s often found near large deposits of marble in the mountains!

30 Jun 2022 at 14:16 | Open on chaos.social
Quincy

@mehdorn @scy and "vortex beast" for Wirbeltier? 🌀 🤪

30 Jun 2022 at 18:22 | Open on chaos.social
Jannis

@scy Not to forget: Giraffe (greed monkey). :P

30 Jun 2022 at 15:02 | Open on chaos.social
scy

@Xjs Gieraffe, Nickaffe, Rollaffe.

30 Jun 2022 at 15:04 | Open on chaos.social
ipofanes

@scy @Xjs

raccoon: Waschbär ("wash bear")

rhino: Nashorn ("nose horn")

30 Jun 2022 at 15:52 | Open on mastodon.social
Anke

@scy I suspect you know, but I'd like to point out anyway for folks reading along: "hippo" is short for "hippopotamus", which is Ancient Greek for "river horse", so yeah, blame the Greeks :D

30 Jun 2022 at 17:15 | Open on social.scribblers.club
cybersloth
opentronics

@sean
@scy
Ich habe mich auch öfter als Faultier bezeichnet. Fun fact: meine Haare waren viele Jahre lang grün. Faultiere sind so langsam, dass sich Algen in ihrem Fell bilden (habe ich in irgend einer Doku gesehen).... Faultiere = grünes Fell! => Ich:grün = Faultier :D

30 Jun 2022 at 18:41 | Open on chaos.social
mayech

@scy My favourite is this Bavarian/Austrian dialekt:

Squirrel - Oachkatzlschwoaf (Oak-cat-tail)

In standard German it's "Eichhörnchen" (Oak-horn)

though both, oak and horn, may have been derived from archaic words relating to agile movement and their species or family.

30 Jun 2022 at 18:55 | Open on mastodon.social
Der Giga

@scy I mean: This has less to do with the German language than taking an outsiders perspektive.
But still; lots of fun. :D

I add:
Platypus: Schnabeltier ("beak animal")
We don't shame the feet, we shame the face.

1 Jul 2022 at 15:58 | Open on troet.cafe
Daniel Barlow
@scy "The Latin word hippopotamus is derived from the ancient Greek ἱπποπόταμος, hippopótamos, from ἵππος, híppos, 'horse', and ποταμός, potamós, 'river', meaning "horse of the river"", says wikipedia

"Nile horse" is just being specific about which river, I suppose.
13 Jul 2022 at 9:21 | Open on brvt.telent.net
FiXato

@scy
similarly a sloth is called a 'luiaard' in Dutch ('lui' (lazy) + '-aard' (nature, character)).
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/luiaard

Not to be confused with a 'luipaard' (leopard) though (note the added 'p' in the middle), where the 'lui' part has nothing to do with being lazy as far as I can tell, but merely is derived from 'leo'.
I first assumed the 'paard' suffix would come from the Dutch word for 'horse', making it a 'lion horse', but that too seems to be just derived from leopard's etymology: en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pard, en.wiktionary.org/wiki/luipaar

#etymology

@scy
similarly a sloth is called a 'luiaard' in Dutch ('lui' (lazy) + '-aard' (nature, character)).
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/luiaard

Not to be confused with a 'luipaard' (leopard) though (note the added 'p' in the middle), where the 'lui' part has nothing to do with being lazy as far as I can tell, but merely is derived from 'leo'.
I first assumed the 'paard' suffix would come from the Dutch word for 'horse', making it a 'lion horse', but that too seems to be just derived from leopard's etymology:

1 Aug 2022 at 23:46 | Open on toot.cat
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