Apr. 15th, 2014 11:19 am
Just ducky
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muckefuckA colleague and I were discussing the French word for "poodle" the other day, caniche. Given the resemblance to Latin canis, I assumed this was a borrowing from some Romance variety without the palatalisation of velars which characterises French, Franco-Provençal, Romansh, and other adjacent varieties. I didn't for a moment imagine that it had anything to do with ducks.
But that's what the TLF claims. I was previously ignorant of the word cane, the feminine of canard "duck; drake". (Whether cane is the root word or whether it was derived from canard by back-formation seems to be a cause for dispute among historical linguists.) This, in turn, is supposedly derived from the same Germanic root as German Kahn and Dutch kaan, a kind of small open boat or barge.
Poodles, of course, were originally bred as water dogs and retrievers. (The English name derives from Low Saxon pudeln "splash about".) So caniche could be a reference to their swimming ability--gliding through the water like a female duck. Or perhaps this is a metonymic designation referring to their preferred prey. -iche seems to be a kind of all-purpose noun suffix, so it doesn't clarify matters any.
But that's what the TLF claims. I was previously ignorant of the word cane, the feminine of canard "duck; drake". (Whether cane is the root word or whether it was derived from canard by back-formation seems to be a cause for dispute among historical linguists.) This, in turn, is supposedly derived from the same Germanic root as German Kahn and Dutch kaan, a kind of small open boat or barge.
Poodles, of course, were originally bred as water dogs and retrievers. (The English name derives from Low Saxon pudeln "splash about".) So caniche could be a reference to their swimming ability--gliding through the water like a female duck. Or perhaps this is a metonymic designation referring to their preferred prey. -iche seems to be a kind of all-purpose noun suffix, so it doesn't clarify matters any.