Are these really from German, as advertised, or from OHG?​—msh210℠ (talk) 19:06, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

Yiddish does have some loanwords from German, in addition to words inherited from OHG/MHG. Off the top of my head, I know that shprakh is a loanword from German (if it had been inherited, it would be shprokh). Of the ones in this category, muzik and kultur might be borrowed from German, and the rest are probably inherited from OHG/MHG. But it is often practically impossible to tell. —Angr 11:18, 6 January 2011 (UTC)

Does the ancient name of Ethiopia share roots with the word abyss? Ragityman 22:58, 7 January 2011 (UTC)

No, Abyssinia is from an Eastern language: compare Arabic حبشه (ḥabeši, “Abyssinian”), Persian حبش (ḥabaš, “Abyssinian”), Old Armenian խափշիկ (xapʻšik, “nigga”).

Just in terms of word formation in Japanese, あやまる would seem to derive from あやむ, itself deriving from あやし. Is this correct and adequate for entering as the etymology? -- Eiríkr Útlendi | Tala við mig 21:23, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I just added the alternate form 井守. I'm curious if anyone knows if this rendering is purely 当て字, or if it gives us the derivation of the term. -- Eiríkr Útlendi | Tala við mig 18:38, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

The page here has three etymologies listed, but they are all the same etymology, simply listing alternate pronunciations. Can't these be collapsed? -- Eiríkr Útlendi | Tala við mig 21:41, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

If it's a simple pronunciation variation, just remove the Etymology headings and make sure there is separate heading for each pronunciation like the following. My question is, do all three refer to the same region, or different regions with Sakurai? Phonetic changes of a word depending on the pronunciations of syllables around it should not be included in a dictionary (though they could be briefly mentioned in the Usage Notes section) Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 22:11, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

Thank you James, it does appear that all three are simply different labels for the same place. The Japanese Wikipedia article on Sakurai-shi uses the spelling 忍阪, which someone's already added as an alternate. -- Eiríkr Útlendi | Tala við mig 23:06, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

OK, maybe we could use a heuristic such as picking a pronunciation that is used most widely when the place name is written by itself (as opposed to in a sentence where its pronunciation could be influenced by those around it). Make that the dictionary pronunciation and note its variations in the Usage Notes section. How does that sound? Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 23:14, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

That's fine by me, but for Japanese, kanji-only headings contain no explicit pronunciation information on the one hand, and on the other, the oshisaka > ossaka > osaka pronunciation shift in this example doesn't depend on the word's location in the sentence, so far as I understand it (also, 忍坂 and 忍阪 are homophones in Japanese). Perhaps I'm misunderstanding you? If you have a clear idea for reorganizing the entry, give it a shot.  :) -- Eiríkr Útlendi | Tala við mig 23:27, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

I think what you've done is good. I made some minor changes. Jamesjiao → ^{T ◊ C} 23:38, 14 January 2011 (UTC)

The etymologies for Spanish playa and Portuguese praia trace them to Latin plag(i)a. I can't find a noun plagia. There are several plaga, and I suppose what's being invoked is our sense 5, Lewis & Short's plaga₂; but L&S call it "mostly poet.". Can anyone back this etymology up?

Le Trésor de la Langue Française Informatisé says re plage 'beach' that it's < Italian < Greek, though confounded with another plage reborrowed from Lat plaga. Borrowing ultimately from Italian feels likelier to me for the other Romance languages as well. 4pq1injbok 01:02, 22 January 2011 (UTC)

Appendix talk:Proto-Germanic *mannaz

Does anyone know the origin of the German word (deprecated template usage) Frack and Italian word (deprecated template usage) frac? SemperBlotto 20:54, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

The Kluge Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen says that Frack derives from English frock < Old French froc. Longtrend 00:25, 1 February 2011 (UTC)