Amy Reese

Chapter 8 Assignment
Origins of Animal Names
August 19, 2014


Assignment:
Investigate these words to see which language they come from and what the name
means in the original language.

Alligator comes from the Spanish word el lagarto, the lizard, from Latin lacerta

Beetle comes from Old English word, bitela which is related to the word bitol
meaning teeth

Caterpillar - probably from Old Northern French catepelose, literally: hairy cat

Cobra - from Portuguese cobra (de capello) snake with a hood

Crocodile - Old French, from Latin crocodlus, from Greek krokodeilos, means lizard

Duck - Middle English duk, doke, Old English dce means diver

Elephant - in the original Greek word (elephantinos) translated of ivory

Hippopotamus - Greek hippoptamos, earlier hppos potmios meaning riverine
horse

Leopard from Late Latin leopardus, literally lion-pard

Lobster Old English loppestre which means locust; by influence of Old English
loppe "spider," a variant of lobbe. The ending of Old English loppestre is the fem.
agent noun suffix (as in Baxter, Webster; see -ster), which approximated the Latin
sound.

Moose from Algonquian language; said by early sources to be from moosu "he
strips off," in reference to the animals' stripping bark for food.

Octopus from Greek oktopous, meaning eight-footed

Porpoise from Old French porpais, "porpoise, meaning pork fish

Rhinoceros from Latin rhinoceros and from Greek rhinokeros, meaning nose-
horned

Spider from Proto-Germanic *spin-thron- literally means the spinner

Squirrel from Greek skiouros, which means shadow-tailed

Penguin possibly comes from Welsh meaning pen white

Porcupine from Old French meaning spiny pig

Walrus - from Dutch walrus, which was probably a folk-etymology alteration (by
influence of Dutch walvis "whale" and ros "horse")