Got lots of mail regarding Margaret Merchant's anti-Bob polecat chat, enough to force a response even though I want to drop the subject. If both the Oxford and Webster dictionaries, as well as every modern etymology book, list cattus as a Late Latin word, and *any* Latin dictionary is missing cattus, should we assume the use of cattus is wrong? Margaret might disagree with me about cattus being a Latin word, but in reality she is disagreeing with almost every dictionary and etymology text writen (and all the modern ones), and she should argue with those authorites, not me. Felis and feles are both correct spellings and take the same meaning, they are just a different form. As for Margaret's Follett remark, I never said polecat came from the Latin, I said the cat part did. As for cattus (catus) in Follett, page 58 has this entry: "Catus, -i: m. male cat, tomcat." As for the spelling of cattus vs catus, catus is the spelling most commonly found in the better Latin dictionaries, but cattus is the spelling used by etymologists. Same volume, p. 148, has feles AND felis to define cat, polecat, ferret, feline and marten. Now, we all know the Latin for ferret is viverra, so why is feles (felis) also given? Because felis is a category, and viverra and catus are proper names. BTW, in Dauzat's "Dictionnaire Etymologique," a book on French etymology (as well as 4 other French Etymology books checked) *all* list Late Latin cattus as the root for chat. As for Margaret's use of the Norman dictionary, so what? Does the word "dog" make hound invalid? Or bitch? As I said, top etymologists traced polecat to a combination of pol/poul- and cat/chat; what's to say a two-word word. I also have a Old Northern (= Norman) French dictionary, and not only does it have putois (and varied spellings) but also lists synonyms, including "poule-cat." Margaret makes the assumption that because a word can be found that translates as polecat, it means the English had to use it rather than some other word or word combination. Margaret objected I was only looking at the root of the word; well, yeah, what's the point? I made that clear from the beginning. Authorities are universal in their treatment of polecat as two words, with each part defined separately. Hell, in many cases, the word itself is hyphenated, which indicates it was two words, even in antiquity. In each of the references I gave, there is a nearly universal agreement that Pole comes from the Old French and Cat from the Late Latin (one agreed with poule, but didn't source cat). Cat and ferret were treated as a single word, and I reported on the words, not the parts. Another bad assumption to make is, "if it's not in the dictionary, then it is not a word," and its doppleganger, "if you didn't use it like it is defined in the dictionary, it is wrong." Dictionaries are limited by space, both in the volume and on the shelf, and a word's exclusion (or a definition) is not proof it didn't exist. Otherwise I am out of a job, because zooarchaeology is *not* defined in the 1993 edition of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate dictionary (BTW which *DOES* say cat comes from the Late Latin "cattus", and polecat from the French poul or pol combined with cat.) There are other problems with Margaret's "single source dictionary" approach, but I will be merciful and not publically point them out. I will say Margaret is taking a linear and extensionalist approach to word origin, when in fact an ideational approach is required because the path is braided and convoluted, and can skip areas, become quite commmon, evolve, and even disappear in a flash. Remember groovy? Language is dynamic, rapidly evolving, and constantly influenced by bordering languages, and borrowing one word from a foreign language and combining it with one of your own language is actually quite common, especially regarding names of animals. To quote Oxford (regarding cattus) "CAT: Forms: catte, catt (before 1100), catt (1200-1700), catte (1400-1600), kat (1300-1700), katte (1600), cat (before 1100). The Middle English and Modern English cat corresponds at once to Old English cat and Old Norman French cat. The name is common European of unknown origin: found in Latin and Greek circa 1st-4th centuries, and in the modern languages, generally, as far back as their records go. [Late Latin] Palladius ? c350 AD has catus, elsewhere catus (Bob note: place a line over the "a" in the second catus to change the vowel sound, but the internet doesn't allow those characters through), and probably in both cases, cattus. From cattus, catta, came all Romanic forms, It. gatto, Sp. gato, Pg. gato, Cat. gat, Pr. cat, ONF cat, F. chat." (and on and on and on.) To quote Oxford (regarding polecats) "Polecat, Pole-cat: Forms: polcat (1400-1700), polkat (1500), polcatte (1600), pol-cat (1600-1700), polcate, polcatte, poll-cat (1700), poll cat (1800), Pole cat (1900) pole-cat (1600), polecat (1700), pulcatt, pulkat (1500), poulcatte (1600), poulcat, powlcat, powl-cat (1600-1800), poulecat, pow-cat (1900). Middle English polcat, pulcatt. The element pole, pol- is probably Old French pole, -poule, (chicken, fowl). This is favored by the forms in pul-, powl-, poul-..." ( and on and on and on). There are basically two ways to try and convince people that your ideas are better than anothers'. One is to show them and explain why they are better, and let the evidence convince. The other way is to tear down other people's ideas in the hope your's will be selected by default, which is particularly effective if you also insult them. Margaret made a lot of talk about her background and her two dictionaries, but she ignored the dozens of references cited, all properly shelved in the library at MU. Of course, if they were checked, then she would have to explain away the things I reported. I guess she could claim she was making a joke, I misunderstood, I don't like her, or she was playing the devil's advocate because it *could* be something else. Or she could do what I did regarding her Welsh word. I said she was right. As I said before, this subject has been beaten to death, and all I am doing is repeating what has already been said. Regardless of what is said after this post, any defence I would make is here, so I will no longer post on this topic, nor will I comment on the personal tone of statements made about me. Honestly, I recommend you ignore everything I have said and check the books yourselves. I've mentioned a pretty good stack, and am willing to give full bibliographic information, as well as page numbers, to any one who asks. Trust your own brain. Bob C and the 21 MO Fert Things. [Posted in FML issue 2065]