In Middle English, moles were known as moldwarp. The expression "do not make a mountain out of a mole hill"—exaggerating problems—was first recorded in Tudor times. By the era of Early Modern English, the mole was also known in English as mouldywarp, a word having cognates in other Germanic languages such as German (Maulwurf), and Danish, Norwegian, Swedish and Icelandic (muldvarp, mullvad, moldvarpa), where the muld/mull/mold part of the word means soil and the varp/vad/varpa part means throw, hence "one who throws soil" or "dirt tosser". Male moles are called "boars", females are called "sows". A group of moles is called a "labour".
Sources:
Wikipedia:
William Roper, Life of Sir Thomas More (1557)
Rackham, Oliver, The Illustrated History Of The Countrysidepage 130 (quoting J. Seddon, The boke of surveying and improvments – [sic]) ISBN 0-297-84335-4
Moles". animalcorner.co.uk. Archived from the original on 12 November 2010.
No comments:
Post a Comment
All comments submitted are subject to approval prior to posting on my blog. Thank you for visiting the Molenator Blog and thank you for your cooperation and patience.