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Re: Country names

From:Andreas Johansson <andjo@...>
Date:Wednesday, May 14, 2003, 7:33
Quoting David Starner <dvdeug@...>:

> On Tue, May 13, 2003 at 09:22:55AM +0200, Andreas Johansson wrote: > > Reminds me: www.zompist.com gives the following Arabic etymology for > the word > > "candy": > > > > candy - short for 'sugar candy', from sugar + qandi 'candied', from > qand 'cane > > sugar' - from a Dravidian language > > > > I was taught it derived from the placename "Candia", because Crete was > a major > > producer of sugar cane during some period. Does anyone know more > about > > this? > > > The 1913 Unabrigided Webster (available on the net) gives (excuse the > random phonetic spelling that later got hacked into ASCII): > > Candy \Can"dy\ (k[a^]n"d[y^]), v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Candied} > (k[a^]n"d[=e]d); p. pr & vb. n. {Candying}.] [F. candir (cf. > It. candire, Sp. az['u]car cande or candi), fr. Ar. & Pers. > qand, fr. Skr. Kha[.n][.d]da piece, sugar in pieces or > lumps, fr. kha[.n][.d], kha[.d] to break.] > > So from the French, from the Arabic or Persian, from the Sanskrit (?).
This is beginning to be quite a number of hypotheses ... Sanskrit, Dravidian, or from Crete. Perhaps one of those aforementioned morphosemantic mergers have been going on? Andreas

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David Starner <dvdeug@...>