The English words bear and horse come from old Norse / Indo-European words meaning brown and fast. Languages do that all the time. We even do that for people, like Inuit and Ainu which mean human in their respective languages. Like “what are you?” “Human” “Ainu, got it”
There is a theory that says that the word bear /björn/bär is a euphemism for the real word for the animal, the prototype indo-European word *Rktos. That word was a taboo to use since our ancestors were afraid that saying that name would make a bear appear. The Slavic languages use the euphemism honey eater. Medvěd, niedźwiedź
In Greek the word for bear is still derived from the Porto indo-European word, αρκούδα arkouda . Is also where the word Arctics comes from. Since Ursa Major (the big Bear constellation) is up north.
For bears, that works (especially since we know about other words like arctus etc.), but it’s odd that this was also done for other words like horse, linked to PIE “to run”. So yes for the euphemism theory and we consider that calling a cat species " Mau" because of their sound as a euphemism, or horses as a whole “run” because they’re hella fast, but I don’t know if we need to push that further with the taboo theory.
The English words bear and horse come from old Norse / Indo-European words meaning brown and fast. Languages do that all the time. We even do that for people, like Inuit and Ainu which mean human in their respective languages. Like “what are you?” “Human” “Ainu, got it”
Eskimo is Algonquin for “eats raw meat” which is where the term to refer to Inuit came from
There is a theory that says that the word bear /björn/bär is a euphemism for the real word for the animal, the prototype indo-European word *Rktos. That word was a taboo to use since our ancestors were afraid that saying that name would make a bear appear. The Slavic languages use the euphemism honey eater. Medvěd, niedźwiedź
In Greek the word for bear is still derived from the Porto indo-European word, αρκούδα arkouda . Is also where the word Arctics comes from. Since Ursa Major (the big Bear constellation) is up north.
Same in Hungarian, the word for wolf means “tailed one”, the word for stag “one with horns/antlers”.
For bears, that works (especially since we know about other words like arctus etc.), but it’s odd that this was also done for other words like horse, linked to PIE “to run”. So yes for the euphemism theory and we consider that calling a cat species " Mau" because of their sound as a euphemism, or horses as a whole “run” because they’re hella fast, but I don’t know if we need to push that further with the taboo theory.