Our seven-year-old daughter Ananya has developed an interest in etymology. Often she'll interrupt her play in the backyard and peek in my downstairs study to ask about whatever word comes to her mind. Some time back she barged in with, "So how did the word dog came about?" I explained to her that the word dog came from Middle English dogge which came from Old English docga. Satisfied, she went back to her play.
I had completely forgotten about it when a few days later I overheard her talking to her grandmother on the phone, "Amma, we got a dogga." I was puzzled and later asked why she said dogga instead of dog. She patiently explained, "You know, Amma is old. That's why I used Old English with her."
That got me to wondering about all the things we call our canine friends: Dog - well, I'll accept the explanation above, for that one. But what about the word hound?
But I guess this is not a subject for this blog, which after all is supposed to be about Penny, and she doesn't care what we call her, as long as we call her for dinner. (Couldn't resist that terrible joke.)
I'll save my thoughts about these doggy words for my other blog, Words All Around.
