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stranger
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stranger
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Colloquial Italian has a word, "paturnia", probably stemming from Latin "pati" (to suffer), which is used meaning just "commotion or fuss", or "mental turmoil". Could "pother" be a corruption of "paturnia", brought to the U.S. by Italian immigrants?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Probably not. OED traces it back to early 16th century with the earliest definition being 'a choking smoke or atmosphere of dust.'
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journeyman
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journeyman
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Pother is definitely English. It certainly describes the state one of my client put me in today.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Welcome, Tony. Say hi to Giacomo for me!
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Online etymology brings these two words together:
pother c.1591, "disturbance, commotion," of unknown origin. Meaning "mental trouble" is from 1641; verb sense of "to fluster" is attested from 1692. bother 1718, probably from Anglo-Irish pother, since its earliest use was by Irish writers Sheridan, Swift, Sterne. Perhaps from Ir. bodhairim "I deafen." Related: Botheration (1797); bothersome (1834).
Would possibly "bodhairim" and "paturnia" have any connection?
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stranger
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stranger
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I am not an expert on Celtic etymology, but I know that the origin of "paturnia" from Latin "pati" is not proven, and I also know that many Northern Italian words have Celtic origins, so I would not reckon a relationship between "bodhairim" and "paturnia" as totally impossible.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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many Northern Italian words have Celtic origins Really? How come?
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old hand
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old hand
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Same place as those blue-eyed, blond-haired northern Italians... :0)
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Carpal Tunnel
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I thought those were Goths. But seriously, the languages were right smack up against each other for a long time and the Celts came within a gnat's butt of successfully invading the Italian peninsula.
That said:
A) The Celtic language spoken by Asterix's people and Old Irish were probably mutually incomprehensible and we have no reason to believe that any word with a similar meaning and a similar sound to the Irish bodhairim would have existed in the continental Celtic language.
and
2) The influence on the language would have been on Latin anyway, so we're still back to paturnia coming from something in Latin.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Could "pother" be a corruption of "paturnia", brought to the U.S. by Italian immigrants?
The first citation for the noun pother, in the sense of 'commotion', in the OED1 is 1592. Words that get adopted into one language from another usually undergo some kind phonological transformation in that sounds in the original language (in this case Italian) that don't exist in the target language (English) get modified. I am not aware of any words in English of Italian origin where a /t/ became a /ð/. Overall, I say no.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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