Dear All,

Let me be lazy and just copy-paste my letter to awad:

I was sitting in the pub with the two of my friends today and somehow we ended up discussing what is the English name for a tea/coffee cup/mug handle... Only one of us is a native English speaker (not me, I shall add) and he claimed it's simply a tea-cup handle... Having been subscribed to AWAD for the better part of the last decade I find it extremely difficult to believe there is no single word for that in English - and a more elegant one on top of that! We weren't, however, able to find one through a simple internet search.

Any chance you could shed some light on the matter?

Anyone? I'll be extremely grateful, because it's killing me not to know that

Cheers,
Rafal

It's called a handle. The important lesson here is that there need not be a single word for every little thing in English or in any other language. Is there a single word for it in your native language?

WELCOME RAFAL ,handle and all.

you could always use the latin, manubrium, although it has already been taken by the medical profession - medical dictionary

In my native language (Polish) we call it "ucho" - ear, because it sort of has the shape of an ear

I even once said that in front of the class coz I didn't know it's called handle and my teacher said with smile that she gets the connotation

WELCOME, ELIFIT

Welcome aBoard, eli!

In my native language (Polish) we call it "ucho" - ear We have a rather old-fashioned saying: "little pitchers have big ears"; for the same reason, I'm sure.

Thank you all. I'm a native Polish speaker as well - and indeed we don't have one name for a tea-cup handle. We call it, as elifit pointed out, a tea-cup ear (or just an ear).

I just thought, perhaps unfairly, that 'handle' is not the most elegant English word to use in this context. And also, since English has a loooong history of words borrowed from other languages, I almost expected there to be one even if not of English origin (there is one in Welsh!). So you're right, there's a lesson in it for me...

Best,
Rafal

ear

There is a proverb in English (and many other languages no doubt) that "little pitchers have big ears". Cup handle is what it's called. I recently dropped a cup and broke its handle. Calling it ear, you might be understood, but calling it handle there's no risk of being misunderstood. The {y} in Polish (and some other Slavic languages that use the Latin alphabet, is a high central unrounded vowel (link). It is written in Cyrllic (for Russian anyway) as {ы}.

Ha, it's called ear in Dutch as well. Most logic thing as unless we deal with an extravagant posh design it always has the form of an ear. Handle? Is that seriously the English word for it? I never knew, in spite of the many cups of tea I had in England and U.S.

( I mean, I'm still astonished about all the cups of whatever I drank and no one ever said a word about the handle or ear. Such a familiar thing and the word never mentioned, jee......) What else can we do without .

There is a proverb in English (and many other languages no doubt) that "little pitchers have big ears". Well--it is true that I seldom have anything of import posted. Can't blame you.

Of course when you call it a handle, there's no risk of misunderstanding.. for an English native speaker. I think the difference is in the representation. In Polish (and Dutch apparently ) the word "ear" represents the shape, whereas in English handle represents the function.. as you use your hand to hold the cup. Hmm, I'm wondering how many such words with differences like this exist. I'll think about it and post it when I find some

And I found one..although both terms refer to a shape. In English we call it an eye of a needle, In Polish we call it an ear of a needle.

The difference is how you look at the needle, if you look at it horizontally, the loop resembles an eye. If you look vertically it resembles an ear.

Ha! I would like to have a look at a Polish needle. For needle we go with the English. Eye. (devided loyalties)

This one's for Jackie:

Eye makes more sense since the shape is oval. By the way, how do you call knitting stitches in Dutch? In polish it's "oczko" [aw-tch-kaw] - small eye and ladder (Am. runner) in tights is also small eye heheh

Funny how many different words are referred to as oczko: blackjack, stone in a ring, mesh in net

knit and pearl over here...(I think...my aunt knits, maybe I should ask her all of the stich names!)

You can have different stitches but the loop you create with the knitting needles is called stitch - oczko

Isn't that knit and purl? I knit too

yup I never was good with knitting terminology...

Knitting terminology....I was never good with knitting.
I can crochet, however.

We call them "stitches". But as one who cannot knit, who am
I to question?