A world of raccoons
Last night we had an interesting discussion about one of my favourite furry creatures… the raccoon. Because my landlords, like me, are academics, this inevitably became a question of etymologies. LOL.
The English term for my fluffy friend, according to the online eytmology dictionary (U of T’s library server won’t give me access to the OED today), is as follows: 1608, arocoun, from Algonquian (Powhatan) arahkun, from arahkunem “he scratches with the hands.” Early forms included Capt. John Smith’s raugroughcum.
In French, he is called a “raton-laveur” - meaning the washing rat.
In Italian, he is called an “orsetto lavatore” - meaning the little washing bear.
In Norwegian, he is called a “vaskebjørn” - meaning the wash-bear.
In Dutch, he is called a “wasbeer” - wash-bear.
In German, he is called a “Waschbär” - wash-bear again.
I find it surprising that none of the European languages have picked up on his bandit-like appearance. I don’t think he looks much like a bear or a rat, but i guess if i had never seen one before it would make sense to choose these sorts of analogies.
Please feel free to add to my translation list… there are many languages that i don’t understand well enough to figure out what the literal meaning of the term is.
In Spanish: “mapache” from nahuatl “mapach”, which allegedly means “having hands”. Nahuatl is the language of the nahua (a.k.a Aztecs or mexicas) and still spoken by more than 1 million people in Mexico.