Sometimes the same word reaches us through different languages. Thus charge is French and cargo is Spanish, both belonging to a Vulgar Lat. *carricare from carrus, vehicle. In old commercial records we often find the Anglo-Norman form cark, a load, burden, which survives now only in a metaphorical sense, e.g. carking, i.e. burdensome, care. Lat. domina has given us through French both dame and dam,[103] and through Spanish duenna; while Ital. donna occurs in the compound madonna and the donah of the East End costermonger. Lat. datum, given, becomes Fr. dé and Eng. die (plural dice). Its Italian doublet is dado, originally cubical pedestal, hence part of wall representing continuous pedestal. Scrimmage and skirmish are variant spellings of Fr. escarmouche, from Ital. scaramuccia, of German origin (see p. [64], [n.]). But we have also, more immediately from Italian, the form scaramouch. Blount's Glossographia (1674) mentions Scaramoche, "a famous Italian Zani (see p. [45]), or mimick, who acted here in England, 1673." Scaramouch was one of the stock characters of the old Italian comedy, which still exists as the harlequinade of the Christmas pantomime, and of which some traces survive in the Punch and Judy show. He was represented as a cowardly braggart dressed in black. The golfer's stance is a doublet of the poet's stanza, both of them belonging to Lat. stare, to stand. Stance is Old French and stanza is Italian, "a stance or staffe of verses or songs" (Florio). A stanza is then properly a pause or resting place, just as a verse, Lat. versus, is a "turning" to the beginning of the next line.
FROM FRENCH DIALECTS
Different French dialects have supplied us with many doublets. Old Fr. chacier (chasser), Vulgar Lat. *captiare, for captare, a frequentative of capere, to take, was in Picard cachier. This has given Eng. catch, which is thus a doublet of chase. In cater (see p. [63]) we have the Picard form of Fr. acheter, but the true French form survives in the family name Chater.[104] In late Latin the neuter adjective capitale, capital, was used of property. This has given, through Old Fr. chatel, our chattel, while the doublet catel has given cattle, now limited to what was once the most important form of property. Fr. cheptel is still used of cattle farmed out on a kind of profit-sharing system. This restriction of the meaning of cattle is paralleled by Scot. avers, farm beasts, from Old Fr. aver[105] (avoir), property, goods. The history of the word fee, Anglo-Sax. feoh, cattle, cognate with Lat. pecus, whence pecunia, money, also takes us back to the times when a man's wealth was estimated by his flocks and herds; but, in this case, the sense development is exactly reversed.
Fr. jumeau, twin, was earlier gemeau, still used by Corneille, and earlier still gemel, Lat. gemellus, diminutive of geminus, twin. From one form we have the gimbals, or twin pivots, which keep the compass horizontal. Shakespeare uses it of clockwork—
"I think, by some odd gimmals, or device,
Their arms are set like clocks, still to strike on."
(1 Henry VI., i. 2.)
and also speaks of a gimmal bit (Henry V., iv. 2). In the 17th century we find numerous allusions to gimmal rings (variously spelt). The toothsome jumble, known to the Midlands as "brandy-snap," is the same word, this delicacy having apparently at one time been made in links. We may compare the obsolete Ital. stortelli, lit. "little twists," explained by Torriano as "winding simnels, wreathed jumbals."
An accident of spelling may disguise the origin and meaning of a word. Tret is Fr. trait, in Old French also tret, Lat. tractus, pull (of the scale). It was usually an allowance of four pounds in a hundred and four, which was supposed to be equal to the sum of the "turns of the scale" which would be in the purchaser's favour if the goods were weighed in small quantities. Trait is still so used in modern French.
METTLE—GLAMOUR