Thus, moose is from the Indian word mouswah, meaning wood-eater; skunk from seganku, an Algonquin term; wapiti, in the Cree language, meant white deer, and was originally applied to the Rocky Mountain goat, but the name is now restricted to the American elk. Caribou is also an Indian word; opossum is from possowne, and raccoon is from the Indian arrathkune (by further apheresis, coon).
Rhinoceros is pure Greek, meaning nose-horned, but beaver has indeed had a rough time of it in its travels through various languages. It is hardly recognisable as bebrus, babbru, and bbru. The latter is the ultimate root of our word brown. The original application was, doubtless, on account of the colour of the creature’s fur. Otter takes us back to Sanskrit, where we find it udra. The significance of this word is in its close kinship to udan, meaning water.
The little mouse hands his name down through the years from the old, old Sanskrit, the root meaning to steal. Many people who never heard of Sanskrit have called him and his descendants by terms of homologous significance! The word muscle is from the same root, and was applied from a fancied resemblance of the movement of the muscle beneath the skin to a mouse in motion—not a particularly quieting thought to certain members of the fair sex! The origin of the word rat is less certain, but it may have been derived from the root of the Latin word radere, to scratch, or rodere, to gnaw. Rodent is derived from the latter term. Cat is also in doubt, but is first recognised in catalus, a diminutive of canis, a dog. It was applied to the young of almost any animal, as we use the words pup, kitten, cub, and so forth. Bear is the result of tongue-twisting from the Latin fera, a wild beast.
Ape is from the Sanskrit kapi; kap in the same language means tremble; but the connection is not clear. Lemur, the name given to that low family of monkeys, is from the plural Latin word lemures, meaning ghost or spectre. This has reference to the nocturnal habits, stealthy gait, and weird expression of these large-eyed creatures. Antelope is probably of Grecian origin, and was originally applied to a half-mythical animal, located on the banks of the Euphrates, and described as “very savage and fleet, and having long, saw-like horns with which it could cut down trees. It figures largely in the peculiar fauna of heraldry.”
Deer is of obscure origin, but may have been an adjective meaning wild. Elk is derived from the same root as eland, and the history of the latter word is an interesting one. It meant a sufferer, and was applied by the Teutons to the elk of the Old World on account of the awkward gait and stiff movements of this ungainly animal. But in later years the Dutch carried the same word, eland, to South Africa, and there gave it to the largest of the tribe of antelopes, in which sense it is used by zoologists to-day.
Porcupine has arisen from two Latin words, porcus, a hog, and spina, a spine; hence, appropriately, a spiny-hog. Buffalo may once have been some native African name. In the vista of time, our earliest glimpse of it is as bubalus, which was applied both to the wild ox and to a species of African antelope. Fallow deer is from fallow, meaning pale, or yellowish, while axis, as applied to the deer so common in zoological gardens, was first mentioned by Pliny and is doubtless of East Indian origin. The word bison is from the Anglo-Saxon wesend, but beyond Pliny its ultimate origin eludes all research.
Marmot, through various distortions, looms up from Latin times as mus montanus, literally a mountain mouse. Badger is from badge, in allusion to the bands of white fur on its forehead. The verb meaning to badger is derived from the old cruel sport of baiting badgers with dogs.
Monkey is from the same root as monna, a woman; more especially an old crone, in reference to the fancied resemblance of the weazened face of a monkey to that of a withered old woman. Madam and madonna are other forms of words from the same root, so wide and sweeping are the changes in meaning which usage and time can give to words.
Squirrel has a poetic origin in the Greek language; its original meaning being shadow-tail. Tiger is far more intricate. The old Persian word tir meant arrow, while tighra signified sharp. The application to this great animal was in allusion to the swiftness with which the tiger leaps upon his prey. The river Tigris, meaning literally the river Arrow, is named thus from the swiftness of its current.
As to the names of reptiles it is, of course, to the Romans that we are chiefly indebted, as in the case of reptile from reptilus, meaning creeping; and crocodile from dilus, a lizard. Serpent is also from the Latin serpens, creeping, and this from the old Sanskrit root, sarp, with the same meaning. This application of the idea of creeping is again found in the word snake, which originally came from the Sanskrit naga.