ciese

Forms

ċīese m (strong ja-stem; genitive singular ċīeses, nominative plural ċīesas)^[1] cēse in the Kentish wills: ceses in the will of Abba (833×839), cesa in the will of Ealhburg.^[2][3] ċȳse, the headword of Bosworth–Toller, also weak ċȳsa.^[4] ċǣse: caeses and cǣsa in a list of food rents among the charters.^[5]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin cāseus (“cheese”), one of the earliest Latin loans: Durkin places the borrowing very early, into proto-Old English as *kāsi, before the Old English sound changes.^[6][7][8] Wiktionary reconstructs the loan already in Proto-West Germanic *kāsī, and the same word is found in Old Saxon kēsi and Old High German kāsi.^[1][8][7]

Durkin traces the sounds: the borrowed *kāsi had its vowel fronted to *kǣsi; the /k/ before the front vowel became /tʃ/; palatal diphthongisation gave *ċēasi, i-umlaut *ċīesi, and the lowering of final -i gave ċīese, the form expected in early West Saxon.^[6] The spellings ⟨ċēse⟩ and ⟨ċȳse⟩ are recorded beside it.^[9][4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word is first recorded in the will of Abba, a Kentish reeve, written between 833 and 839 and surviving in its contemporary single sheet: the holder of his land is to give the community at Folkestone every year malt, groats, III wega spices & ceses “three weys of bacon and of cheese”, four hundred loaves, an ox and six sheep.^[2][10] Another Kentish will, that of Oswulf and Beornthryth (805×810), has the word in a ninth-century copy.^[11]

Semantic evolution

The sense is always cheese.^[4][12] Early records are food rents in charters and wills, measured by the wey, and Ine's laws include ten cheeses in a food rent.^[4][13] The medical texts prescribe new goat's cheese and forbid new cheese to the sick, and in glosses it renders Latin caseus and formaticus.^[4][5][8] Durkin counts it among the loanwords that were the only Old English word for their meaning, with no native synonym.^[14]

The word lived on as Middle English chese, now English cheese.^[1][15]

Timeline

• 833×839 – ceses in the will of Abba, a contemporary single sheet.^[2][10]
• s. ix med. – I wege cesa “one wey of cheese” in the will of Ealhburg.^[3][10]
• s. x med. – ne ete niwne cise “let him not eat new cheese” in Bald's Leechbook.^[5][16]
• s. x/xi – cheese in the will of Æthelgifu.^[17][10]

Meanings

Noun

1. cheese.^[4][5][8]

Descendants

• Middle English chese (→ English cheese; Middle Scots cheis; Middle Scots cheys)^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, revised ed. by S. E. Kelly and R. Rushforth, King's College London / University of Cambridge, esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk, p. S 1482
3. ^ a b The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, revised ed. by S. E. Kelly and R. Rushforth, King's College London / University of Cambridge, esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk, p. S 1195
4. ^ a b c d e f Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 190
5. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 126
6. ^ a b Durkin, Philip (2014), Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 148
7. ^ a b Holthausen, Ferdinand (1934), Altenglisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Heidelberg: Carl Winter, p. 48
8. ^ a b c d Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. cīese
9. ^ Durkin, Philip (2014), Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 109
10. ^ a b c d Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
11. ^ The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, revised ed. by S. E. Kelly and R. Rushforth, King's College London / University of Cambridge, esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk, p. S 1188
12. ^ Sweet, Henry (1896), The Student's Dictionary of Anglo-Saxon, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 56
13. ^ Liebermann, F. (1906), Die Gesetze der Angelsachsen, vol. II.1: Wörterbuch, Halle: Niemeyer, p. 34
14. ^ Durkin, Philip (2014), Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 138
15. ^ Durkin, Philip (2014), Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English, Oxford: Oxford University Press, p. 131
16. ^ Gneuss, Helmut; Lapidge, Michael (2014), Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts: A Bibliographical Handlist of Manuscripts and Manuscript Fragments Written or Owned in England up to 1100, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 412
17. ^ The Electronic Sawyer: Online Catalogue of Anglo-Saxon Charters, revised ed. by S. E. Kelly and R. Rushforth, King's College London / University of Cambridge, esawyer.lib.cam.ac.uk, p. S 1497