sticca

Forms

sticca m (weak; genitive singular sticcan, nominative plural sticcan)^[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Proto-West Germanic *stikkō, from Proto-Germanic *stikkô (“stick, pole”).^[1] Köbler gives the Proto-Germanic noun with forms in *-e-* and *-i-*, and lists Old Norse stikka, Old Saxon stikko (“hook”) and Old High German stecko beside it.^[2][3] Wiktionary explains the Proto-Germanic noun as a derivative of the verb *stikkōną.^[1]

The root is Proto-Indo-European *(s)teyg- (“to pierce, prick, be sharp”), according to Köbler and Wiktionary.^[2][1] If so, the word first meant a pointed stick.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first firmly dated record is in Bald's Leechbook, copied in the middle of the tenth century: styre mid sticcan, “stir with a stick”.^[5][6][7] The Old English Bede, in a manuscript of the early tenth or the first half of the eleventh century, uses it for pieces of ice: þæm sticcum halfbrocenra iisa, “the pieces of half-broken ice”, flowed around a man standing in a river in midwinter.^[8][6]

Semantic evolution

The compound cladærsticca already glosses Latin anate in the Épinal–Erfurt glossary.^[9] Bosworth and Toller give a stick or peg, as the tent-peg driven through Sisera's head in Judges, and the stick used to stir a medicine; then the pointer of a dial; and a wooden spoon, from the monks' sign language: to ask for one, move the hand as if eating with a spoon.^[7][10] Clark Hall lists the same senses.^[11]

It continued as Middle English stikke, used of twigs and pieces of wood, now English stick.^[12][4]

Timeline

• s. x med. – styre mid sticcan “stir with a stick” in Bald's Leechbook.^[5][6]
• s. x in. or xi¹ – þæm sticcum halfbrocenra iisa in the Old English Bede.^[8][6]
• s. x² – in Andreas in the Vercelli Book.^[13][6]
• s. x ex. – Ælfric's Catholic Homilies I.^[14][6]

Meanings

Noun

1. a stick, peg.^[7][2]
2. the pointer of a dial.^[7][11]
3. a wooden spoon.^[10][11]

Word family

• candelsticca
• ġeocsticca
• tōþsticca
• teldsticca

Descendants

• Middle English stikke (→ English stick; Scots stick; Scots stikk)^[1]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Altenglisches Wörterbuch, 4th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling, p. s.v. sticca
3. ^ Köbler, Gerhard (2014), Germanisches Wörterbuch, 5th ed., online, koeblergerhard.de/wikiling
4. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b 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
6. ^ a b c d e f Healey, Antonette diPaolo; Price Wilkin, John; Xiang, Xin, eds. (2009), Dictionary of Old English Web Corpus, Toronto: Dictionary of Old English Project
7. ^ a b c d Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. 918
8. ^ a b 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. 531
9. ^ Pheifer, J. D. (1974), Old English Glosses in the Épinal-Erfurt Glossary, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 97
10. ^ a b Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement, p. Suppl. 711
11. ^ a b c Clark Hall, J. R. (1960), A Concise Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, 4th ed., with a supplement by H. D. Meritt, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 319
12. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
13. ^ 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. 704
14. ^ 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. 407