more about the origin of the word 'kangaroo'

Following a link on the 6Ablog, I found an informative little video clip about the word kangaroo.
A discussion on a forum called QI also has information about this word's origin. Judy Bennett says:

Lieutenant James Cook beached his 'HM Bark Endeavour' in what is now Cooktown, in 1770 having damaged his ship on the Great Barrier Reef. He remained in the area for nearly seven weeks. The word 'kangaroo' was first recorded in the ships' journals during this time, and the animal was also drawn by Sidney Parkinson. The journals are held at the James Cook Museum in Cooktown. The first sighting of the animal was on June 24th 1770. They tried to shoot one for quite some time, finally Lieut. John Gore succeeding on July 14th. It was eaten at supper the following day.

I've posted about this word previously.

cynical about quinsy

Last week I had a quinsy.

Well, I probably didn't have a full-blown case of quinsy, because that would involve 'a severe sore throat', and mine wasn't too bad. Annoying and inconvenient, though.

I came across the word quinsy in a book called growing berries and currants, a directory of how to cultivate them successfully. (I love growing berries and I'm excited that my raspberries already have flower buds.)



Currants were often used in the past as a cure for quinsy. If I'd known about that perhaps I'd have drunk black currant juice each day, instead of lemon and honey drinks, and spared myself the sore stomach this week.

Curiosity about the word's origin sent me to the Net, and I discovered that, like the word cynic, it comes from the old Greek word for dog. The Online Etymology Dictionary says:

quinsy
"severe sore throat," c.1300, qwinaci, from O.Fr. quinancie, from L.L. cynanche, from Gk. kynankhe "dog strangling," originally "dog collar," from kyon (gen. kynos) "dog" + ankhein "to strangle," cognate with L. angere (see anger).

As I said on my dog blog, I only have to see my dog straining at the lead when she sees something interesting ahead of us, to visualise a sore throat as a strangling collar. Observing the way she gargles and gags, I suspect she does at times give herself a temporary quinsy.