Bridal…Bridle Funny thing is, I actually thought about it (for about a nano second) and decided in my minds eye that the writing on that little white box of straps was BRIDAL. Glad I don’t write for a living. Peace to all Bill Costanzo _____ From: pianotech-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of kurt baxter Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 2010 2:35 AM To: pianotech at ptg.org Subject: Re: [pianotech] bridLE (now off topic for the sake of irrelevantetymological discussion) Hmm... I don't know:... "Bridal" is derived more than anything from the word "Bride", right? Old English brȳd; related to Old Norse brūthr, Gothic brūths daughter-in-law, Old High German brūt] However, "Bridle" is: Middle English bridel, from Old English brīdel; akin to Old English bregdan to move quickly "Bridle" is related to "Braid": Middle English breyden to move suddenly, snatch, plait, from Old English bregdan; akin to Old High German brettan to draw (a sword) My question is why bridle straps so named? I always figured it was because how the straps pulled on the hammer like a horse, but I have no reason to think this is correct. -k In any case, the words "bridal" and "bridle" are not unrelated etymologically. Does one not speak of "the marriage tie" and of "tying the knot"? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://ptg.org/pipermail/pianotech.php/attachments/20100526/82f75ff7/attachment.htm>
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