🚀 go-pugleaf

Ross Clark wrote:
> 
> This is confusing enough already, but I thought I'd point out that there
> is another French word, "lagon". My Petit Robert says its an 18th century
> borrowing from Spanish lag�n. If this were the immediate source of
> the English word, it would better account for both pronunciation and
> spelling (compare dragoon, cocoon, etc.). The Robert entries for the two
> French words are interesting -- it looks like one of those pairs of words
> that lexicographers feel ought to have some clear difference of meaning,
> but where usage is just hopelessly inconsistent:
> 

The 10th Collegiate says lagoon < Fr. & It. (resp. lagune, laguna) -- 
that "&" is most peculiar! -- attested 1673, suggesting that the 
18th-c. lagon is too late to be relevant. I can't find my American 
Heritage!

Random House 2nd ed. (where the etymologies were done by a platoon of 
Chicago grad students reporting to Eric Hamp) has a rather different 
story: 1605-15; earlier laguna (sing.), lagune (pl.) < It < L lacuna, 
-ae ditch, pool ...

That sent me to the OED, which has the earlier stuff ... so what were 
the Merriam-Webster people thinkin'?
-- 
Peter T. Daniels					grammatim@worldnet.att.net