[LM_NET] GEN: help with word origin

[Donna Nix <dgillila@AOL.COM>]

Greetings,

I received a stumper question last week, and I've exhausted my resources.? I'm 
hoping there might be an academic colleague or other children's literature 
specialist reading the list who can help.? 

Here is the text of the question:
Recently, I came across the word "wrekin" in a translation of Grimm's fairy tales. 
The context of the word seems to be a hook to hold a kettle over the fire. I can 
find no reference to it in Websters unabridged dictionary (1956), nor does it have 
a reference that I can find on line. Can you find a definition or etymology for 
this word?

The word is found in Snow White and the context described above seems to be 
correct.? I and colleagues here have checked the OED, the one German dictionary in 
our library, all of our literature databases, folklore resources, online cookery 
history sources, and Googled for it in a dozen different ways.? I did find a site 
(in German, which I can't read) that seemed to be like a concordance of Grimm's 
fairy tale terms, but the process of paging through all the "w--'s" nearly drove me 
crazy, so I stopped somewhere in the "wh---'s". If you're going to try Google, be 
forewarned that there is a landmark in England called Wrekin, and there are 
thousands and thousands of hits for it.? There is also a colloquial phrase in 
England, "all around the Wrekin"--meaning the 'long way around' that brings more 
thousands of hits. (not looking for any of those--been there already {grin}!)

Does anyone have a source for finding this information?? If so, can you check the 
definition/etymology and send it to me?

Thanks,

Donna
?


Donna Nix
Plymouth, MN
dgillila@aol.com ?
University of St. Thomas
Minneapolis, MN
denix@stthomas.edu 
www.stthomas.edu/libraries 
www.mnbatt.blogspot.com 

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