Hi, I'm Heddwen Newton. I’m half Dutch, half British, and I work as a translator, teacher, and linguist. I am the owner of the website www.hoezegjeinhetEngels.nl. I write on Substack about language, specifically about Dutch and English, though sometimes other languages get a look in, too. Here are a few excerpts for Tuhat. I'd love to hear what you think!

Family ties

Dutch and English are cousins, perhaps even sisters, depending on how you like your familial metaphors. In this section, I highlight some surprising ways in which they are related.

The theme of this newsletter is teeth, and I’m sure there’s some interesting etymology going on in dentists’ offices, but I recently discovered a fun etymological connection between English and Dutch which I am going to tell you about instead, and then I’ll try to give it some kind of far-fetched connection to this month’s theme with a desperation which might be amusing. Possibly.

Wilkinson - little William’s son**

The ‘-kin’ in names like Wilkinson, Jenkins, Watkins and even *Dickens should be familiar to Dutch speakers, *especially the ones from Belgium, because it is the diminutive form. Just think of Manneken Pis, kindeke Jesus, and gorgeous Flemish idioms such as *je mag je pollekes kussen (Dutch Dutch: je mag je handjes dichtknijpen; *you can be grateful about what happened. Pollekes are what Belgians call children’s hands).

As early as the 10th century there were boys’ names in English like Wilkin (little Will, short for William), Jenkin (little John, or indeed Jan), Watkin (little Wat, possibly short for Walter), and Dickin (little… uhm… Richard.)

The Oxford English Dictionary, which generally knows what it is talking about, reckons the habit of making children’s names ‘small’ like this would have been taken from the Dutch, which makes sense to me, because who doesn’t like giving their child a cute diminutive nickname like the children of those handsome fellers selling linen and cheese?

These names existed for centuries in English, but nowadays aren’t used anymore. However, they still exist in many common last names, as it was common to tell the difference between one John and the other John by saying ‘that one’s Wilkin’s son’ and ‘the other one is Watkin’s son’.

(Tenuous connection with this month’s theme: people who have names also tend to have teeth.)

gherkin - a little gurk

A gherkin is what non-American English speakers call a pickle; little cucumbers pickled in vinegar. The name comes from the Dutch word *gurkkijn, *which would now be augurkje. The word augurk, in turn, comes from the Balto-Slavic language group, perhaps Lithuanian agurkas. Cucumbers originally come from northern India, but were cultivated in Eastern Europe before they made their way to the west.

In the past, and perhaps even now, some Dutch people said* gurk* instead of augurk, and that’s where ‘gherkin’ comes from. After a while, Dutch decided to start using the fancy French-inspired word komkommer for the bigger vegetables, and augurk for the little ones in vinegar. Germans ended up using Gurke for both.

(Tenuous connection with this month’s theme: you eat gherkins with your teeth)

napkin - a little tablecloth

Old French gave English the word nape, which was used for pieces of cloth, especially tablecloths. A napkin, then, is simply a small piece of cloth. Which it is, so that makes sense.

For some words that end in -kin, most English speakers still have the intuition that the -kin denotes something that is small, such as in ‘lambkin’ and ‘munchkin’. But for words where the front part has become unrecognisable, like ‘gherkin’ and ‘napkin’, the -kin just feels like part of the word. The etymology of ‘napkin’ is very popular for this reason; English speakers are always delighted to learn that the -kin is actually a diminutive.

(Tenuous connection with this month’s theme: You use a napkin when you are having dinner. You also use your teeth when you are having dinner.)

pumpkin - a little… pump?

Pompon was the French word for melon, taken into medieval English as pompion, and the theory is that the first American colonists referred to pumpkins as ‘little melons’, hence pumpkin.

(Pumpkin pie is eaten with teeth. And Jack-o’-lanterns have teeth, though mine never do, because I’m terrible at carving Jack-o’-lanterns.)

catkin - a little fluffy thing

Catkins are these small seed/flower things that hang from trees; my botany skills are severely undeveloped, so you’ll have to do a google image search and then you’ll see what I mean. The word comes from the Dutch katteken, and they are indeed still called katjes in Dutch. They are so called because their fluffiness reminded people of kittens.

(Kittens have teeth. Little sharp cute ones, ouch!)

lambkin - a little lamb

Though almost archaic, most English speakers would, I think, still recognise lambkin as meaning a little lamb. The word is now mostly used to refer to lambkin cats, a cat that has a kind of sheepswoolen texture to its fur.

(Lambs have teeth. I think. Or are they like human babies and the teeth come later? Oh dear.)

bumpkin - a short and stocky Dutchman

A bumpkin is a word which is still used in English to refer to an unintelligent or unsophisticated person, often from the country.

The word bumpkin was first used in English in 1570, and the monk who wrote it down added a little note in Latin explaining that a bumpkin was a short, stocky Dutchman. We think it may come from either bommekijn, which was a small barrel of water, or boomkijn, a small tree; presumably because the Dutchman in question was shaped similarly.

(Teeth.)

mannequin - a little man

When they hear the word ‘mannequin’, most English speakers think of the plasitc human figures used in shop windows to show off clothes. Because the word looks so French, and because mannequins aren’t small, I found it quite surprising to learn that the word ‘mannequin’ comes, via French, from the Dutch word manneken.

English had the word mannikin or manikin from as long ago as the 15th century for little statues and figures, for example used as models for painting. The shop-window version, however, was borrowed from the French much later. From the late 19th century ‘mannequin’ was used to talk about people who would model clothes for dressmakers, and from the 1930s onwards the word was used to talk about display dummies.

(Teeth?)

munchkin - a little person

Americans like calling small, endearing people, especially children, ‘munchkins’. The word was coined in 1900, when L. Frank Baum decided on this name for the little people who inhabited Munchkin Country in The Wizard of Oz. We don’t know why he chose the word munchkin. It may have had something to do with the German word *Männchen, *with the city of Munich (München in German), or with Baron Munchhausen; but it’s all speculation, as Baum never noted why he chose the word.

Munchkin is the last word in my list because it is the newest, but also because if the English speaker in your life is struggling with the idea that the -kin suffix makes things feel smaller, the word Munchkin is the word to convince them.

Also, Munchkins have teeth! Hah!

Sources: OED - kin, bumpkin, augurk, munchkin, napkin, pumpkin, catkin, mannequin

(You can find a few more English words that end in -kin here, as well as some outtakes from this column.)

Speaking Dutchly

**

Speaking Dutchly is my column for DUTCH, a magazine for Americans and Canadians with Dutch heritage. It is aimed at English speakers who are interested in the Dutch language, but don’t actually speak it.

A Mouthful of Idioms: our Pearly Whites

On our journey through Dutch idioms, I presented you last time with the popular Dutch idiom ‘to have hair on your teeth’ (haar op je tanden hebben), which we use when someone isn’t afraid to speak their mind. They aren’t afraid to bite back with those hairy teeth, one might say! For this month’s column, we continue with the teeth theme. These sayings have been flossed, polished, and are ready to shine.

Shared teeth

Since English and Dutch are linguistic sisters, you’d expect many idioms to match. But when it comes to teeth, I have only been able to find three expressions that do: ‘to be armed to the teeth’ (tot de tanden bewapend), ‘to show your teeth’ (je tanden laten zien), and ‘to sink your teeth into something’ (ergens je tanden in zetten).

Breaking your teeth on something

Dutch adds another step to sinking your teeth into something; for us, it is also possible to ‘break your teeth on something’ (je tanden ergens op stukbijten). You sunk your teeth into something, and now you are trying really hard to be successful, but you are failing. In English, we might say we are running into a brick wall. (Which, to be fair, would also break your teeth.)

Between English and German

There are also some expressions that are half the same; ‘to live from the hand in the tooth’ (van de hand in de tand leven) is the Dutch version of living from hand to mouth. And where English speakers fight ‘tooth and nail’, the Dutch fight ‘hand and tooth’ (zich met hand en tand verzetten). In Dutch, ‘hand’ (hand) and ‘tooth’ (tand) rhyme, which no doubt helped the phrase stick.

I have not been able to find if the Dutch and English versions are directly related, but I did find that in German, the expression is ‘to fight with hands and feet’ (sich mit Händen und Füßen wehren). So, the Dutch version sits between English and German, which is where Dutch usually sits, so no surprises there.

Walking on your gums

‘To walk on your gums’ (op je tandvlees lopen) means you are on your last legs. You have given all your energy, and you are just about completely spent. I asked more than 100 Dutch speakers on Facebook what image this common Dutch expression conjured up for them, and 95% agreed with me that it made them think of a person who is so tired that they have fallen to the ground, and, unable to use their arms or legs any longer, teeth broken, they are dragging themselves forwards by their gums. Now that’s exhaustion! The other 5% felt that ‘walking’ meant something like ‘functioning’ in this case, and the person was forced to ‘function’ without teeth.

From doing research for this column, I have now learned that the actual meaning of ‘to walk on your gums’ has to do with shoes. The soft part between the bottom of a shoe and the shoe itself used to be called the ‘gum’ of the shoe, the analogy being that the hard sole was the ‘tooth’ of the shoe. When the shoes were so old that the soles had worn off, people were said to be walking on their gums. This used to mean they were dirt-poor, but nowadays it means that someone has no more energy. This derivation is unknown to Dutch people; in my poll, only one person knew this, every other person thought it had to do with the gums in our mouths.

Molars on each other and carry on

Interestingly, in the Netherlands there is a stronger distinction between teeth and molars. Where in English molars is a word you only use when you are talking to a dentist, or perhaps your dog’s vet, the Dutch equivalent kiezen is a far more common word. When Dutch speakers talk about gritting their teeth and carrying on, they actually say ‘clamp your molars together and carry on’ (kiezen op elkaar en doorgaan), and a toothache is called a molar ache (kiespijn). (They don’t do this in Belgium, where a toothache is called tandpijn.)

Getting it badly for your molars

‘To get it badly for your molars’ (het flink voor de kiezen krijgen) means to go through a tough time. If Fred’s boss shouts at him for doing a bad job, then he got it badly for his molars. If his wife divorces him, then he got it badly for his molars again. I have not been able to find out where this Dutch expression comes from, but looking at old usages, I think the idea is that life is giving you more than you can chew. This also tracks with the expression ‘to have something behind your molars’ (iets achter de kiezen hebben), which literally means you have eaten something, and is metaphorically used to say that someone has endured a lot. Once Fred has bounced back from his manager’s tirade and his divorce, his friends might say ‘that Fred, he has a lot behind his molars already’ (hij heeft al heel wat achter de kiezen).

And with that, my 850 words are just about up. We’ve talked though quite a lot of tooth-related expressions, but we haven’t quite sunk our teeth into the full buffet of Dutch dental idioms yet! Maybe it’s the Dutch love of food, or their habit of gritting their teeth (or molars!) and pushing through, but there are enough toothy idioms to fill two columns. So brace yourself (pun intended): I’ll be back in two months, ready to serve up more pearly-white expressions.