Canon, Cannon, Cannula, Cane

created by wharfinger

(thing) by wharfinger (6.2 y) (print) ? 2 C!s I like it! Sun Aug 13 2000 at 16:39:48

Cannula is the Latin diminutive of the Latin "canna", or "cane". Cane is a plant or family of plants, much like a reed or bamboo; in English "a cane" is the stem of a cane plant. "A cane" has properties: It is long and narrow and hollow in the middle. And that's where we start from.

There is a cane which is a walking stick, not often made of cane, but "a cane" is good for more than just to lean on. "Canna" is a unit of Italian distance, and a canon is a ruler or measuring rod: In parallel there is a "rule" that you follow, which is the same word as a rule for measuring. A canon is a rule, axiom, or law; it is the rule (of conduct and worship) for a monastery, hence the book containing that rule; The Canon is the official list of whatever it is you're discussing, and a canon is a prebendary, an ecclesiastical figure who officiates in return for a benefice¹.

The Spanish cañon or canyon opens out from the Spanish caña, a cane or reed, and it is hollow inside. The cannula the good doctor inserts into your vein is hollow too, but a cannel² -- channel, or canal seems to have been open on top to begin with and only closed up when it became a conduit: Apparently it's not related. A cannon that thunders (formerly "canon") is long and hollow inside, and it is related, while "cant" is the unrelated "bent", but it does by chance happen to be as long and hollow as the rest. A canon loses its length in the OED's sense 14, where it becomes "a metal loop or 'ear' at the top of a bell, by which it is hung", and gains it back again in the cannular (but not canicular!) ornamental rolls on the ends of your breeches; these rolls are called canions.

Yes, and a candy cane comes from sugar cane in the factory, and from cane in the OED as well.

"Canoe" is from the New World and unrelated. A Menckenian "cannaille", a pack of dogs and by extension a rabble, is from the Latin "canis" or "dog", and is unrelated. The Gaelic "cannach" is cotton-grass, and is from something spelled "canna" by somebody, somewhere. It looks interesting, but the trail is cold . . . The "ch" is something a bit like the throat-clearing "ch" of modern Hebrew. I'm not so sure about Lucas Cranach. I think he's unrelated, too.

¹ We'd all do well to have a benefice.

² A cannel is also a candle with an elided 'd'.

printable version
chaos

The general theory of household item appearance and disappearance	menstrual extraction	benefice	Bright Angel
Cannula	Rasputin : A hard man to kill	Cannon	canon
Reed	Epiphany	Officiate	Cannular
Canicular	Cant	Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within	Elision
Plasma ball	Cyrus	Lucas Cranach the Elder	Etymology
bamboo	axiom	Conduit	canal

Y'know, if you log in, you can write something here, or contact authors directly on the site. Create a New User if you don't already have an account.

Login
Password

remember me
password reminder
register

Everything2 Help

cooled by themusic

Things you could have written:
Fake words and broken definitions in dictionaries
Soviet Union vs. Socialism
B-25 Mitchell
The Third Man
Mary, Queen of Scots
Existentialism
Palm Beach County's Screwed Up Ballots
Song of Amergin
Ram Dass
Spanish Flu
spider camp
Like a child
System Miscellany

locke baron
Tyan Thunder K8WE	(thing)
locke baron
Udaloy class destroyer	(thing)
Scaevola
Same-sex marriage	(idea)
SteveMurrayFromNZ
British Standard Handful	(idea)
nailbiter
nerve stapling	(thing)
locke baron
Multiple Myeloma	(thing)
SubSane
blonde, freckles, skinny, short	(person)
arcanamundi
A Ruba'iyat for May	(person)
riverrun
Timed Writing	(idea)
auraseer
Fling	(fiction)
StrawberryFrog
Iron Man	(review)
devolution
Misogyny and Porn, East to West - An Empirical Analysis	(idea)
devolution
Korea is a place that refuses to stand still	(idea)
Beanie127
The Pacifist Soldier	(fiction)
VergilKint
Distilled from Dreams	(fiction)

This affordable entertainment brought to you by The Everything Development Company