humbert@ihlpa.UUCP (Schachter) (01/09/86)
A few months ago I asked readers to help me complete a chart giving the English
names of various categories of animals. I thank you all collectively for your
valuable replies. The chart is now much more complete than it was before my
request, although it is still incomplete:
Generic Adult Adult Castrated Child Child Child
Single;Plural Male Female Male Generic Male Female
Horse ; Horses Stallion Mare Gelding Foal Colt Filly
Ox ; Cattle Bull Cow Ox <or> Steer Calf ??? Heifer
Swine ; Swine Boar Sow Barrow Shoat ??? Gilt
Goat ; Goats Buck <or> Doe <or> ??? Kid ??? ?Doeling?
Billy Nanny
Sheep ; Sheep Ram Ewe Wether Lamb ??? ???
The questions marks indicate uncertainty. I do not know whether `doeling' is
actually used by goat farmers. In general, it appears that goats are less
important to the English-speaking peoples than are the other animals on the list,
because their language has not developed specialized terms to describe them
(`Buck', `Doe', `Kid' and `Doeling' are somewhat all-purpose words that can
be used for many different species). Also, notice the absence, or the
difficulty of obtaining, words to describe a young male animal. It appears that
young female animals are more important to English-speaking farmers than
are young male animals, again because their language has developed specialized
terms to describe them.
The ambiguity of some terms is also interesting. For example, `ox' can be used
in a general sense to denote any bull, cow, steer, or calf (in fact, it is the
only word I know that provides a singular for `cattle'). It can also be used,
however, in a specific sense to denote a steer.
I still invite you to help me complete the chart if you can. I also invite you
to improve the chart if you can provide words that are either more accurate or
less colloquial (for example, I suspect that both `billy' and `nanny' would
not appear in a scholarly journal, although of course I may be wrong). After
January 17 I shall no longer receive elctronic mail at this address; a
forthcoming article in net.net-people will announce my departure from Bell Labs
and describe how I can be contacted afterward.
jfs