It has been proclaimed on this mailing list that the English
expression "donkey's years" mutated from the phrase "donkey's ears",
as in "as long as a donkey's ears".
I question this etymology. I think it is quite plausible that
"donkey's years" was the original expression. The fact is that the
donkey lives longer than any other domestic animal on earth, except
the camel. Donkeys live a long time. None of you has ever seen a
dead donkey.
The presence of this expression in other languages would, of course,
be dispositive of the question. The reverse, however, is not true.
The absence of this expression in other languages would not be
dispositive of the question, because it is clear that the ancient
English-speaking people were very much involved with donkeys, perhaps
more so than the speakers of other languages. This is evident, e.g.,
from the fact that English has two separate and unrelated words for
"horse" and "donkey", in contrast to, for example, one word for
"camel" and "elephant", even though the difference between a horse and
a donkey is much smaller than the difference between a one-humped
camel and a two-humped camel, or between an African elephant and an
Asian elephant (or between an African swallow and a European swallow).
When the native vocabulary of a language makes fine distinctions
within one class of objects, and not within another class of objects,
it means that the former class of objects was more important to the
original speakers of that language than the latter class of objects.
Donkeys were important to the original speakers of English, thus their
longevity may have found its way into the idioms of English without
having found its way into the idioms of other languages.
I cannot think of a way to make this posting relevant to the stated
purpose of this mailing list, except perhaps to suggest that the next
version of ASSP incorporate a feature for discarding postings about
etymology that somehow appear on the assp-user mailing list.
Jay F. Shachter
6424 N Whipple St
Chicago IL 60645-4111
(1-773)7613784
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://m5.chicago.il.us
"Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur"
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