[OT] It goes back beyond Mahler. St. Gregory is reputed to have said of some fair-haired English slaves for sale in Rome, "Non Angli sed Angeli."
> On 15 Jan 2022, at 10:58, Lukas-Fabian Moser <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hi Wol, > >> Out of curiosity, and speaking as a Brit! what on earth is an "English >> Horn"? Is the instrument the English call a Cor Anglais? > > Yes. > > The etymology seems to be a bit involved here - although it seems certain > that the name has nothing to do with England. :-) Two standard explanations > essentially amount to a derivation either from "angelic" (referring to > instruments held by angels in Christian imagery) or "angled" (referring to > some of the various forms of the instrument) in some language. > > On a semi-related note: Surprising as, for example, a connection between > "English", "Anglais", "Angelic" may seem, there is a funny matter in German > that, coming from the 19th century Wunderhorn poetry collection, survives in > Mahler's fourth symphony: "Wir führen ein englisches Leben", which a > modern-day German speaker would naively interpret as "We live an English > life" (and maybe think of tea time and fish and chips), but which undoubtedly > actually means "We lead an angelic life": Engel = Angel, Eng(e)lisch = > Angelic. > > Lukas > >
