An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language/Annotated/Gans

by Friedrich Kluge

Gans, feminine, ‘goose,’ from the equivalent Middle High German gans, Old High German gans, feminine; a common Teutonic term for ‘goose,’ unrecorded in Gothic only, in which *gans, feminine (plural *gans) may have been the form (compare Spanish ganso, adopted from it). To this correspond Anglo-Saxon gôs (ô from an before s), plural gês (owing to the i mutation), feminine, English goose, plural geese; Old Icelandic gás, feminine, from pre-Teutonic ghans-; Dutch gans; one of the few names of birds to be ascribed to a primitively Aryan origin, since it recurs in most of the languages of the Aryan group; Sanscrit haṅsá-s, masculine, haṅsî, feminine, ‘goose,’ Modern Persian yâz, Lithuanian żąsìs (Old Slovenian gąsĭ is borrowed from Teutonic), Greek χήν, Latin anser (for *hanser), Old Irish géis, ‘swan’ (from ghansi). The s of Aryan ghans- seems to be a suffix (compare Fuchs, Monat); at least Teutonic words of cognate stem point to ghan- as the more primitive form; compare Old High German ganaȥȥo, Middle High German ganze, genz, masculine, ‘gander,’ Dutch gent, ‘gander,’ Anglo-Saxon ganot, English gannet (‘swan’); Anglo-Saxon gandra, English gander. Pliny informs us that large flocks of geese were kept in Germania, and that the birds or their feathers were sent even to Rome; one species was said to be called gantae by the Teutons; a similar term is known in Romance (Provençal ganta, Old French gante, ‘wild goose’), which borrowed it from Teutonic. To the Teutonic ganta, from pre-Teutonic ganda, the Old Irish géd, ‘goose’ (Lithuanian gàndras, ‘stork’), is primitively allied.