What is garbage, almost every child in any country of the world knows - this is one of the categories of human waste. And even if not in such words, anyone can explain the meaning of this term. But not everyone knows what rubbish means, how it differs from garbage. Moreover, although these words seem to have the same root, this is a very common misconception. So, it is worthwhile to deal with the noun "litter": where did it come from and in what phrases and phraseological units is used most often.
Etymology of the term
Before you know what rubbish is, it is important to look at the origin of this name. So the "progenitor" of this term, according to the dictionary of M. Fasmer, was the word "to shit" (to defecate).
As for the term "garbage", it has a completely different origin, and although it is the most commonly used synonym, it does not belong to the same rootwords for the given noun.
According to the classical version, this name is derived from the name "busor" ("bead" or "busor") meaning in the Turkic languages "trash or old things".
There are also other theories about the origin of this word. For example, some believe that it may have come from the Greek term mouds (defilement), or from the Old Irish mosach (unclean), even from the Low German mussig (dirty).
Sor - what is it? Phrases with this noun
In the Russian language, the word "litter" refers to small dry garbage, trimmings, sawdust, wood chips, sometimes dust.
This value is the main one. Meanwhile, this name is often used in a figurative sense when talking about some trifle or something completely devoid of value.
The antiquity and prevalence of this noun among the people contributed to the fact that far from one phrase with the word “litter” was widely used in speech.
So the ancestors called the trash can weedy, and the trashcan itself was called a weedy pit. A bad deed is a weedy business, and among the Slavs, a chicken was often considered a weedy bird because of its habit of looking for food among the scattered garbage in a barn or in the yard.
Other meanings of this term
There are also many other meanings of the word "litter".
- These are four abbreviations (A person's birth certificate; Vehicle registration certificate; the name of one ofEstonian political parties - the Union of the Fatherland and Res Publica and the Sevastopol defensive region, destroyed during the Great Patriotic War).
- There are several place names for Sor. This is the name of the Bay of Baikal, one of the Russian villages, three rivers (in Russia, France and Great Britain), as well as one of the French communes.
- Shor or Sor are the names of the soil in the deserts of Central Asia.
- Fernando Sor was also named after a famous Spanish-born guitarist and composer of the 19th century.
- Often this term is correlated with the English abbreviation COP (Constable On Patrol - translated as "constable on duty"). And although it sounds completely different - [cop], due to the external similarity, these names are interlingual homographs (they are spelled the same, sound the same and mean different things).
Synonyms for the word
The most commonly used synonyms for the term "rubbish" are rubbish, rubbish, dust, rags, dust, dirt, ashes, rags and refuse.
In fact, all nouns that mean waste of any kind can be used as synonyms for this name.
The term "litter": cognate words
First of all, it is worth dispelling the myth about some nouns, which, out of ignorance, are sometimes mistaken for the same root as rubbish. In the first paragraph, it was explained why "garbage", although it is a synonym, but does not refer to the same root as the term "rubbish".
Among other similar - the noun "quarrel" (strife, enmity). So the verbs derived from it"quarrel" and "quarrel" are sometimes confused with the same root to litter - "quarrel" and "litter". However, the quarrel and the quarrel are in no way connected with each other, although they are very similar to each other.
Also, in rare cases, the noun "sororat" (marriage to the sisters of the spouse), which comes from the Latin term soror - sister, is mistakenly considered the same root.
In here "weed", "weedy" and all words derived from them are the same root for "litter". In addition, such terms include "mote" and "blockage", as well as similar adjectives and verbs.
It is interesting that in foreign languages there are names similar to "rubbish" that even sound very similar. In Latvian it is sãrni (waste), in Greek it is skor (filth), and in Low German it is scharn (dung).
Why there is a spelling error
Despite the fact that this term has only one syllable, consisting of three letters (two consonants and one vowel between them), some people still do not know how to spell the word "sor" correctly.
The most common mistake that is made in this noun is the double "s": quarrels. It is noteworthy that most text editors do not correct this oversight, because they perceive the noun as the genitive plural of the word "quarrel". However, it is worth remembering clearly that the term "litter" is always written with one letter "s", and if there are two of them, then this word comes from "quarrel", which means it has a completely different meaning.
Phraseological units with the word "litter"
The most famous idiom with this noun is "Do not wash dirty linen in public." Its meaning: to keep all household problems secret from others, not interfering with their family problems.
However, at the time of its inception, this phraseological unit had a slightly different meaning. It has come down to our days in a shortened version, since in the old days the Slavs said this: “Do not take dirty linen out of the hut when the sun has set.” This was due to their belief that the night is the lot of bad deeds, which means that all your deeds must be done in the light of day.
Besides this, the Slavs sincerely believed that rubbish had a special power and with its help sorceresses could cause trouble to people who threw it away. Therefore, if they carried it out, it was only during the day, when the evil spirits were powerless, and left far from their homes - so that it would be difficult for the witches to find it for their dark rituals.
This belief in the magical properties of litter was reflected in many old sayings that warned against taking it out of the house.
Here are just some of them.
- Litter is swept under the bench and burned in the oven.
- Meti the hut, and put rubbish under the threshold.
- Sweep, sweep, but don't throw rubbish on the street.
- Don't litter bread crumbs - it's a sin.
By the way, phraseologism with a derivative verb - “to waste money” (waste it) was quite common at all times.
Despite the antiquity of the noun"litter", it has not gone out of use among Russians even today. However, now people do not use it in their speech as often as it was just a hundred years ago. Perhaps this is due to the emergence of a huge number of other more modern and colorful terms for naming garbage. On the other hand, the phraseological unit "to wash dirty linen in public" is incredibly popular to this day and is used much more often than the word "litter linen" itself.
