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cranberry

KRAN-behr-ee · noun

Dutch Low SaxonGerman Low GermanEnglish

Origin

Cranberry entered English in the 1640s from Dutch Low Saxon or German Low German Kraanbeere, a compound of Kraan ("crane") and Beere ("berry") — matched in English by cran- + berry.

Journey

The word seems to have passed fairly directly from Low German/Dutch Low Saxon into English as a straightforward calque, with each half of the compound translated into its English equivalent.

Related words

The same crane-plus-berry logic shows up far beyond Germanic languages: Polish żurawina and Ukrainian журавлина both derive from words for "crane," as does Latvian dzērvene from dzērve ("crane") — a strikingly widespread pattern of naming this berry after the bird.

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