• Saxon •
Pronunciation: sæk-sên • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Noun, proper
Meaning: 1. A member of the Germanic tribe that joined with the Angles and Jutes in the 5th century to conquer Britain. 2. The language of these people. 3. A native or resident of present-day Saxony.
Notes: For a proper noun, Saxon has a rich derivational family. Saxondom refers to the region occupied by Saxons, and Saxonic and Saxonish are the adjectives. Saxonism refers to the preference of Anglo-Saxon words over borrowings, and a Saxonist is either a specialist in Anglo-Saxon or an adherent of Saxonism. To Saxonize (Saxonise) a word is to Anglicize (Anglicise) it.
In Play: Today's Good Word is often encountered as part of a compound: "In 1066, when the Normans invaded England, they were the most hated people by Anglo-Saxon population." When used alone, it usually refers to the language: "I like that ancient Saxon phrase, which calls/The burial ground God's-Acre! It is just;" (Henry Wadsworth Longfellow "God's Acre" Longfellow's Poetical Works, 1893).
Word History: Today's Good Word was not a Saxon word but borrowed from French Saxon, handed down from Latin Saxo, Saxonis "Saxon", presumably based on saxum "(piece of) stone". Saxum traces its origin way back to PIE sek-/sok- "to cut" (X=[ks]), which we find in Latin secare "to cut", securis "axe", and secula "sickle", section(n) "a cutting, section", Old English seax "knife", Modern English sickle, Russian and Serbian sekira "axe", and Russian sech' "to cut up; whip". Without the E vowel we find English scythe and German schneiden "to cut". Apparently, the relation between pieces of stone and cutting dates back to the late Stone Age (3000 BC), when people were still using stone tools and weapons. We see the same origin in British placenames, like Wessex, Sussex, Middlesex. Saxophone is an eponym of Belgian Charles Joseph Sax, its inventor. The surname Sax comes from the same source as Saxon. (Now for a grace note of gratitude to Wordmaster William Hupy for finding the fascinating history of this word and sharing it with us.)
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