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SACK (1),
a bag. (L.,—Gk.,—Heb.,—Egyptian?)
M. E. sak, Chaucer, C. T. 4019.—A.
S. sacc, Gen. xlii. 25, 28.—Lat.
saccus.—Gk.
σάκκος.—Heb.
saq, stuff made of hair-cloth, sack-cloth; also, a sack for corn.
β.
A borrowed word in Hebrew, and prob. of Egyptian origin; cf. Coptic sok,
sack-cloth, Gen. xxxvii. 34, Matt. xi. 21; see Peyron's Coptic
Lexicon. E. Müller cites sak as being the Æthiopic
form. γ. This remarkable word has travelled everywhere, together (as
I suppose) with the story of Joseph; the reason why it is the same in all
languages is because it is, in them all, a borrowed word from
Hebrew. We find Du. zak, G. sack, Icel. sekkr, Swed.
säkk, Dan. säk,
Goth. sakkus (sack-cloth, Matt. xi. 21), Ital. sacco, Span. and Port.
saco, F. sac, Irish and Gael. sac, W. sach. And see
Sack (2).
Der. sack-cloth, Gen. xxxvii. 34; sack-ing, cloth of which sacks are made,
coarse stuff; sack-ful. Also sack (2), q.v.; satch-el,
q.v. Doublet, sac, a bag or receptacle for a liquid, borrowed from
F. sac. SACK (2),
plunder; as a verb, to plunder. (F.,—L.,—Gk.,—Heb.,—Egyptian?)
'The plenteous houses sackt;' Surrey, Ecclesiastes, c. v; l. 45.
Formed from the sb. sack, pillage. 'And Helen, that to utter sack
both Greece and Troië brought;' Turbervile, Dispraise of Women (R.)—F.
sac, 'a sack, waste, ruine, havock, spoile;' Cot. Cf. F. saccager,
'to sack, pillage,' Cot.; also O. F. sacquer, 'to draw hastily, to pull out
speedily or apace;' Cot. We also find Low Lat. saccare, to put into
a bag; a common word; and Low Lat. saccus, a garment, robe, treasure,
purse. β. There seems to be little doubt that the F. sac, pillage,
is connected with, and due to, the F. sac, a sack, from Lat. saccus; see
Sack
(1). The simplest solution is that in Wedgwood, 'from the use of a
sack in removing plunder;' though the sense is probably rather metaphorical than
exact. In the same way we talk of bagging, i.e. pilfering a thing,
or of pocketing it, and of baggage as a general term, whether bags be actually
used or not. Thus Hexham gives O. Du. zacken, 'to put in a sack, or
fill a sack;' zacken ende packen, 'to put up bagg and baggage, or to trusse
up.' γ. The use of O. F. sacquer is remarkable, as it seems to
express, at first sight, just the opposite to packing up; but perhaps it meant,
originally, to search in a sack, to pull out of a purse; for the sacking of a
town involves the two processes: (1) that of taking things out of their
old receptacles, and (2) that of putting them into new ones; note the Low Lat.
saccus in the senses of 'treasure' and 'purse.' Burguy notes that
the O. F. desacher, lit. to draw out of a sack, was used in the same way as the
simple verb. δ. It deserves to be added that Cotgrave gives 17
proverbs involving the word sac, clearly proving its common use in
phrases. One of them is: 'On luy a donné son sac et ses
quilles, he hath his passport given him, he is turned out to grazing, said of a
servant whom his master hath put away;' hence the E. phrase, 'to give one the
sack.' And again: 'Acheter un chat en sac, to buy a pig in a
poak.' SACK (3),
the name of an old Spanish wine. (F.,—L.)
See the account in Nares. He notices that it was also called seck, a
better form: 'It is even called seck, in an article cited by bp. Percy
from an old account-book of the city of Worcester: "Anno Eliz.
xxxiiij. Item, for a gallon of claret wine, and seck, and a pound of
sugar." Other instances have been found.' By
Sherris sack, Falstaff meant 'sack from Xeres,' our sherry; see Sherry.
Sack was a Spanish wine of the dry or rough kind.—F.
sec, dry; in the phrase vin sec; Sherwood (in his index to Cotgrave) has:
'Sack (wine), vin d'Espagne, vin sec.' Cf. Span. seco, dry.—Lat.
siccum, acc. of siccus, dry. Root uncertain. ¶
We may note Du. sek, sack, a sort of wine (Sewel), as illustrating the fact that
sack stands for seck; this also is from F. sec. So also G.
sekt,
sack; Swed. seck (Widegren). [†]
ADDENDA SACK (3),
Spelt secke, A. Borde, Dyetary, ch. x. ed. Furnivall, p. 255 (1542).
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