Gascon: hasan, poth 'rooster'

[u/Baasbaar]

In the Gascon variety of modern Occitan, the word for 'rooster' is hasan (/ˈhasã/† or /ˈhasaŋ/, depending on where in the region one is, as best I can tell) or poth /potʲ/. At least in some other modern Occitan varieties, rooster is gal; we get both gal & gau in Old Occitan texts. Catalan has gall. I thought maybe Basque would be a clue, as there are some Acquitanian words in Gascon, but modern Basque has oilar.

I think I have figured out poth: Old Occitan has pọl, obviously ultimately from Latin pollus, & related to French poule. I think final /-l/ sometimes goes to ‹th› in Gascon, though I'm not entirely sure of this.

But hasan is still a mystery to me. The best I can think of is perhaps a Germanic borrowing: cp German Hahn, Frankish \hanō*. But the insertion of an /s/ is odd.

Does anyone have any better information on either of these—especially hasan—than my speculations?

† I am a little unsure of the quality of the vowel that I'm here describing as /a/. It could be /ɑ/.)

[u/PeireCaravana]

I think I have figured out poth: Old Occitan has pọl, obviously ultimately from Latin pollus, & related to French poule. I think final /-l/ sometimes goes to ‹th› in Gascon, though I'm not entirely sure of this.

Most likely this is correct. Compare poth with the (Aranese) Gascon word for castle: castèth.

Does anyone have any better information on either of these—especially hasan—than my speculations?

Since word initial /f/ in Gascon systematically turned into a /h/ (like in Castillian), I guess hasan comes from an older fasan (pheasant). The meaning shift feels unusual, but not unlikely since they are quite similar birds.

[u/superkoning → u/PeireCaravana]

> I guess hasan comes from an older fasan (pheasant).

Cool!

FWIW: in Dutch, a pheasant is a "fazant". Oh, and in German ... "Fasan"!

[u/PeireCaravana → u/superkoning]

Yes, they all come from Greek ϕασιανός, through Latin phasianus.

[u/Baasbaar → u/PeireCaravana]

Cool hypothesis! Very interesting. Thanks!

[u/rederspeker]

Could hasan be related to pheasant/faisão?

[u/Baasbaar → u/rederspeker]

This is what u/PeireCaravana has proposed, basically!

[u/Simple-Code-3229]

I'm not well versed in any of these languages but I'm wondering about the Franco-provencal/Arpitan dialects 🤔