birch etymology

Birch < birche, birk Middle English < birce, beorc Old English. Akin to Ukrainian bereza, German Birke, Old Norse björk, Sanskrit bhurja. A very old Indo-European tree word, its root *bherja means that birch is the ‘bright’ tree, a reference to its chalky-white bark. The words birch and bright are cognates, words stemming from the same root cluster in Indo-European: *bhel, *bher, *bhrek, all of which give words related to shining whitely, shimmering, blazing, burning. The Ukrainian word for the month of March is Berezen ‘time when the birch trees flower.’ And there is that refreshing Russian potion, berezovyi sok (birch drink).

Ukrainian Surnames

Ukrainian has the usual type of birch last names like Berezko = bereza Ukrainian ‘birch’ + ko surname suffix. But Ukrainian also has a group of unique and sometimes humorous surnames formed like Shakespeare was in English, namely, an imperative followed by a noun object. Some are actual surnames; others are names created by humorists and dramatists. Among the actual surnames is Lupibereza ‘peel the birch’ indicating either a woodsman or an ancestor who beat others or was beaten himself (?). A few others in this subgroup of playful Ukrainian surnames:

Peciborsc ‘cook the borsch’

Tovcigrecko ‘stamp the buckwheat’

Vernidub ‘pull out the oak’

Nepijvoda ‘don’t drink water’ (comic name of an alcoholic ancestor ?)