[OT]The word 'bylaws' Re: [Squeakfoundation]So....

[squeakfoundation@lists.squeakfoundation.org]

I have (of course) been reading your discussions about how to setup SqF
and the word "bylaws" got my attention. I have never heard/seen it
before but I guessed it must come from the nordic languages.

Swedish:

by = village
lag = law

And there is actually a word "byalag" in Swedish. (all this seems to
exist similarly in Norwegian)

So it seems to mean "village law". After checking with Merriam-Webster I
conclude my guess was semi-correct, "bylaw" seems to indeed stem from
the scandinavian word "byalag". But there is more to learn here.

In Swedish the word "lag" both means "law" and "team"/"group of people".
I would guess (yes, a guess - I may be wrong) that the meaning of the
word "lag" (as in "law") evolved from "byalag", because it seems to me
that "byalag" in the beginning referred to a "team of men from the
village" that got together when something needed to be done that
required cooperation - like putting a roof on a house or something.

It wouldn't surprise me if the "will" of this team more and more turned
into "rules" of the village. So perhaps that is how the word lag (as in
"law") came about.

Ok, now you can all smack me in the head and explain to me that it
actually came from Swahili or something. :-)

regards, Göran