Definition of "folk-etymologize" []

• To introduce or develop a folk etymology (verb)
• To explain the etymology of a word as folk etymology (verb)

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• "If I were the kind of person to speculate without foundation about the origin of idioms in other words, if I felt competent to folk-etymologize with abandon I would say that perhaps it comes from the notion that a big full skirt and big round cheese might have some topological symmetry."
• "Alas, the same Teutonic root almost certainly accounts for harbor, thereby putting paid to George Borrow's attempt to folk-etymologize that word to the Welsh/Gaelic aber ` riverine estuary or confluence. '"