Folk
The English word Folk is derived from a Germanic noun, *fulka meaning "people" or "army" (i.e. a crowd as opposed to "a people" in a more abstract sense of clan or tribe). The English word folk has cognates in most of the other Germanic languages. Folk may be a Germanic root that is unique to the Germanic languages, although Latin vulgus, "the common people", has been suggested as a possible cognate.
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Famous quotes containing the word folk:
“An’ when the earth’s as cauld’s the mune
An’ a’ its folk are lang syne deid,
On coontless stars the Babe maun cry
An’ the Crucified maun bleed.”
—Hugh MacDiarmid (1892–1978)
“Myths, as compared with folk tales, are usually in a special category of seriousness: they are believed to have “really happened,” or to have some exceptional significance in explaining certain features of life, such as ritual. Again, whereas folk tales simply interchange motifs and develop variants, myths show an odd tendency to stick together and build up bigger structures. We have creation myths, fall and flood myths, metamorphose and dying-god myths.”
—Northrop Frye (1912–1991)
“In the past, the English tried to impose a system wherever they went. They destroyed the nation’s culture and one of the by- products of their systemisation was that they destroyed their own folk culture.”
—Martin Carthy (b. 1941)