Fix ferdig is another odd Norwegian expression. Not entirely sure I understand what it means. Ferdig is "finished," of course, but what does it mean when you add the English word "fix" to it? It seems to be a little redundant (like the English "all finished"--something is either finished or it isn't, so "all" is unneccessary). After all, Norwegians love their double phrases ("rett og slett," "i bøtte og spann," "ting og tang," etc.), so I suppose I shouldn't waste too much time wondering about "fix." KE will know, but he and E are sleeping in this morning.
At any rate, as you may have guessed, I am thrilled to announce that I repaired the gaping hole and finished up the linen tunic last night. It was actually really easy grafting across the entire front, and I didn't make any additional stupid mistakes along the way, thankfully.
The seam hits just above my bust. It is visible, but since the sweater is black, not distractingly so. I'm hoping that with washing and blocking, perhaps it will become less visible. The problem is actually two things: 1) the gauge of the sweater is really loose, which was hard to replicate with Kitchener stitch, and 2) the gloss of the linen yarn is actually different from different angles. Somehow, the graft yarn is going in a different direction than the main body yarn, so it shines differently.
Regardless of such details, I am just delighted to have made a garment that I thought I had destroyed functional again.
5 comments:
I just had to jump in with my two cents on "fiks ferdig." First of all, let me just say that I don't think this came from English.
A quick Google search shows that the "x" spelling" fix ferdig" (which makes it look like it came from English) gets 1,370 hits while "fiks ferdig" gets a whopping ten times as many (12,400). So, the "fix" spelling may well be a back-formation from English. But I don't think the word is.
Secondly, it's a pet peeve of mine when people assume old words, very OLD words, were borrowed into Norwegian from English. I'm no expert, but I'm pretty sure this came into Norwegian more or less the same way it came into English--probably from Latin fixus the past participle of figere meaning "to fasten." English gets blamed for a lot of Latin words. And that just doesn't make any sense to me.
My guess is that it originally had to do with animal harnesses--all fastened up/all harnessed up (fiks) and ready to go (ferdig). Although that's purely a guess.
I'm glad your sweater fix worked. I had to do something almost exactly the same 2 weeks ago (but with a much more forgiving wool). I'm still loving all the knitting photos and project updates.
Tara
Well, I did some etymological digging, and here's what I've found:
The Norwegian expression comes via Danish from German "fix und fertig." Both Norwegian words "fiks/fix" and "ferdig" come from German "fix" and "fertig," respectively (actually probably via Low German). The expression is quite old.
The phrase has two things going on:
First, there is the etymology of the two words themselves. “Fiks/fix” comes via German from Latin “fixus.” (The sense of “repair” is quite modern--it comes from 19th century American English). The original sense of “fixus” is “attached,” “fastened,” “stabilized.” (It’s the past participle of "figare”). Semantically, "fix” came to mean “ready to be used.”
“Ferdig/fertig” comes from Germanic fart+ig-, meaning “movable,” “drivable,” and eventually meaning “ready to go” or “ready to use,” and by extension “ready, prepared, finished.”
So, originally “fix und fertig” meant “ready and ready.” This is what it still means in Norwegian, and this is the older meaning.
In German, over time the sense here of “ready” came to mean "done" or “finished,” and by extension it meant “tired or exhausted.” You know like when you’re completely exhausted you might say, “I’m done.” So the modern German meaning now is more “completely exhausted,” “pooped,” "I've had it,” etc. This sense may occur in Norway, too, but I'm not sure.
Second, there is the alliteration of semantically related words, which is EXTREMELY common in all the Germanic languages going all the way back to the Sagas, illustrated by your Norwegian examples. German has tons, too: "ganz und gar," "dick und doof," "Feuer und Flamme," “Stock und Stein,” “Land und Leute,” “Wohl und Wehe,” “nie und nimmer,” "frank und frei," etc.; English also has tons: “home and hearth,” “kith and kindle,” “kit and caboodle,” “friends and family,” “sink or swim,” “do or die,” etc. ad nauseam. So the alliterative aspect has drawn “fix” and “ferdig/fertig” together because they originally meant similar things. (Germanic languages also do a lot of rhyming pairs, too, e.g. German “Hegen und Pflegen,” etc., and I’m sure Norwegian has tons of those, too.)
Notice also that the pairing of “fiks og ferdig/fix und fertig” is of one Latin element and one Germanic element. This kind of “doubleting” is quite common in Germanic languages as well. English has “null and void” (Anglo-Saxon + French), “goods and chattels” (AS + F), etc. It’s sort of a way of translating your terms so that people could understand no matter what language they spoke.
Hope that helps!
-Erik
Ooooh, loved both comments. I learned from KE after I posted that there were more hits on "fiks ferdig" than "fix ferdig" (forgot the quotation marks when I did it).
Snoristed--just wanted you to know that I don't automatically assume an English origin:) I didn't have a lot of training in Old Norse and Old English (just a couple of terms in both) but I took enough to see how much of modern English has its source in Old Norse.
Erik--that more than helps! It is fantastic, and I thank you for the information! I love those double phrases. I have a really long list of Norwegian ones that KE and I compiled at one point. Perhaps I should post them and ask for more suggestions!
I'd never thought about the etymology of "fiks ferdig" but I always assumed that "fiks" was used in the sense of being "cool", "fashionable", "clever" - hm, I can't seem to quite translate it, but "så fiks du er på håret!" or "det var fikst" is something I hear occasionally - I think it might be slang from the 50s or something, you usually hear it from older people.
Based on the etymology from German I guess this is NOT the real meaning of "fiks ferdig", but the secondary meaning of "fiks" might add to the cultural sort of enjoyment of the term?
Here's a dictionary definition or four :)
Duh! Tara, I didn't get that you were snoristed until just now (though I totally figured out that Erik was THE Erik, translating/etymological madman). Now I see that I didn't need to list my training in Old Norse and Old English, since you went through the exact same thing and got better grades than I :)
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