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I haven't had a chance to consult a dictionary, but I recall reading about "charnal houses" which I think were slaughter houses. By extension, figuring such a place would be quite filthy, a word "charny" could be used as describing a very dirty place - a room, a sink or other plumbing fixture, etc.
Joanne, that same thought crossed my mind as soon as I heard the word, too. My understanding of "charnel house," though, is that of a repository for dead bodies. I haven't been able to find a connection between them, though.
Your guess reminds me of the word "shambles," which indeed has its roots in the idea of a bloody slaughterhouse.
It's a great example of how the original, vivid sense of English words can get really watered down over the years, no? Today we'd not think anything of telling a teenager his room is a shambles. But the word's origins are pretty icky!
I'd LOVE to know if something similar's going on with charny, but I've never seen any evidence for it.
I have a large backlog of podcasts, so I come to this topic late. When I heard the word "charny" used to mean dirty - specifically applied to a dirty room - I thought of a charwoman (or char) who cleans rooms. I don't know anything about word morphology, but is it possible that "charny" could mean a mess that is cleaned up by a char?
The other thought I had was that "charny" might be related to "charry", having the quality of charcoal: charny -> charry -> sooty -> dirty. Again, I don't know word morphology, but it's something that came to mind.
At the old Maramec Springs Ironworks, I believe they called the place where they put the charcoal, limestone, and iron ore into the top of the blast furnace as the "charny house". My memory is old and I cannot find verification on the web.
Emmett
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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