Talk:Ettercap Street

"Ettercap" is an old English word for "spider" and has been used in this context by Tolkein: in The Hobbit, the malicious spiders of Mirkwood,(at the opposite end of the scale on which Shelob and Ungloliant occupy the far end) are described as "ettercaps". Bilbo Baggins uses this as an insult, in fact. But unsure as to how this fits in the Discworld, save by use of the name. AgProv (talk) 13:29, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Only, Tolkien used attercop. See "Ettercap" in Wikipedia, a monster in Dungeons and Dragons. The word doesn't appear in Dictionary.com or the Shorter Oxford (curious aside: the only word in the SOED that starts with "ett" is ettle). --Old Dickens (talk) 14:36, 23 April 2015 (UTC)

Aaargh. You are right. Scratch this! AgProv (talk) 22:25, 26 April 2015 (UTC)

Plenty of evidence that Pratchett played Dungeons & Dragons, though, so the D&D etymology (which seems to come via attercop, since Ettercaps are spider-like monsters) is still relevant. -- Guybrush (talk) 04:21, 2 March 2022 (UTC)