Names
Soodi (Soot)
Oxbow lake, body of stagnant water, arm of a river separated from the main channel, old, dried-up river bed. Named for the former rivers that were part of what used to be the Mustjõe delta emptying into Kopli laht (bay). For “used to be”, see Liiva and Paljassaare. Word probably derived from Soo. Soot:soodi is also the nautical term for the strange-sounding Eng. for ‘rope’, i.e. sheet, or line used to control the sail. Originally from Old Eng. sceatline where the first part comes from sceata, the lower part of the sail, and clearly derived from Old Eng. sciete, scete, etc., length of cloth, giving us also bed-‘sheet’, and the second part gradually fading from use and memory. See Köismäe.
Söödi (Sööt)
Fallow land. Part of a fodder and staples street-name group. See Timuti.
Sookailu (Sookail)
Labrador tea or wild rosemary, lit. marsh march tea, Rhododendron tomentosum (syn. [i.e. formerly] Ledum palustre), a traditional folk remedy for coughs. Street planned but never built.
Sookaskede (Sookased [pl.])
Sing.: sookask aka karune kask (hairy birch), sokikask (although this reads like ‘sock’ birch, Wiedemann gives it as a genitive of sokk:soki ‘juice’, i.e. the sap that locals drink [see Mähe], I mean, the buggers don’t just stop at hugging trees…), sookõiv (marsh birch), suukõiv (‘mouth’ birch, but poss. a dialect form of soo), downy, white, European white or hairy birch, Betula pubescens, presumably the one that younger Estonians use to flagellate themselves in the sauna.
Soolahe (Soolaht)
Marshy inlet or bay.
Soone (Soon)
Little spring or stream, after the (now essentially covered, see Trummi) winding brooklet it crosses, Iisaku soon (Iisaku spring, source about 1 km WSW away). Iisaku itself probably comes from the Ger. name Isaak. The same word also means: 1) a groove or a slot; 2) a lode or a vein; 3) a vessel, vein, artery or duct; 4) a gutter or channel; and 5) for those with an inordinate interest in insects: trachea (for humans, it tends to be hingetoru (lit. soul‑ or, more reasonably, breath-tube) or trahhea. I'll stop and won't mention the thingies inside fiber-optic cables that ferry the pulse of modern existence.
