To which came this reply:
>The "nut cases" (cute pun) may be on >to something here, the suggestion
>being that both words derive from L. >testis = witness, from testari = to
>be a witness, attest, make a will, etc. >Add -ment(um) to the verb (which
>indicates the result or product of the >action of the verb) and you have
>testament. Add the diminutive -cule to >the noun and you have "little
>witness," viz. of virility. (The OED >considers this etymology uncertain
>but admits a 16th c. French parallel.) ->-CGE
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Had I said 'not common English roots', I still would be safe.
I misused the word 'folk etymology' . Folk etymologies often do give us new words and meanings and are quite legitimate in lexical development. I should have said, rather 'fallacious' and 'pseudo-learned' etymologies used to make prescriptions about our language or observations about our views of our language or world (something that has plagued English studies since at least the Renaissance, because all those Renaissance men failed to realize that English is basically a Germanic language--perhaps a creole of British Danish and Anglo-Saxon-- lexically and alphabetically hijacked by Norman French, Latin and then John Milton and his contemporaries).
Now about 'testis' and 'testis'. For one thing, which came first? Which was the source for the other?
Even if the Romans made a connection, that hardly means (1) it wasn't a folk etymology that they made or (2) that the English words 'testicle' and 'testify' are related in any clear way for modern speakers of English.
The Romans might have made the folk etymology themselves. It could be the case that they came to think of male gonads as 'little witnesses' because of soundalike roots (it would appear that one plausible source is the similar sounding root 'testa' meaning shell).
Roman Latin itself had native (pre-literary) roots, Etruscan roots and Greek roots.
One theory is that it wasn't a folk etymology but rather another legitimate process called 'calque' (though note we are talking about latin speakers here, not English ones)
http://www.bartleby.com/61/73/T0127300.html
[one theory is] >>testis is due to a calque, or loan
translation, from Greek. The Greek noun parastats means “defender (in law), supporter” (para– “by, alongside,” as in paramilitary and –stats from histanai, “to stand”). In the dual number, used in many languages for naturally occurring, contrasting, or complementary pairs such as hands, eyes, and ears, parastats had the technical medical sense “testicles,” that is “two glands side by side.” The Romans simply took this sense of parastats and added it to testis, the Latin word for legal supporter, witness. <<
Which means the Romans more likely derived the sense of the word 'little witness' standing for 'male gonads' from legal terminology borrowed from Greek rather than the silly story about them deriving the word 'witness' from 'balls' because all witnesses had a pair of balls on which they swore an oath.
But for the purposes of talking about the two words in modern English, 'testicle' comes from Middle English 'testicule', which may have come to us by way of the Normans and/or the literary French and Latin of the time). 'Testify' comes from Middle English 'testifien' which again looks like a latinate, literary contribution to our language, but it's a big jump back to the Latin 'testificari' and then a common or differentiated 'testis').
So the point is, for speakers of modern English, there is no connection whatsoever, since our language would not even be intelligible with what was Middle English, let alone Old English or Middle or Old Norman--and the Normans themselves were Frenchified Danes--or the literary latin of the period just after the Norman invasion of Britain, let alone Roman latin).
And remember, when it comes to the explanatory power of etymologies, Testis unus, testis nullus. Which we might say means: one account is worth no account.
And a final thought occurs to me: a pleonasm of testis is far better than a neoplasm of the testis.
Charles Jannuzi